11 Years ago, Bradley Lockhart Lost Wife to Tragic Murder

By Alicia Cruz
Editor-in-Chief
Theblackurbantimes

11 years ago, in March 1998, Bradley Lockhart, the father of 5-year-old Shaniya Davis, experienced an unimaginable tragedy that left two people wounded and three dead including his wife of seven years, Vickie Sue Lockhart, then 28, his wife’s 19-year-old sister, Channel Coleman and another man, 24-year-old David Lee Epps.

Today, he is preparing to bury another family member -- his five-year-old daughter, Shaniya Davis. Davis was the recent focus of a massive search that griped a nation and ended with North Carolina officials finding her body along side a road in Sanford, North Carolina.


In all, five people were bound, gagged and shot that evening on March 3, 1998. The murders occurred at a duplex apartment on Graham Road in Fayetteville that was being rented by Joe Epps Staton the brother of David Epps.

The two injured men were Thorsten Malin, 21, and Tyrone Parker, 20. Malin rented the home along with Staton who was not home at the time of the murders. Police reports stated that two men broke into the home with the intent to rob Joe Epps who had received almost $20,000 in a settlement the year before.” They thought it was in the house,” said mother Sheila Epps.“The money was in the bank, but my son may have bragged about having it.”

Police reports stated that the killers walked into the home around 1 a.m. after one of them identified himself at the door. Each person in the home was bound, gagged and then shot several times.

The Sheriff Department was summoned to the home at about 1:24 a.m. after Malin freed himself and escaped through a bedroom window and went to the duplex apartment next door, where the landlord lived, and they called 911.

The killers left the home after the murders, tossing the murder weapon near a school bus stop on the corner of Mackenzie and Duncan Streets in the Spring Lake area of Fayetteville. Four men were arrested for the shotgun killings, but only two were convicted for the triple homicide, Vincent Lee Thomas and Litdel Burkhalter. Both were charged with First-Degree murder, First-Degree Kidnapping, Robbery with a Dangerous Weapon, Conspiracy to Commit Armed Robbery and Assault with a Dangerous Weapon with the intent to kill.

Both were sentenced to life in prison. Bradley and Vickie Sue Lockhart, had three children together.

Since the murder of his wife, Bradley Lockhart's children have mostly stayed with their grandparents in the Remington subdivision behind Seventy-First High School.

Thomas was a soldier stationed at Fort Bragg at the time of the murders.

He voluntarily went to the Cumberland County Sheriff’s Department after eyewitnesses fingered him in a photo line-up. He was arrested at that time.

Since Thomas’ conviction, he has had 27 infractions while in prison, the latest having occurred in February 2009 according to the North Carolina Department of Corrections. He is currently incarcerated at the high security State Prison Scotland in Laurinburg, North Carolina.
Below are details of the infractions Thomas has committed while in prison:

V. Thomas
02/20/2009 NO THREAT CONTRABAND
10/22/2008 NO THREAT CONTRABAND
01/28/2008 WEAPON POSSESSION
01/28/2008 DISOBEY ORDER
12/06/2007 GAMBLING
10/20/2006 UNAUTHORIZED TOBACCO USE 08/13/2005 SEXUAL ACT
07/25/2005 ASSAULT STAFF W/WEAPON
11/06/2004 SEXUAL ACT
02/13/2004 ATTEMPT CLASS C OFFENSE
01/09/2004 ATTEMPT CLASS A OFFENSE
01/09/2004 DISOBEY ORDER
08/21/2003 SUBSTANCE POSSESSION
08/21/2003 DISOBEY ORDER 08/21/2003
GAMBLING 12/21/2002 ATTEMPT CLASS A OFFENSE
10/19/2002 SEXUAL ACT
10/19/2002 DISOBEY ORDER
07/15/2002 DISOBEY ORDER
07/15/2002 UNAUTHORIZED LOCATION
06/14/2002 PROFANE LANGUAGE
05/19/2002 DISOBEY ORDER
05/19/2002 UNAUTHORIZED LOCATION
02/11/2001 PROFANE LANGUAGE
02/11/2001 DISOBEY ORDER
09/08/2000 SUBSTANCE POSSESSION
05/25/2000 THEFT OF PROPERTY

Burkhalter, who is now 33-years-old, was arrested the day after Thomas and led Deputies to the area where the shotgun had been disposed of. It wasn’t there. Burkhalter is currently incarcerated at the Lanesboro Correctional Institution in Polkton, North Carolina where he has racked up a total of nine prison infractions since his incarceration. Here are a list of those infractions:

L. Burkhalter, Jr.
06/26/2008 SELL/MISUSE MEDICATION
01/09/2006 SUBSTANCE POSSESSION
07/15/2003 ACTIVE RIOTER
07/15/2003 DISOBEY ORDER
04/14/2003 ASSAULT STAFF W/WEAPON
04/14/2003 SUBSTANCE POSSESSION
04/14/2003 DISOBEY ORDER
02/05/2003 SUBSTANCE POSSESSION
06/15/2002 UNAUTHORIZED LOCATION


**Quotes taken from WRAL archives and prisoner information taken from the N.C. Dept., of Correction web site.

UPDATE: Police Searching For Shaniya Davis in Wooded Area of Sanford, NC

UPDATE

By Alicia Cruz
Theblackurbantimes

Sources say that the search for 5-year-old Shaniya Davis has moved to a remote wooded area of Lee County. At this time Law enforcement and residents are searching the wooded areas and waters along Walker Road in the county (City of Sanford). A road in the county near N.C. 78 has been taped off with yellow crime-scene tape.

By 3 p.m., several all-terrain vehicles were seen around the area and later, a Highway Patrol helicopter was present. Right now, it's beginning to look like this search is turning grim. Shaniya Davis was last seen on videotape in the arms of Andrette McNeil, who is currently in police custody inside of a hotel approximately seven miles south of the scene where investigators are currently searching.

McNeill surrendered to police Friday and was charged with first-degree kidnapping. Police say he admitted to the kidnapping of the child but that he did not know where Shaniya was at the time of his arrest. McNeill's bail has been set at $100,000.

Police say an employee of the hotel on video called police to report that they saw a child matching Shaniya's description. When police arrived McNeill and the child were already gone. Authorities reviewed surveillance video and confirmed the child's identity through family members.

Last night, police arrested Shaniya’s mother, Antoinette Davis, and accused her of felony child abuse involving prostitution, interfering with a police investigation, filing a false police report and human trafficking. The mother is in jail and her bond has been set at $51,000. Arrest documents state that the 25-year-old mother has been "uncooperative" with detectives.

Davis, who is employed as a caregiver Carolina Inn at Village Green, an assisted living facility, reported her daughter missing to police on Tuesday. Her job is located on Forsythe Drive, between Village Drive and Robeson Street. No word from police on whether that area has been searched.

Davis told police that she last saw her child at 5:30 a.m. on a couch in their mobile home. When she went to check on little Shaniya later, she was gone. Davis reported her child's disappearance at 6:53 a.m. The mobile home is located in the Sleepy Hollow Mobile Home Park off Murchison Road in Fayetteville and little Shaniya had only been living with her mother for about three weeks.

Prior to that time, Shaniya lived with her father, Bradley Lockhart also of Fayetteville, for about four years. Lockhart, who described his relationship with the mother as a "one-night stand" to an Associated Press reporter said he let the child live with her mother because Davis had found a place to live and had held a job for six months.

“I just wanted her to be a mother,” he said Saturday. “She was never part of her life.” Lockhart said he and Davis never argued about him raising Shaniya and that he did not know anything about McNeill. Again, if anyone has information about this case or the whereabouts of Shaniya Davis, you are asked to telephone the police at (910) 433-1585.