Michigan State Police Detectives Jim Bundshuh, right, and Joseph White, left, talk with Washtenaw County Sheriff Deputy Craig Harvey at the scene of the Pageant Street home in Ypsilanti Township.

File photo

For years, Ira Bevins Jr. threatened to kill his mother, making her so fearful that she tape-recorded a conversation with him, newly released documents show.

He made good on that threat June 28, beating, stabbing, and shooting Uvon Bevins, then setting fire to her house with her body inside, reports said.

Minutes later, Washtenaw County Sheriff’s deputies Michael Marocco and Chad Teets confronted him at a nearby intersection in Ypsilanti Township.

They ordered him to drop a gun, but he refused and pointed it toward them, records show.

That’s when Marocco, who had never fired his weapon in the line of duty, shot Bevins in the back and face.

Washtenaw County prosecutors ruled the shooting was justified.

“The deputy gave Bevins an opportunity to surrender, but he did not and instead took aggressive action by pointing the gun,” said a memo to Prosecutor Brian Mackie from Chief Assistant Prosecutor Joseph Burke. “The deputy took the only reasonable action available.”

The memo was included in nearly 250 pages of documents obtained by AnnArbor.com from the Michigan State Police under the Freedom of Information Act. An internal sheriff's department investigation also cleared the deputies of any wrongdoing.

The documents shed new light on what happened that night. State police detectives investigated both deaths at the request of the sheriff's department.

“The facts bore out that (the deputies) acted within our policies and procedures and that the shooting was justified,” said Sheriff Jerry Clayton.

Both deputies returned to duty after being placed on paid administrative leave for a short time, which is routine in an officer-involved shooting.

"They acted in the best interest of the community and to keep themselves safe," said Derrick Jackson, director of community engagement for the sheriff’s department. "The deputies really are here to protect life, so when they have to take a life, that's not an easy thing to do."

Bevins’ sister, Sandra Haubrich, questioned why Marocco fired a second shot.

“Knowing the man was down, they shot him in the face,” she said. “I can’t get over that. Does that sound like a logical thing to happen?”

A deputy opens fire

Marocco and Teets declined through their attorney to be interviewed by state police detectives about the shooting, documents show.

However, both provided similar accounts in reports they were required to submit to the sheriff’s department that morning.

The deputies were working in the MacArthur Boulevard neighborhood in Superior Township when they responded to a report of a suspicious garage fire at Byron and Pageant avenues in Ypsilanti Township at 12:11 a.m. Dispatchers informed them a man seen leaving the fire may have mental issues and apparently barricaded himself in the house with a gun a year earlier.

A woman who called 911 said the man was carrying a gun and plastic bag. Deputies found a man matching the description at the intersection of Wendell Avenue and Red Leaf Lane, they wrote in their accounts.

Marocco stopped his unmarked blue Chevrolet Impala at the intersection, which was illuminated by a streetlight.

The intersection of Wendell Avenue and Releaf Lane is shown.

Lon Horwedel | AnnArbor.com

The plainclothes deputies - wearing shirts with a sheriff’s badge on the front and “SHERIFF” on the back - exited the car.

The man, who was 10 yards away, was carrying a plastic bag in his left hand, walking west toward the southwest corner of the intersection where they parked. Deputies ordered him to stop.

“Police! Freeze!” they yelled, Teets wrote.

The man took a revolver out of the bag and held it in his right hand, when both deputies gave him multiple "loud and clear verbal commands to drop the gun," Teets wrote.

“I’m not dropping no f---ing gun,” Bevins replied, according to Teets.

Marocco used the driver’s side door as cover, and Teets was behind the rear bumper on the passenger side. Both unholstered their firearms.

“Bevins began to turn his upper torso in a clockwise movement toward my position with the handgun in his right hand,” Teets wrote.

Marocco fired his department-issued Glock .45-caliber semi-automatic handgun. Bevins went to the ground, Marocco wrote.

Bevins, who was on his back,"looked back toward me and again pointed the weapon at me," Marocco wrote.

Marocco fired a second shot, striking Bevins in the face.

Bevins held onto the gun “for a short time, then dropped it and rolled to his left slightly before settling on his back,” according to Marocco, who stepped on the gun near Bevins’ head. There were several knives on the ground next to Bevins' left hand.

A suspect is down

Marocco relayed to dispatch that a man was down, and he had fired two rounds. He requested an ambulance and union representative.

Deputy Daniel Buffa, who arrived within two minutes, searched the man and found a cell phone and several .357 caliber bullets in his left pocket.

Buffa saw a "bullet hole" on the right cheekbone area of the man's face, but he wasn’t bleeding.

"I still observed the suspect to be breathing, so I began talking to the suspect, telling him to keep breathing because (an ambulance) was on their way,” Buffa wrote.

Sgt. Marlene Radzik, who is now a lieutenant, arrived shortly after and recognized Bevins because of a scar on his chest from a suicide attempt, she wrote.

Bevins was taken to St. Joseph Mercy Hospital, where he was pronounced dead. A funeral service still hasn’t been held, family members said, because his 18-year-old daughter can’t accept what happened.

Confronting a killer

When deputies confronted Bevins at the intersection, he had just beaten his mother, stabbed her, shot her in the face and burned her body, reports said.

He set fire to nine areas of the four-bedroom Pageant Avenue house they shared, using lighter fluid and gasoline to fuel the blaze, records show.

Firefighters found the body of his 66-year-old mother at 12:37 a.m. in her bedroom. It smelled of gasoline. Two shell casings were on the floor of another bedroom.

Uvon Bevins had multiple “suspected knife wounds,” to her head and hands, “severe burns to her body,” and blunt force trauma to her head, documents show.

According to prosecutors, Bevins used his mother's gun to kill her. State police detectives never found the bullet, which exited her body.

Investigators searched the home the morning of the fire, recovering two lighter fluid containers and two gas cans.

A 15-year-old girl who was with the 911 caller told state police she saw Ira Bevins inside the kitchen during the blaze. When he was coming outside, she told him the garage was on fire, records show.

He replied, "Paramedics are on the way."

But Bevins never called 911, investigators said.

The State Police investigation

Bevins, 43, died of his gunshot wounds, an autopsy found. One bullet entered the right side of his lower back and lodged in his left hip. The other pierced his upper right cheek and was recovered from his left shoulder, autopsy results showed.

The 12:19 a.m. shooting wasn’t captured on video because the Impala was not equipped with an in-car camera.

Sheriff’s Cmdr. Dieter Heren pointed state police detectives to two shell casings by the driver’s side of the Impala, records show.

The .357 caliber Smith & Wesson revolver recovered from Bevins “contained six rounds of unfired ammunition,” sheriff’s Lt. Jim Anuszkiewicz told state police.

State police detectives interviewed five witnesses who heard the gunshots, records show, but none had a clear view of the shooting.

Daniel Reynolds was watching television about 12:15 a.m. when he heard some yelling outside that lasted between 30 seconds and one minute, he told state police.

He looked out the window and saw a vehicle in the middle of the intersection with its lights shining into his house. A man was standing by the driver's side door.

"He saw a second individual in front of the car by the curb in the area where Ira was eventually shot," records show. "At the same time, he heard a gunshot."

Ashley Brock told police she heard what she thought were fireworks and looked out the window. Someone in a gray shirt and black pants was standing behind a car, she said.

"Don't move motherf---er," the person said. She then heard a second shot and someone yell: "Stay down."

The warning signs

Ira Bevins Jr., the youngest of six, had a history of mental illness, few close friends and never really held a job, family members said.

He depended on his parents, who retired from the auto industry. His father died in 2005, putting more pressure on his mother. She had hobbies, including cooking and working in her yard, but spent much of her time dealing with her son, family members said.

Ira Bevins Jr. had been getting drunk and threatening to kill his mother for 20 years, his brother, Thomas, told state police.

But in the weeks leading up to the killing, he also was making the threats while he was sober, his brother told investigators. In addition, Bevins was threatening to kill a woman who accused him of sexually assaulting her.

He told relatives he would “shoot it out with the cops” if he carried out those threats, reports said.

Bevins was out on $15,000 bond, charged with first-degree criminal sexual conduct in an Aug. 4, 2008, incident. His mother bailed him out, family members said.

As a condition of his bond, he was required to undergo alcohol testing. Washtenaw County Circuit Judge David Swartz lifted that condition in May at the request of Bevins' public defender because Bevins had been passing the tests.

But Bevins started drinking regularly again and reportedly was drunk and looking for a gun the night he killed his mother, records show.

"Ira, when he wasn't drinking, would give you his last dollar for food," said his sister, Rhonda Holder. "When he was drinking, he was a very aggravating person."

Bevins was upset about the charge against him and let his frustration be known. He reportedly had a more than a two-year relationship with his accuser, and his family members were convinced the allegations were false. Bevins wanted his mother to pay for a private attorney.

The Bevins lived in this home at 1235 Pageant Street in Ypsilanti Township.

Lon Horwedel | AnnArbor.com

"He didn't feel he was going to get properly represented by a court-appointed attorney," Holder said.

Two weeks before killing his mother, Bevins visited an acquaintance and told him he was angry about the rape allegation. He asked for a pistol, saying "he needed to take care of something or go away to prison for 20 years," records show.

Uvon Bevins was becoming increasingly fearful of her son, records show.

On June 26, she went to the sheriff's substation on Holmes Road in an attempt to have her son's bond revoked, her friend told state police. Relatives say Uvon Bevins was referred to the courts.

She had obtained a personal protection order against her son in 2000, but asked it be lifted because it put her son out on the street, Holder said. Uvon Bevins would call police to report threats, but was told there was little they could do because her son lived at the home.

"Ira was mentally ill," Holder said. "He had a record that shows that and my mom and dad were in between a rock and a hard spot."

Ira Bevins Jr. belonged in a mental hospital, Holder said.

"It's just terrible," Holder said. "We had two people crying out for help, and nobody did nothing about it and we pay the consequences for it."

Uvon Bevins called Holder the morning of June 27 telling her, "Ira had aggravated her all night long and she just couldn't take it anymore."

She asked Holder how to use a tape recorder Holder gave her on June 6.

Uvon Bevins wanted to show authorities evidence that her son was threatening to kill her, Holder said.

The last time Uvon Bevins was seen alive was when she left a friend's home at 4:30 p.m. on June 27, about seven and a half hours before the fire was reported. After lunch, she told her friend "she was scared and concerned because Ira was threatening to kill her."

State police didn't find the tape recorder when they searched Uvon Bevins' home. A family member’s boyfriend found it the next night near a dresser in her bedroom.

It contained a tape that lasts several minutes. On it is the voice of a man believed to be Ira Bevins Jr.

"Ira Bevins is heard threatening to murder Uvon Bevins approximately five times, and implies he might kill others as well," records show.

Holder has the tape, but hasn't listened to it. She doesn't want to know the details.

"It ain't gonna bring either one of them back."

Lee Higgins covers crime and courts for AnnArbor.com. Reach him at (734) 623-2527 or email at leehiggins@annarbor.com.