Joliet Murder Defendant Pleads Guilty To Armed Robbery

JOLIET, IL — Bobbie Ollom, a young woman who has spent the past two-and-a-half years in the Will County Jail facing first-degree murder charges, reached a plea bargain Monday for her role in the Joliet Denny's parking lot killing of Crest Hill resident Gregory Brown, 36.

Provided that Ollom testifies at the upcoming trials of her co-defendants, the Will County State's Attorney's Office of Jim Glasgow will dismiss Ollom's two remaining charges of first-degree murder and robbery, according to her attorney Chuck Bretz.

"She has to testify truthfully," Bretz said.

On Monday, Ollom pleaded guilty to her Class X felony of armed robbery. Her sentencing will not take place until after the trials of her two remaining co-defendants, according to Bretz.

The shooting victim was fatally shot in the Denny's parking lot, and the Joliet shooting happened around 10 p.m.

Video surveillance footage that Joliet police obtained from the restaurant showed Ollom had been inside the Denny's restaurant talking with Brown prior to his violent death.

Ollom was not the shooter in the Plainfield Road homicide, Bretz pointed out.

Now 26 years old, Ollom becomes the first of three co-defendants to work out a plea agreement with Will County's prosecutors. Her co-defendants are: Christopher C. Parker, now 25, of Chicago, and Joshua T. Anderson, now 22, of Chicago.

All three defendants are being held on $5 million bail.

Bretz told Joliet Patch that Parker was the shooter, and that Anderson was responsible for setting the crime up.

Bretz said his client was unaware that Anderson and Parker had hatched a plan to rob and kill the victim at the Denny's restaurant in Joliet. After the homicide, Ollom and Anderson were captured several days later by authorities in Burlington, Iowa.

"It was a stupid thing to get involved in," Bretz said of Ollom.

Ollom is a former Joliet resident who had been living in Seneca at the time of the April 30, 2019, Joliet homicide on Plainfield Road.

Back in April, Bretz filed a motion asking for a bond reduction for Ollom.

"There is no indication that the defendant was aware that anyone would be injured or killed ... It is particularly inappropriate and troublesome that Christopher Parker, the actual shooter, has the exact same bond as the defendant," Bretz argued at the time.

Ollom, according to Bretz, was "completely cooperative with the arresting officers and willingly answered all of their questions pertaining to the various details of the incident underlying this case."