Friends: Killer showed no guilt

Two men say they helped clean up after a slaying out of fear of Jakiem Wilson

RALEIGH -- Jakiem Wilson thought his friends would help him get away with his wife's murder.

They did help scrub blood off the walls and floors after Nneka Wilson, 24, was stabbed to death by her husband Feb. 12, 2007, as she left the shower.

But Tuesday, Jamie Holder and Roderick Howell, both now 19, told a Wake County jury that their former friend had showed little remorse and even told them beforehand that he wanted his wife of three years dead. They helped him only because they feared he would also kill them, they said.

" 'She nags, she [complains] too much,' " Howell said, repeating what Wilson told him that night. " 'She's going to put me on child support. I work too hard for my money.' "

Wilson is on trial for his own life. Wake prosecutors are seeking the death penalty in a trial that began Monday. Nneka Wilson, a 2001 Enloe High School graduate, had married Jakiem Wilson months after the couple met and she became pregnant with their son. Problems and violence were evident to family members, and Wilson had been sent to prison for violating his probation when their daughter was born.

Wilson's attorneys have already told jurors that Wilson killed his wife but have also suggested that the killing came as the result of a fit of rage and not the plan that prosecutors described.

On the stand, Howell described how Wilson handed him a rag soaked in the victim's blood and asked the teen to paint a gang sign on the bedroom wall of Wilson's son, Mathias, then 2. The defendant wanted to make it look as if a Bloods gang member had killed the young mother in retaliation for Wilson's affiliation with a rival gang.

"I couldn't," Howell said. He made part of the sign with the blood and left when he saw the toddler.

The child's 7-month-old sister was in her room nearby. Both children were unharmed but were left unattended for several hours later that morning as Wilson slept in a Selma home in a failed attempt to create an alibi, according to testimony from both Holder and Howell. Wilson never checked on the two children, Howell said.

Wilson, in the midst of cleaning up his wife's blood, cried once and told Howell he loved his wife. But then the defendant again brought up the possibility of paying child support as justification for the killing, Howell said.

Jurors also learned more about Wilson's lifestyle.

Both Holder and Howell said the trio, along with a fourth man, had formed their own gang dubbed the 74 Gangsta Disciples. The young men took their cues and tips on how to be gangster -- what to wear and how to display gang signs -- from a book Holder provided and used to teach the group.

Leadership by trick

Holder was the leader of the small posse after the Garner native tricked the others into thinking he was from Chicago and had been immersed in the big city's gang life. On the contrary, Holder had been placed in foster care at age 8 and remained there until he aged out at 18, he testified.

At the time of Nneka Wilson's killing, Holder was homeless, bouncing from house to house and crashing on couches of friends and relatives. He has been in solitary custody in the Wake County jail since, not able to leave his cell for more than an hour a day. Wilson's attorneys suggested that Holder may have embellished his testimony, hoping to strike a deal with prosecutors about his own pending charge of being an accessory after a murder.

Wilson worked at a graphics company and would frequently invite friends and members of his small gang to his house. But both Howell and Holder said they'd never been formally introduced to Nneka Wilson, despite spending time recording music in the couple's Wendell home.

Jurors also heard about several missteps in the attempt to cover up the crime.

Wilson had Holder dump out bloody water from a vacuum off the back porch of the home and discard socks and rags used to clean up the crime nearby, according to testimony. The defendant also nearly forgot to take something from the house to make it look like a robbery until Howell mentioned the oversight.