Police: Highway slaying was not random

Wednesday, May 4, 2005 | 11:12 a.m.

Metro Police are treating last week's Interstate 15 shooting as "a targeted homicide" and not a random act, based on evidence of illicit narcotics found in the car driven by the slain woman.

Rochelle Carter, a 37-year-old single mother of five, was killed Friday on I-15 near Charleston Boulevard when someone pulled alongside her and fired several rounds into the driver's side of the Chrysler she was driving.

Police found what "we suspect to be illegal drugs in her car beyond what would be for personal use," Metro Police Homicide Lt. Tom Monahan said today. He declined to say what kind of drugs were found.

"What this (evidence) does support is that we consider this a targeted homicide, not a random act," Monahan said.

Carter has no prior drug convictions, nor convictions for any other crime, Monahan said, noting she also had no known gang associations.

In an arrest related to the Carter incident, Mario Andre Phillips, 40, who police describe as Carter's boyfriend, was taken into custody after he came to the shooting scene in what police say was a stolen car.

"He showed up understandably very upset, emotional and angry and was not permitted to go to the (victim's) car," Monahan said, noting a patrol officer, per standard procedure, took down the license plate to the car Phillips was driving after Phillips did not identify himself to police.

Monahan said the officer then checked the plate "on the likelihood it would return to the person operating the vehicle" and learned it was stolen.

Phillips was being held today in the Clark County Detention Center on charges of possession of a stolen vehicle and possession of methamphetamine. His bail has been set at $6,000.

Phillips, however, is not a person of interest in the homicide investigation at this time, Monahan said, noting that Phillips likely saw live reports of the crime scene on TV news, recognized the car as the one his girlfriend was driving and drove to the area.

Police are continuing to follow leads and are trying to locate what witnesses have described as a black Lincoln Navigator that was seen near the car Carter was driving at the time of the shooting.

"I would not say this case has gone cold," Monahan said. "We still have a lot of people to talk to,"

Also, he said, toxicology tests on the victim are pending. They usually take two weeks to return from the lab, Monahan said.

The incident, which snarled early morning commuter traffic for several hours, occurred shortly before 5 a.m. in the southbound lanes about 450 yards south of the Spaghetti Bowl. Carter was killed by a gunshot wound to the head, police said.

Anyone with information about the incident can call Crime Stoppers at 385-5555 or Metro Homicide at 229-3521.