Before denying bond to William “Marc” Wilson, who faces felony murder and aggravated assault charges in shooting death of Haley Hutcheson, 17, Judge Michael Muldrew heard reports that Hutcheson’s family received multiple threats via social media and email.

Nobody during the bond hearing Tuesday afternoon in Bulloch County Superior Court said that Wilson was responsible for any of these threats. In fact, he had already been in jail three weeks when at least some of the threats were received. Muldrew said he did not base his decision to deny bond on the threats but on witnesses’ accounts of Wilson’s actions.

However, the judge said he was “extremely concerned about public statements that have been uttered on behalf of the defendant.”

Wilson, who will soon be 22, has been held at the Bulloch County Jail since June 17, when he turned himself in.

Hutcheson, who was a Claxton High School student, was pronounced dead at East Georgia Regional Medical Center shortly after 1 a.m. Sunday, June 14, after being struck by a bullet while riding in a pickup truck on Veterans Memorial Parkway with four other teens.

Statesboro police alleged in warrants that Wilson fired the bullet that struck Hutcheson from a handgun in his car while both vehicles were in motion. Multiple shots were fired, according to testimony Tuesday.

Back on July 6, the day before Muldrew issued a gag order prohibiting anyone involved in the case from making public statements about it outside of the courtroom, Wilson’s parents and some of his defense attorneys held a press conference. The attorneys asserted that Wilson, who is biracial, and a girlfriend, who is white, were victims of a racist attack by people in the pickup truck, who were white, and that Wilson fired his gun in self-defense.

Sent to grand jury

Attorneys Francys Johnson, Mawuli Davis and Martha Hall represented Wilson in a preliminary hearing Tuesday morning that concluded with Muldrew ruling that the charges should go forward to a grand jury. Then the bond hearing began in the afternoon with Johnson calling Wilson’s father, Deron Patrick Wilson, fire chief for Coweta County Fire and Rescue, to the witness stand.

He testified that his son had no disciplinary problems that he knew of while in school. He had no previous arrest or criminal record.

“We’d never dealt with anything of any criminal nature anywhere, anytime, in the family, that I know of at least,” Chief Wilson said.

Marc Wilson was living with his parents in Coweta County before his arrest. But he previously had briefly attended East Georgia State College, his father said, and has a brother and a sister who live here. He came to Statesboro for a visit the week of Hutcheson’s death.

Returned with gun

The day after the shooting, Wilson returned to his parents’ home and at first said nothing about the incident, according to his father’s testimony. But when Wilson learned he was a suspect, he told his father, who then called Statesboro Police Department Capt. Jared Akins.

“He was ready to come back,” the older Wilson said, when Johnson asked if his son had shown any resistance to returning to face the charges.

The Wilsons voluntarily brought the handgun back to Statesboro and allowed police to inspect and photograph Marc Wilson’s car.

He had a part-time job at a gym but was primarily being supported by his parents before his arrest, his father testified. He said the family would assist in making sure that Marc Wilson did not return to Bulloch County except for court appearances if that were made a condition of his release.

Aunt reports threats

But the prosecutor, Ogeechee Circuit Chief Assistant District Attorney Daphne Totten, also called one witness during the bond hearing. Heather Ernst, Haley Hutcheson’s aunt, said she was speaking for her entire family in asking that bond be denied.

“I’ve received multiple threats throughout this entire time,” Ernst said. “Threats have been made through the social media, private messages through social media, as well as some people received threats by email.”

She said the threats included “threats against our children, as far as harming our children” as well as threats to urinate and defecate on Hutcheson’s grave.

In answer to questions form Totten and the judge, Ernst said that the threats to desecrate the grave had occurred after the previous, July 7, attempt at preliminary and bond hearings. They were postponed that day over concerns about COVID-19 cases among witnesses.

Ernst, on Tuesday, testified that she didn’t know who made the threats, but that there had been “maybe 20 or more.”

When questioned by Johnson, she said she had discussed the threats with law enforcement but not forwarded the messages to investigators. “But I still have them,” she said.

Totten said the threats continued and have been shared with the district attorney’s office and some law enforcement officials, who are working to identify the source.

“We’ve got concerns about the risk of flight. … We also have concerns about harassment and intimidation,” Totten said.

She said the state was also concerned that, based on testimony heard Tuesday, Wilson had become angry after “racial hand gestures” were made toward him by people in the truck or someone flipped him a finger, and that this suggested he might be a danger to the community if released on bond.

But Hall referred to Wilson as having “almost 22 years of being a law-abiding citizen” with “not even so much as a traffic ticket.” She called his actions the night of the shooting a “moment in time” and “an anomaly” and argued that he would not pose a threat to anyone.

She said that the threats could not be attributed to Wilson or his family.

“Judge, we’ve seen, unfortunately, in other situations that people who know nothing about this case, have nothing to do with this case, can hijack this case by creating Facebook pages and social media cases,” Hall said.

“But wouldn’t it be true that people think they know something about this case because of extrajudicial statements that were made by the defense?” Muldrew said.

Hall said she respectfully disagreed and noted that the Police Department also held a media conference, with members of Hutcheson’s family, prior to Wilson’s arrest. She added that the defense had not directed anyone to take information it shared and threaten anybody.

“The court is extremely concerned about public statements that have been uttered on behalf of the defendant, and it appears they are made for no other reason than to influence the public and possibly witnesses in this case,” Muldrew said. “At this time it is hard to know which of those statements should be attributed to Mr. Wilson and his immediate supporters, but they are a great concern to the court, and the court will monitor the situation carefully.”

‘Significant threat’

But he said his denial of bond was based on other grounds, including a reported statement from Emma Rigdon, now identified as the young woman who was in the car with Wilson, that “Marc got mad and pulled a gun and shot.” That quote is from the judge, not directly from testimony.

“Due to the fact that Mr. Wilson’s anger appears to have overtaken him when he had contact with the persons in the truck occupied by Miss Haley Hutcheson, who appears by all accounts to be a true innocent party in this case, the court finds that the defendant poses a significant threat to persons in the community, and bond will be denied,” Muldrew said.

However, he said he could reconsider if grand jury proceedings are delayed too long because of COVID-19 situations.

Rigdon was not called to testify during Tuesday’s hearings. Instead, statements from her and someone who called police after hearing from her were reported by Statesboro Police Department Detective Travis Kreun, the first witness of the day.

His testimony and that from a driver of the driver of the pickup truck, Mason Glisson, 18, of Claxton, produced an at times contradictory picture of that night’s events.

One thing that became clear was Hutcheson’s position in the truck. She was in the back seat between two other teens, a young man and a young woman, while another young man was in the front passenger seat beside Glisson.

Referencing notes from the police investigation, Kreun said a single bullet hole was found in the middle of the back glass of the truck when it was searched and photographed. Police recovered three shell cases at two different spots on the bypass.

Other details from the preliminary hearing can be found in a story that has been posted at www.statesboroherald.com since Tuesday night.