Boshears Cries As Jury Sees Photos Of Katie Kearns' Body

JOLIET, IL — A member of the Kankakee County Coroner's Office, Bill Perkins was summoned to the farmhouse of Ronald and Georgia Keagle on the morning of Nov. 16, 2017.

"They had located a body in like a shed away from the house," Perkins testified Tuesday morning during the first-degree murder trial of Jeremy Boshears. The 36-year-old Joliet Outlaw is accused of fatally shooting his new girlfriend, Katie Kearns, inside the Outlaws clubhouse on Joliet's east side.

After the shooting, Boshears loaded Kearns' body into her Jeep Grand Cherokee and drove it to the Keagles' farm near St. Anne. Ronald Keagle was a fellow Joliet Outlaw and his wife considered Boshears like another son, according to Monday's trial testimony.

Perkins arrived at the farm property around 5:30 a.m.

"This would be the decedent wrapped in a mattress, wrapped in black plastic," Perkins told the jury.

On Tuesday morning, Will County Judge Dave Carlson warned the jury they would be viewing several graphic photos presented by Assistant Will County State's Attorney Dan Egan.

"Mr. Perkins, did you eventually open that tarp?" Egan inquired.

"Yes," Perkins testified.

According to Perkins, the body wrapped inside the tarp and the mattress was Kearns, the 24-year-old Joliet bartender. A resident of Mokena, Kearns was reported missing by her family a few days earlier.

On Tuesday morning, Egan showed the jury a photo of Kearns with a gunshot wound to her head.

Over at the defense table, Boshears began crying. He grabbed the tissue box on the table to wipe away his tears.

For the next several minutes, Boshears mostly kept his head down as the Will County State's Attorney's Office displayed several autopsy photos showing the gunshot wound on the large video screen inside Courtroom 405.

After recovering the body, Perkins told the jury that Kearns was placed into a body bag that was taken to the morgue in Kankakee for an autopsy.

Following Perkins on the witness stand, Egan called Dr. Valerie Arangelovich, the forensic pathologist who performed the autopsy on Kearns.

She has been a forensic pathologist for 18 years and has performed about 5,000 autopsies, she told the jury.

While Dr. Arangelovich was on the witness stand, Egan began showing the jury several more photos of Kearns' body. Her gunshot wound was a contact wound, the jury learned.

Dr. Arangelvoich told the jury that the muzzle of the gun was pressed up against the right side of Kearns' head when the gun was fired. The bullet exited her head on the left side.

At 11:25 a.m. Will County Judge Dave Carlson abruptly announced he was giving the jury a short break.

After the jury left his courtroom, the judge told everyone that one of the jurors looked physically upset from viewing the photos of Kearns' autopsy.

At 11:40 a.m. the jury returned to the courtroom and testimony resumed.

The forensic pathologist told the jury that Kearns' blood alcohol concentration was nearly three times the legal limit to considered intoxicated in Illinois.

Additionally, Kearns had several prescription medications in her system, including "a therapeutic level" of Xanax.

She also had used cocaine, the jury heard.

"The cause of death was a gunshot to the head," Arangelovich testified.

More Patch Trial Coverage: Bullet Ties Boshears To Katie Kearns' Murder: Testimony