22-year-old Irma Simeus found dead in her trunk 9/7/08 WEST PALM BEACH, FL CONVICTION

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Authorities Ask For Tips On Body Found In Trunk

WPBF-TV
updated 3:32 p.m. ET, Fri., Sept. 12, 2008
WEST PALM BEACH, Fla. - It's been nearly a week since the body of a young mother was found stuffed in the trunk of her abandoned car in West Palm Beach. Detectives said Thursday that they need the public's help to solve the crime. Detectives canvassed the Palm Beach County neighborhood where the body was found, passing out fliers. They said they hope the victim's face will propel someone to come forward with information.

"We want the information," said Palm Beach County Sheriff's Office Sgt. Jim Defago. "The detectives need the information."

On Thursday, the Palm Beach County Sheriff's Office and CrimeStoppers put up a bus stop unsolved murder poster.

The victim was 22-year-old Irma Simeus. Her body was discovered Saturday morning stuffed in the trunk of her car.

"It appeared to be a stolen vehicle at the time the deputies arrived," said Detective Daniel Morgado. "That's what was thought initially. They came, they observed the vehicle, it was open and they found her body." Simeus had a lot of friends and was well-liked in the community, police said. That's why detectives said they believe someone has information on the crime.

Detectives said they believe Simeus was attacked and killed near her car in a parking lot at the Bella Lago apartments on Elmhurst Road near Haverhill.

Her body was placed in the trunk of her silver Honda, driven around a corner and dumped in a vacant lot.

"I know the last time her family saw her was about 8 p.m. that night prior to her going out, where she was supposed to meet some friends and go out to a night club," Sgt. David Conklin said.

Police said that may also have been the last time Simeus saw her 4-year-old son, Javon.

"You know you want to do the right thing in life, but sometimes you're afraid of the retribution," Defago said.

Detectives said they hope someone will be brave and come forward so the mother can rest in peace.

Funeral services for Simeus will be held on Saturday.

Anyone with information on the case should call the Palm Beach County Sheriff's Office at 561-688-4102.

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/26673578/

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Mother believes daughter's murder 'a set up'

SUBURBAN WEST PALM BEACH, FL -- A week and a half after a single mother was brutally murdered in Suburban West Palm Beach, there are few leads.

Investigators say they've received a few tips, but none have panned out.

But the mother of  22-year-old Irma Simeus who was killed in the Belle Lago neighborhood's parking lot, then put in the trunk of her car and abandoned nearby, believes she was lured there.

Charite Simeus tells NewsChannel 5, "it could be a setup.  That's the only thing that I can think of."

She explains, "Somebody called her first around five and she said she don't want to go anywhere and they keep calling."

Charite says after five or six more calls, Irma finally agreed to go out.

She tells us, "She left around eight and they said at ten o'clock she was already dead."

Palm Beach County Crime Stoppers is offering a $1,000 reward for information leading to an arrest, but Charite says catching the killer is not of much importance to her.

She explains, " Irma is in peace now.  The people who kill Irma, they cannot be in peace....God knows, nobody knows, but he will pay for it....I don't care, I don't mind anymore for him to be caught or not, but if he has a conscience, that will be his judgment."

She says the hardest part is the innocent words of Irma's four-year-old son, "JJ," "After the funeral, we show him where we put Irma underground and he just say that he want to go there to find his mom."

The other gut wrenching twist to her grief: knowing someone knows what happened in those final moments that forever changed her family.

Charite elaborates, "Maybe she cried for help.  Nobody was there, nobody was there to help her that night and that's what's killing me."

Anyone with information can call Palm Beach County Crime Stoppers at 1-800-458-TIPS.http://www.wptv.com/news/local/story.aspx?content_id=ecf887da-762a-487c-926d-4e5c921f8a85

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Family of slain woman struggles with sudden absence


Monday, September 15, 2008

Irma's little boy sits by the window, waiting for a mother who will never come home.

A week after Irma Simeus — a 22-year-old medical technician who wrote poems, wrapped herself in strong opinions and never gave up on the idea of love — died violently at the hands of an enraged attacker, her family is wrestling with her sudden absence.

Irma's mother, Charite Simeus, has spent the past several days bustling about, answering detectives' questions, arranging her daughter's funeral and taking down the pictures of Irma that once adorned the family's humble little house on Meridian Road west of West Palm Beach.

On Thursday, she pauses in her yard, catching her breath beneath a shade tree as her grandson, 4-year-old Javon, plays inside.

"She had so many opportunities to really become somebody, but now somebody just cut that short," Charite says of her daughter. "It's the wrong crowd, that's what it was. But I know whoever spilled her blood, God will ask their blood."

The notion is little comfort for Charite and the rest of her family — for her husband, Joseph, a thin and weary man who moves around in a cloud of sadness; for her oldest daughter, Kerlyne, 28, and for her 20-year-old son, Casthely, who refused to eat after his sister was killed.

Earlier Thursday, Palm Beach County Sheriff's Detective Dan Morgado put up a poster of the young mother at a bus stop near Haverhill and Elmhurst roads, where Irma's bloodied body was found stuffed in the trunk of her silver Honda Civic on Sept. 6.

Someone killed her in a brutal, personal way, detectives said — though they declined to specify how she was killed, saying the release of that information might harm the investigation.

Back beneath her shade tree, Charite would rather focus on Irma's accomplishments.

"She made many mistakes, but she had the power to control when she was first at fault. To correct it," Charite says.

She remembers how proud she was when Irma was selected to speak at her career college graduation ceremony this spring.

She remembers the last day of her daughter's life. The two of them spent it at home, tending to Javon. Irma had looked so happy.

Then, about 5 p.m., Irma's cellphone rang. Someone, a friend maybe, kept urging Irma to come out. The phone rang again and again and again. Each time, Irma would answer the call, talk awhile and hang up, smiling.

"It was someone she knew," Charite figures. "It was like somebody was trying to get her to go out. It was like a plot."

At last, about 7 p.m., after she had bathed her son and put him down to sleep, Irma gave in. She looked at her mother and told her she was going out for a while.

The older woman frowned.

"Why you looking at me like that?" Irma said.

"You will come back tonight?"

"She said, 'Yes, I'll be back soon,' " Charite said. "She never did."

Now, having dealt with one monumental task — burying her daughter — Charite is girding for another: raising her little girl's son as her own.

"Javon, he's starting to give us trouble," Charite sighs, stirring beneath her shade tree as her break nears an end. "We had to tell him Irma isn't coming back. I thought that my heart would stop that day. And for two days, I was numb.

"After that, I prayed. I said, 'Give me the strength to raise Javon.' And God gave me the strength."

Since his mother died, the little boy has sat by the window at the house on Meridian Road, an impish little face peeping from beneath the shade, waiting for Irma.

He waits there now. His lips are smiling. His eyes are bright, expectant.

http://www.palmbeachpost.com/localnews/content/local_news/epaper/2008/09/14/a1b_irma_0915.html

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story published last year
http://www.crimestopperspbc.com/news/still-no-arrests-2-years-after-irma-simeus-murder/

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Still no arrests 2 years after Irma Simeus murder

PALM BEACH COUNTY, Fla. - Javon Simeus may seem like a carefree first grader, but when he sits in his suburban West Palm Beach home, with walls covered with pictures of his mother Irma Simeus, the haunting truth of why grandma takes care of him comes to light.
 
The six-year-old says, "That bad people tried to get Irma...and Irma had blood everywhere."
more at link

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https://www.palmbeachpost.com/news/20190619/man-takes-guilty-plea-in-2008-cold-case-murder

Man takes guilty plea in 2008 cold-case murder

6-19-19

Thaddeus James, 31, was sentenced to eight years in prison after he pleaded guilty to second-degree murder in the 2008 stabbing death of Irma Simeus.

WEST PALM BEACH — A man who was charged in the 2008 stabbing death of Irma Simeus pleaded guilty to lesser charges Wednesday morning.

Thaddeus James, 31, was sentenced to eight years in prison after he pleaded guilty to second-degree murder before Circuit Judge Glenn Kelley. James, who was originally charged with first-degree murder, was given credit for the more than three years he’s spent in jail since his arrest in 2016.

Erik Jackson was also charged in the fatal stabbing, but the charges were dropped in 2017 by the State Attorney’s Office. The office did not comment on why the charges were dropped, but said “it was the appropriate and ethical thing to do.”

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When James was arrested in Broward County in 2009, his DNA came back as a match found on Simeus’ body, he was interviewed by detectives. He told investigators he, Erik Jackson and Jackson’s brother, Quentin, burglarized homes, and Simeus pawned stolen goods for them. Quentin Jackson was never arrested in connection to Simeus’ death.

James was not arrested at the time, but the case was assigned to the sheriff’s office Cold Case Unit in 2014.

DNA evidence was retested in 2015 and forensic scientists determined that the DNA taken from Simeus’ right ankle is approximately 5.2 billion times more likely that it originated from Irma Simeus and Thaddeus James than if the DNA sources came from Simeus and an unknown individual.


Palm Beach County Sheriff’s investigators arrested James and Jackson in February 2016. Soon after the arrests, Charite Simeus, Irma’s mother, told The Palm Beach Post her daughter’s death caused her health issues, but the arrest brought her some relief.

“It’s about time,” Charite Simeus said of the arrests.