NC man who cut off his ankle monitor on the morning of his murder trial is recaptured

A Charlotte man who cut off his ankle monitor and fled on the morning of his murder trial last month has been recaptured, police say.

Willie Devon James, 33, disappeared on Feb. 28. His recapture was announced Monday by Charlotte-Mecklenburg Police.

A CMPD spokeswoman did not immediately respond to an email from The Charlotte Observer seeking details.

James is accused of fatally shooting Matthew Duke Gibbons, 25, who was discovered in the front yard of a home in northwest Charlotte on Feb. 1, 2018. Police at the time said James and Gibbons knew each other.

James was expected in court the morning of Feb. 28 for the start of jury selection in his first-degree murder trial. He never showed.

He had been placed on bond in June 2018 and ordered to wear an ankle monitor. He removed the device around 4 a.m. the day of his expected court appearance, police said. James was last known to be on the 3600 block of Brookshire Boulevard.

James is now charged with first-degree murder, robbery with a dangerous weapon, possession of a firearm by a felon, injury to property and interference with an electronic monitoring device.

His disappearance rekindled a long-running debate in the county’s criminal-justice community over whether homicide defendants should be released before trial. The issue, which has surfaced in other jurisdictions around the country, pits court reform and the rights of those presumed innocent vs. public safety.

In 2019, the Charlotte-Mecklenburg Police Department announced it would no longer monitor homicide suspects placed on electronic surveillance, due to what CMPD said was the unnecessary safety risk these subjects posed.

“I cannot stand behind having murder suspects on (electronic monitoring) ... I think the better place for them would be in jail awaiting trial,” then-CMPD Chief Kerr Putney said at the time.

CMPD said at the time that it would continue monitoring defendants assigned devices before the December 2019 cut-off. James fell into that group and was under monitoring up until the day of his trial. James’ flight left CMPD monitoring only three homicide defendants out on bond.

Under N.C. law, judges may consider only two factors in granting pretrial release: whether there is a reasonable assurance the defendant will appear at future court hearings; and whether a release poses an unreasonable risk of harm to the community.

At the time of its decision to end monitoring, CMPD released statistics that showed a fourth of the defendants placed on electronic monitoring had committed another crime while wearing the devices. In 2019, some 127 defendants removed their monitors.

Prior to his homicide arrest in February 2018, James was convicted in 2014 of conspiracy to commit robbery with a dangerous weapon and was sentenced to 10 months in state prison, according to N.C. Department of Corrections records.

If James is convicted at his trial, he faces a mandatory sentence of life in prison without parole.