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Record of Glen Cove murder suspect detailed

Cops tell of arguments at home and noise complaints from his neighbors

BY JOSEPH MALLIA | Newsday Staff Writer

August 24, 2006

Evan Marshall at the courthouse in Mineola on August 22, 2006. He is charged with killing and dismembering his neighbor Denice Fox. (Photo by Howard Schnapp)

City of Glen Cove police called Evan Marshall the "mad midnight drummer" because he often pounded away on his drum set late at night, and they once got an emergency plea for help from his mother during an argument at their home.

Marshall, accused last week in the decapitation murder of neighbor Denice Fox, 57, often generated noise complaints in his upscale Glen Cove neighborhood by loudly playing his drums, police said. Records also show that Marshall, 31, was arrested three times last year for shoplifting and driving while intoxicated.

Det. Sgt. Thomas Fitzpatrick said Marshall's mother, Jacqueline, called 911 in 1999 asking for assistance because she couldn't handle her son's outbursts.

"He and his mother had an argument and he became enraged," Fitzpatrick said. "She called because he was acting irrationally. He had an anger problem."

He said Marshall had left the house where he lived with his mother when police arrived and no arrests were made. As for the noise complaints, Fitzpatrick said, "He liked to play the drums. He was a mad midnight drummer."

His three Glen Cove arrests all came last year, records show. He was twice arrested on charges of shoplifting at a 7-Eleven and another convenience store in May and June 2005. He was charged with driving while intoxicated on Aug. 1, 2005, when he registered .08, the level at which someone is legally intoxicated, Glen Cove police said. His driver's license was suspended.

Marshall is being held without bail in the Nassau County jail on a charge of second-degree murder. Nassau police seized boxes of pornographic videotapes, sadomasochistic paraphernalia and sex toys from the basement closet of his mother's home at 3 Willada Lane.

Since the Aug. 17 killing, police have been trying to determine whether Marshall, a bedding salesman, is connected to similar crimes in New York or in other states he has visited or lived in, including California, Florida or Arizona. The Manhasset High School graduate attended Arizona State University, graduating in 1997 with a degree in history.

After Marshall's arrest last week, Glen Cove detectives looked into whether there were any complaints from neighbors about him, but found nothing, Fitzpatrick said.

Neither Jacqueline Marshall nor her son's lawyer, William Keahon, could be reached for comment yesterday.

In August 2003, records show, Marshall was involved in a traffic accident in Phoenix. At the time of the accident, according to Philip Stanfield, an attorney involved in the case, Marshall said he was driving back to California to attend Western State University College of Law, in Fullerton, Calif. Officials at the law school declined to say whether Marshall had been a student there.

Real estate records show that Marshall's father, Robert, owns a waterfront home in Newport Beach, Calif. Neighbors of the father said yesterday that the elder Marshall rented out the home.

And at the Homestead Apartments in Fullerton -- where records show Evan lived in 2002 -- few remembered him.

"I talked to him once or twice. He'd be nice enough, but he seemed a little weird, slurring his words and that sort of thing," said Wayne Williams, the assistant maintenance manager of the complex.

Staff writers Karla Schuster and Michael Frazier contributed to this story.