Chesterton Tribune

 

 

Chesterton Police seek surveillance tape along South Calumet and 100E corridor; Dillard pleads not guilty

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By KEVIN NEVERS

Folks who live along the South Calumet Road/100E corridor between Porter Ave. and 1050N--and who have residential surveillance cameras installed on their property--are being asked to contact the Chesterton Police Department at (219) 926-1136.

CPD Chief Dave Cincoski told the Chesterton Tribune late on Monday that investigators working to establish Christopher Mark Dillard’s movements in the hours before and after Nicole Gland’s slaying--sometime between 2:53 and 3:45 a.m. Wednesday, April 19--believe surveillance footage shot along the South Calumet Road/100E corridor could be of assistance.

Cincoski described an investigation with multiple moving parts and avenues of inquiry, all of which are being actively pursued, he said. Cincoski declined, however, to release at this time any more information than was contained in the probable cause affidavit filed against Dillard on Friday.

Dillard in Court

Meanwhile, Dillard, 50, of Hobart, entered a standard plea of not guilty on Monday morning, at a preliminary hearing before Porter Superior Court Judge Bill Alexa, Deputy Prosecuting Attorney Cheryl Polarek told the Tribune today.

Alexa, for his part, assigned public defender Bob Harper to represent Dillard, after Dillard informed Alexa that he’s indigent, owns no property or vehicle, has no bank account, and--besides his employment as a bouncer at the Upper Deck Lounge--worked in food preparation at an unspecified Wendy’s restaurant, Polarek said.

In addition, Alexa granted the state’s motion to order Dillard to submit to finger- and handprinting and to provide blood, urine, and DNA samples. Polarek noted that the CPD previously obtained and executed a search warrant for blood and urine samples, for the purpose of drug-testing Dillard, as well as a separate warrant for DNA samples. But investigators are interested in obtaining what are known as “major-case prints” of Dillard’s finger- and handprints, over and above those taken on his being booked into the Porter County Jail, Polarek said.

Dillard is currently being held without bond, although he is entitled to file a “motion to let bail,” under which the state would be required to argue why a bond should not be set for him. As of this morning, Polarek said, Dillard had not filed such a motion.

Trial has been tentatively scheduled in Alexa’s court for Aug. 28 and preliminary hearings for June 9 and July 21.

Murder is punishable in Indiana by a term of 45 to 65 years.

The Case

Gland, 23, a bartender at the Upper Deck Lounge and a resident of Portage, was found deceased in her Ford SUV at 9:10 a.m. Wednesday, April 19, next to a dumpster behind the Chesterton Tribune building on Lois Lane, two doors to the south of the Upper Deck. An autopsy subsequently determined that she’d been stabbed 24 times in the torso, head, and neck, and had bled to death.

The break in the case came later the same day, when Dillard’s girlfriend reported to Hobart Police, after hearing the news of Gland’s death, that she’d discovered a knife missing from her butcher block, Cincoski stated in his affidavit. Dillard was located in Hobart on the evening of April 19, detained for questioning, and transported to the Chesterton Police station.

During the course of that interview, Cincoski stated, Dillard advised that he remembered little of his movements in the early morning hours of April 19, as he’d been “‘partying rough’ for the last two days.”

But in a conversation with his girlfriend early in the morning of Thursday, April 20--in a recorded interview room at the CPD station and with full knowledge that his comments were being taped--Dillard admitted that “I killed the girl, I didn’t mean to,” telling his girlfriend that “the drugs had a hold of him,” Cincoski stated in his affidavit.

 

Posted 4/25/2017

 

 
 
 
 

 

 

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