BY RACHEL MELCER
The Cincinnati Enquirer
J. L. Lawson
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James Lee Lawson, arrested Saturday in connection with the killing and dismemberment of a Middletown woman, eluded police for three months as he forged a new life in Carrollton, Ky.
The 29-year-old Middletown man assumed a new name, landed a job, found a new girlfriend, Billie Jenks, and moved in with her and her young son.
On Thursday, he counted his blessings around the Thanksgiving dinner table of his girlfriend's grandmother in the rural community of Blocher in Johnson Township, Ind., about 25 miles north of Louisville.
That's when his new life fell apart - thanks to a very suspicious grandmother.
Butler County Sheriff's Lt. Anthony Dwyer, who headed the investigation of the death of 33-year-old Cheryl Ann Durkin, whose torso was found in the Great Miami River in April in Hamilton, credited the girlfriend's grandmother for cracking the case.
Lt. Dwyer says it happened this way:
The grandmother, whose identity is being withheld by police, was suspicious of the way Mr. Lawson ducked his head as a family member videotaped their Thanksgiving feast.
And she recalled that her granddaughter had found conflicting identification documents bearing Mr. Lawson's picture. He explained them by saying he was wanted by police on a drug charge - and although that "raised her eyebrows," his girlfriend did not kick him out, Lt. Dwyer said.
Mr. Lawson also apparently provided conflicting accounts of his past to his new girlfriend.
On Friday afternoon, the grandmother - after mulling over the developments - smelled trouble. She called Indiana State Police and invited them to view Mr. Lawson's half-hidden face on her home video.
Summoned by Indiana State Police at 10 p.m. Friday, Lt. Dwyer immediately drove to the grandmother's home, questioned her and watched the videotape.
"We run a lot of dead-ends down. But in this particular case, we felt that the information was specific enough to go down there and check it out," Lt. Dwyer said. "(Mr. Lawson) is hard to see on the videotape, but I've interviewed him before. He's easy to spot if you know his mannerisms and characteristics."
Confident that he had found his man, Lt. Dwyer headed to Carrollton, where he consulted with Kentucky State Police.
At about 5 a.m. Saturday, they surrounded Ms. Jenks' home.
Police called and told her there was a family emergency - enticing her to leave the home. They learned Ms. Jenks' son was staying overnight with some relatives, Lt. Dwyer said.
And then someone called Mr. Lawson, pretending to be an acquaintance whose car had broken down and needed a lift.
When Mr. Lawson stepped out of the house, he was arrested.
"It's kind of unbelievable, since (the grandmother) hadn't seen him (on America's Most Wanted) on TV or anything," Ms. Durkin's sister, Karla Edwards of Madison Township in Butler County, said Saturday. "I'm glad she got concerned enough to call someone.
"I'm thankful that he didn't have time to get mad at the new girlfriend and do the same thing to her (as police say he did to Cheryl Ann Durkin), so her family won't have to go through the same things that we've been going through."
Mr. Lawson is being held without bond in Carroll County Detention Center on a fugitive warrant. Butler County officials are expected to seek his extradition Monday.
Sifting through his belongings Saturday, police found four birth certificates, four Social Security cards and five state IDs.
His mother, 46-year-old Ellen Peck, pleaded guilty last month to helping her son dispose of parts of Ms. Durkin's body. She is to be sentenced this week on charges of obstruction of justice and tampering with evidence.
Ms. Durkin, a drywall contractor, disappeared in February. Her torso was found two months later in the Great Miami River. In September, other parts of her body were found near Brookville Lake in Indiana and in Rush Run State Park in Preble County.
In Carrollton Saturday night, Ms. Jenks refused to be interviewed. A next-door neighbor who asked not to be identified said the town was stunned by the arrest.
For the two months that Mr. Lawson lived there, he rarely came out, the man said. "They were nice quiet people who didn't cause much trouble."
Last Thanksgiving, Ms. Durkin was laughing with her family, planning for the future and doing her best to beat a drug addiction, her sister recalled. This year, she was sorely missed.
"Our Thanksgiving was really hard. No one was in the mood for it," Mrs. Edwards said. "It's depressing. You lose someone and all you can do is have your memories."
Her family hoped that they would be able to celebrate the rest of the holidays with Mr. Lawson behind bars.
"I told Lt. Dwyer that would be the best Christmas present that we could get," Mrs. Edwards said. "I never lost faith in him, and now it's come true."
She has mixed emotions about the likelihood of Mr. Lawson's trial.
"Until it's finally over, I don't think any of us are going to rest. For the rest of our lives, we're going to have to deal with this. A part of us is missing, so we're never going to heal," she said.
"But it does make it easier, knowing that there will be justice."
Police have not disclosed the motive for the killing and they say the nature of the relationship between Mr. Lawson and Ms. Durkin was unclear.
"As far as I know, Cheryl had just met him. I don't think they even knew each other for two weeks (before she disappeared)," Mrs. Edwards said. "She had never mentioned him, and she usually talked about things like that."
