ST. LOUIS COUNTY, Mo. — A man from Bellefontaine Neighbors has been accused in state and federal court of six homicides and two non-fatal shootings, stretching from St. Louis to Kansas.
Perez Deshay Reed, 25, was charged Saturday by St. Louis County prosecutors with two murders in September here, including a 16-year-old girl.
St. Louis police said Monday they also plan to seek charges against Reed in connection with two fatal shootings in St. Louis.
Federal prosecutors added a gun charge and Reed could also face additional charges related to two more homicides in Kansas City, Kansas, officials have said.
Authorities have not provided a motive for the shootings.
The FBI said Reed was arrested Sunday with a gun used in six shootings, including four fatal shootings.
Reed's home address is listed on Chambers Road in North County. He is unemployed and going through a divorce, according to court filings. He has no attorney yet in the murder case.
In court documents and statements, officials have linked Reed through the gun used, witness statements and other information to these shootings:
—Sept. 12: A man waiting at a bus stop about 9 p.m. at 1624 Chambers Road in Dellwood was shot several times in the chest without warning. The man, identified in court papers as “L.M.” survived but has been left permanently disabled.
—Sept. 13: Marnay Haynes, 16, was fatally shot in the arm and head at 9:34 p.m. in the 9900 block of Glen Owen Drive in unincorporated St. Louis County. Haynes was a runaway who had spent time in a group home.
—Sept. 16: A woman identified as “R.H.” was shot in the face at 10:23 p.m. at the rear of 4542 Adelaide Avenue in St. Louis, but made her way to a BP gas station in the 4100 block of West Florissant Avenue. She was conscious and breathing but couldn't tell police what happened and was later admitted to the intensive care unit of a hospital.
—Sept. 16: Pamela Abercrombie, 49, of Spanish Lake, was fatally shot in the head at 11:45 p.m. that same night, about one-half mile away from the shooting of R.H., in the 3800 block of West Florissant Avenue in St. Louis.
—Sept. 19: St. Louis police found Carey Ross, 24, of St. Louis, dead just after noon in a vacant lot in the 1500 block of Mullanphy Street. Ross had been shot in the head and body, likely about 12 hours earlier.
—Sept. 26: Ferguson police found the body of Lester Robinson, 40, at 7:15 a.m. He had been fatally shot in the head and the hand in or near 1710 Barbados Lane.
—Oct. 28: After taking a train to Kansas City, Reed was spotted at 11:15 p.m. on surveillance cameras entering the apartment of a man in the 900 block of Washington Boulevard in Kansas City, Kansas. The man, Damon Irvin, was with him. Reed left seven hours later, but Irvin was not seen alive again. Police found Irvin, 35, in his apartment on Nov. 1, dead of gunshot wounds.
—Oct. 29: Reed and a woman, Rau'Daja Fairrow, 25, entered the same apartment building in Kansas City just before 7 p.m. Reed left about 15 minutes later, and Fairrow's nude body was found Nov. 2 in her apartment. Reed showed his driver's license to enter the building, and surveillance cameras captured the distinctive crescent moon-shaped tattoo on his forehead.
Reed and Fairrow had communicated by cell phone 652 times in the month of October, the affidavit says.
Law enforcement officers were watching Reed when he got on an Amtrak train to St. Louis on Nov. 5. He got off at the first stop, in Independence, and got on a bus, where he was arrested by the FBI's Safe Streets Violent Crimes Task Force. Reed had a .40-caliber pistol with him that matched the St. Louis area shootings in September, the affidavit says.
Reed denied hurting anyone and told investigators that he found the gun in Jennings. He said he bought drugs from Fairrow.
A spokesman for the district attorney in Wyandotte County, Kansas, said Monday that no charges have been filed in the Fairrow and Irvin killings.
Throughout the investigation, police commanders in the St. Louis metro area have been hesitant to publicly call this the work of a serial killer, but the allegations in court records leave no doubt that that's how they view Reed.
While definitions of serial murders have varied over the years, a symposium cited on the FBI’s website defined serial murder as the killings of two or more victims by the same person or persons in separate events. Serial murder, the FBI said, is a relatively rare event, comprising fewer than 1% of all murders in any given year.
St. Louis County police Lt. Craig Longworth said in a Monday press conference on the case that there is no known connection between any of the people killed or shot.
"These seem to be random acts," Longworth said. "Why? I can't give an answer to that. This is still under investigation and obviously further will come as we continue."
Longworth said investigators had not yet learned of any other shootings possibly connected to Reed prior to this year, but that detectives will follow any leads.
"We're not done with this by any means," Longworth said. "And we'll see if any new cases come up."
Reed was being held on a federal charge filed Saturday of interstate transportation of a firearm with intent to commit a felony. At a hearing Monday, Reed said in a quiet, tremulous voice that he understood the federal charge that he faced. Reed told U.S. Magistrate Judge Patricia Cohen that he normally takes the antipsychotic Haldol, but isn't currently. He did not say how long he has been off his medication.
Assistant U.S. Attorney Ryan Finlen said prosecutors want him held in jail until trial, and Reed's lawyer on the gun charge said he and Reed would not challenge that. Asked if he understood a legal form agreeing to waive his detention hearing, Reed said, "I know how to read, but it's, like, understanding it."
Reed is next due in U.S. District Court for a preliminary hearing on Nov. 22.
Reed's lawyer, James Miller, did not immediately return a message seeking comment.
Reed is facing charges in St. Louis County Circuit Court of first-degree murder, three counts of armed criminal action and one count of first-degree assault. Bail has been set at $2 million cash.
Reed is already facing two misdemeanor charges in St. Louis County after he was stopped Feb. 27, 2019, on a MetroLink train without a fare ticket, court records show. He gave a St. Louis County police officer false identifying information and was arrested when the officer found outstanding warrants for him. At jail, Reed “became even more combative and physically resisted a search by corrections … officers,” charging documents say, eventually head butting one jailer.
A mailed notification of his next court date, which happened to be Monday, Nov. 8, was returned as undeliverable to his address in Bellefontaine Neighbors.
In 2016, Reed was charged in St. Louis County with arson. He had been in jail for about 18 months when he filed a federal civil suit, complaining that his public defenders were insisting upon a second mental evaluation before the case was allowed to proceed. He insisted that he was fine. He also said his stay in jail, and the violent people and environment there, were affecting his mental health. He'd lost his job and his family and child support was piling up, his lawsuit says.
Reed insisted he did not need one.
A federal judge dismissed the suit. St. Louis County prosecutors dismissed the arson case when Reed’s family, who were the witnesses, refused to cooperate, a spokesman said.
Reed started living with his first cousin in 2004, when he was 8 years old. She officially became his guardian several years later, after his parents were deemed “unwilling, unable and unfit” to care for him, court records show. The guardian could not be immediately reached for comment Monday.
Married in Jackson County on Jun 19, 2019, Reed appears to have split his time between the Kansas City and St. Louis areas in recent years. He had a string of brushes with the legal system in both areas.
His wife, Anysia Alder, was sued by her landlord in 2019. The landlord said in court documents that Reed was never approved to live in her apartment.
The landlord wrote, “Since mid-May 2019, Defendant Alder has exhibited deteriorating behavior," going on to say she “entered and occupied another resident’s personal vehicle” and refused to leave, took other people’s property, incited and took violent physical action and accosted other residents and staff, threatening violence and death.
She intimidated them “with the presence of males not known to be occupants,” the filing says, possibly including Reed.
The landlord wanted Alder out in 24 hours. The case was later dismissed.
Reed's wife filed for divorce in July. The case was set for a hearing Dec. 2 in Jackson County. Alder could not be reached for comment. But her aunt, Brenda Hooks, told the Post-Dispatch that relatives never trusted Reed. "I think he has psych problems," Hooks said. She didn't elaborate.
Alder had also sought a divorce in 2020 and Reed agreed to it in his response filed in court. The case was dismissed when neither side showed up in court for a hearing.
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