$750,000 bail for woman, 24, charged in Batavia slaying
Bail was set at $750,000 Tuesday afternoon for a Batavia woman accused of stabbing a man to death Monday morning.
Latoya Baines, 24, charged with two counts of first-degree murder, appeared before Kane County Circuit Court Judge Karen Simpson.
Assistant State's Attorney Alice Tracy said Baines stabbed Gerald J. Jackson in the chest because she believed he was “involved” with another woman at the apartment complex where Baines lived. The dispute started in an apartment building in the 1100 block of East Wilson Street. Baines then returned to her apartment in the 1200 block of East Wilson Street and got a knife, Tracy said.
“She didn't have to arm herself,” Tracy told the judge. “The defendant could have left.”
Jackson, 25, was the father of one of Baines' two children, Batavia Police Deputy Chief Dan Eul said.
The two buildings are close, separated by a lawn. Batavia police said Jackson's last known permanent address was in the 6200 block of South Carpenter Street in Chicago, but that he lived at least part-time with Baines. A Kane County court record from a 2010 traffic case also listed another building in the complex as Jackson's address.
A neighbor of Baines, who declined to give her name, said it was “shocking” to hear Baines accused of the crime. “This is surprising,” the woman said, adding that Baines was a nice woman. Baines was loving and “very protective” of her son, who is in kindergarten, and a 1-year-old daughter, the neighbor said. Jackson was nice too, she said, and was often at Baines' apartment. The neighbor said she never heard of any trouble.
Batavia police were called at 1:08 a.m. Monday to the Batavia Apartments for a disturbance and found Jackson in a stairwell in the building in the 1100 block of East Wilson Street, unresponsive and bleeding profusely. Baines and another woman were struggling at the base of the stairwell, where officers found three knives near the women.
Jackson was taken to Delnor Hospital in Geneva, where he was pronounced dead. The other woman was not injured.
Police say Baines and Jackson had a “domestic relationship.” Tracy did not specify the nature of their relationship.
Baines was assigned a public defender. She will remain in jail unless she posts $75,000 bond. Her next court date is May 9.
Tracy told the judge that Batavia police had been called to a domestic dispute between Jackson and Baines in June 2010. Jackson had cuts on a forearm and a hand. Both declined to press any charges in that incident, she said. Eul said Tuesday police had been called to several domestic disputes involving the pair since then.
According to Tracy, Baines has lived in Batavia about 18 months. Before that she lived in Bolingbrook and in Chicago.
An onlooker in court, Audray McClay, said he was a pastor at a Chicago church Baines has attended. He said Baines was “an upstanding young woman” but declined to comment further.
Police say it is the first murder in Batavia since April 2004. In that case, a man kidnapped and beat his former mother-in-law in Batavia, then left her to die in the basement of an abandoned farmhouse in Kaneville Township.
Ÿ Daily Herald staff writer Harry Hitzeman contributed to this story.