Crime Stoppers tip leads to arrest in Bradenton homicide case

BRADENTON -- A Crime Stoppers tip led homicide detectives to the suspect in the fatal shooting of another man in East Bradenton last month.

At 1:51 a.m. March 21, Manatee County Sheriff's Office deputies responded to reported gunfire in the 4300 block of Eighth Street Court East in Bradenton. They arrived to find Nicolette Johnson, 24, lying in a driveway suffering from gunshot wounds.

Johnson was pronounced dead by paramedics at the scene.

Two days later, detectives identified Kyle Dewayne Stackhouse, 27, as a suspect in the shooting and obtained a warrant for his arrest charging him with second-degree murder.

On Monday, Stackhouse was apprehended in Jonesboro, Ga. He is expected to be transported to the Manatee County jail early next week to face the murder charge.

It was a single Crime Stoppers tip that led detectives to identify Stackhouse as the shooter, according to lead detective Jeffrey Bliss.

"That's what blew the case wide open," Bliss said.

The affidavit for Stackhouse's arrest warrant sheds light on the circumstances of the shooting and how Stack

house became a suspect.

After hearing gunfire, a witness called 911, looked out a window and saw a white four-door sedan speed off to the north on Eighth Street Court East. The neighbor walked outside to find Johnson with several gunshot wounds to the head.

Near Johnson was a black .40-caliber handgun, his cell phone, several spent .45-caliber shell casings and one spent round.

At about 3:35 a.m., deputies found a silver four-door Hyundai engulfed in flames in the 11900 block of Moccasin Wallow Road. Detectives later learned the car had been stolen, but not yet reported as such.

On March 23, an informant told detectives about a man he believed was responsible for Johnson's death and the arson, the report states, and that the witness had been shot several months earlier.

Detectives determined the witness and Stackhouse had been shot on March 29, 2015, and the detective in earlier case said Johnson had been a person of interest.

During an interview, the witness told detectives he had been sitting in the driver's seat of his Hyundai parked in front of Johnson's home about 1:30 a.m. on the morning Johnson was shot dead, according to the report. Johnson, he told detectives, was sitting behind him in the backseat with the door open and his legs facing out.

The witness said he was at Johnson's home to buy cocaine, but Johnson didn't have any, so he was waiting on Stackhouse to bring him some. Stackhouse had called to say he was almost there and not to leave, which the witness felt was suspicious, he told detectives.

Johnson's cell phone's call log confirmed that the call came in at 1:39 a.m.

"(The witness) stated that out of nowhere he heard numerous gunshots," Bliss wrote.

He then saw someone running away from his car, headed south, the witness told detectives. The witness quickly accelerated, speeding off north on Eighth Street Court East, and Johnson fell out of the car.

Stackhouse arrived on foot five minutes later to the same location the witness had driven to, the affidavit states. The witness confronted Stackhouse about the shooting and was told "it had to happen" and to get rid of the car, but he refused. He demanded the car and left it somewhere, according to the report.

Stackhouse, according to the affidavit, told him that it had been Johnson who had shot them in 2015.

Jessica De Leon, Herald law enforcement reporter, can be reached at 941-745-7049. You can follow her on Twitter @JDeLeon1012.

This story was originally published April 1, 2016 at 10:56 PM with the headline "Crime Stoppers tip leads to arrest in Bradenton homicide case ."