Jeremy Boshears Didn't Look For Katie Kearns: Testimony

JOLIET, IL — Just days before she vanished on the night of Nov. 12, 2017, 24-year-old Kaitlyn "Katie" Kearns returned to her family's home in Mokena, excited to introduce a member of the Joliet Outlaws, her father Kevin Kearns testified Thursday at the first-degree murder trial of Jeremy Boshears.

"He put a gun to her right temple and pulled the trigger," Assistant Will County State's Attorney Dan Egan told jurors. "When he and Katie Kearns are alone, he kills Katie Kearns."

As for the prosecution's first witness, Kevin Kearns told the jury that he sold wine and liquor for his job. In November 2017, "Kaitlyn had brought a guy over that she wanted me to meet," Kevin Kearns testified.

Assistant Will County State's Attorney Tom Bahar asked Kevin Kearns to look around the courtroom to see if he saw the young man his daughter introduced to him.

An awkward silence filled Will County Courtroom 405 for almost two minutes.

Finally, Katie Kearns' father answered the question by responding, "No, I don't."

Turns out, Boshears, now 36, was wearing a dark suit, and he now has a full head of brown hair, unlike in November 2017 when he shaved his head and often wore his Joliet Outlaws motorcycle club attire.

On Thursday, Boshears was seated in the courtroom, next to his attorney, Chuck Bretz.

Almost five years ago, when Kevin Kearns first met Boshears, he was wearing jeans and a black vest, Kevin Kearns testified. The two men talked for about 15 to 20 minutes.

"It was cordial," Kevin Kearns testified.

As the questioning about their first face-to-face encounter continued, Kevin Kearns told the jury how "I offered him a drink, being a liquor salesman."

Bahar asked if he remembered the man's name?

"Jeremy Boshears," Kevin Kearns told the jury. "He said he was in love with my daughter. He actually did tell me he was married, but he was getting a divorce."

On that occasion, Kevin Kearns tried to offer Boshears one of his many brands of whiskeys that he sells, but Boshears was not interested.

"He told me, 'The only thing I drink is Crown Royal,'" Kevin Kearns testified. "Mine is better than that."

After refusing to sample some of Kevin Kearns' whiskeys, Boshears settled for a can of beer. Afterward, Boshears and Katie Kearns left her father's house.

They probably "left to get a bottle of Crown Royal," Kevin Kearns testified.

Katie Kearns' last day alive was a Sunday, Nov. 12, 2017.

She lived at her father's Mokena house, along with her sister and the family's dog. Katie Kearns also had two adult brothers who lived on their own.

Katie Kearns worked at a breakfast restaurant called Caffe Milan in Frankfort, and she had a part-time job as a bartender in Joliet at Woody's, her father testified.

"I had said goodbye as she was going out the door ... that was the last time I saw her," her father testified.

A couple days later, "I went to the Joliet Police Department, and I filled out a missing persons on her. Around (November) 13th or 14th."

At the time of her disappearance, Katie Kearns drove "an off-blue" Jeep that had belonged to an ex-boyfriend, her father testified.

Suddenly, after about 20 minutes of additional questions on the witness stand Thursday, Kevin Kearns addressed the court.

He realized the young man "with the blue shirt and that suit coat on" was the same person his daughter brought over to his house — five years ago.

Will County Judge Dave Carlson allowed Kevin Kearns to re-answer the earlier question and acknowledge to the jury that he was identifying Boshears.

Within days of reporting his daughter missing, Kankakee law enforcement notified him "that they had recovered Kaitlyn's body ... St. Anne, I believe it was," her father told the jury.

Will County Sheriff's investigators informed him "she was found in the back of her Jeep and her body was wrapped in a shower curtain," Kevin Kearns testified, as he began to cry.

The judge asked if he wanted any water.

"No, I'm good," he replied.

Kevin Kearns began to cry as prosecutors asked him questions about the wake at the funeral home and his memories of his daughter.

"My daughter was always very upbeat," he said. "She would help anyone anytime she could."

Bahar asked Kevin Kearns whether he ever spoke with Boshears on the phone after his daughter brought him over to his house.

He did.

It was around Nov. 13, 2017, after his daughter went missing.

"I said she's missing," Kevin Kearns testified. "He said, well, I saw her on the 11th at the (Joliet Outlaws) clubhouse."

The prosecutor asked if Boshears offered any assistance in finding her.

"Uh, no," Kevin Kearns told the jury.

During cross-examination, criminal defense attorney Chuck Bretz approached Kevin Kearns in a soft-spoken voice.

"Mr. Kearns, I'm very sorry for your loss," Bretz told him. "No parent should have to bury their child."

During opening statements, Bretz told the jury that the evidence would show that Boshears did not kill Kearns. She took her own life by fatally shooting herself in the Joliet Outlaws clubhouse, Bretz said.

Bretz asked Kevin Kearns if he knew that his daughter had been "treated for about two years prior to her death" for anxiety, panic attacks, depression and bipolar disorder.

About three weeks before her death, Katie Kearns was in the emergency room at Silver Cross Hospital because she had lacerations to her wrist.

"I was made aware," her father told Bretz. "I was not at the hospital."

According to Kevin Kearns, his daughter's mental health issues may have stemmed from the death of her mother. She died in 2007, the jury learned.

"She was very close to her mother," Kevin Kearns testified.

Bretz told the jury that Katie Kearns was nearly three times the legal limit to be intoxicated when she died. She also had taken several medications, and she had used cocaine.

"I am aware that she had dabbled in recreational drugs, I believe she smoked marijuana," her father testified.

Bretz asked if Kevin Kearns knew about her use of cocaine.

"To my knowledge, she was not," her father testified.

During opening statements, Egan told the jury that Boshears invited Kearns to the Joliet Outlaws clubhouse after she finished tending bar at Woody's, a well-known biker bar on Joliet's east side.

While she was inside the Outlaws clubhouse, around 1:45 a.m. she began receiving a flurry of text messages from an ex-boyfriend who invited her over to his place to have sexual intercourse, prosecutors said.

One of the ex-boyfriend's text messages informed Katie Kearns, "I just thought you wanted to have my baby," Egan told the jury.

By 2:25 a.m. Boshears was on the phone, making "an avalanche of phone calls," Egan told jurors.

"Thirty phone calls in approximately 90 minutes to fellow Outlaw members," Egan declared. "Katie Kearns had no gunshot residue on her hands when they found her body."

Three of Will County State's Attorney Jim Glasgow's most seasoned prosecutors are handling the murder trial against Boshears: Steven Platek, Egan and Bahar.

Egan told jurors the evidence showing Boshears committed first-degree murder "is overwhelming. It's beyond a reasonable doubt. I ask that you hold him accountable for what he did to Katie Kearns that night and find him guilty."

Will County Judge Dave Carlson sent the jury home for the long weekend around 4:15 p.m.

The courthouse is closed Good Friday. The Boshears trial will resume at 9:30 a.m. Monday.

It's expected to last about two weeks.

More Patch Trial Coverage: Boshears Became A Killer Once He Got His Outlaw Patch: Egan