Alleged serial killer Billy Chemirmir to go on trial Monday in Dallas County
DALLAS - Billy Chemirmir, who’s indicted on 18 counts of capital murder, will go on trial Monday.
Chemirmir is accused of posing as a utility or maintenance worker to gain entry to senior living facilities and homes where his elderly victims lived alone. They were then suffocated and robbed of their jewelry
One of his alleged victims, Phyllis Payne, married the love of her life. They were together for 66 years and had children and grandchildren.
After he died in 2011, she lived independently at a senior living apartment, but it was there, when she was 91 years old, that investigators said a serial killer, Chemirmir, suffocated and killed her, before stealing her jewelry.
"He posed as a maintenance worker and then he knocked on her door, said that he was there to fix her alert button in the bathroom, and she just let him in," Payne’s daughter, Loren Adair Smith, said.
Investigators said Chemirmir targeted elderly women, suffocating and killing 18 of them in Dallas and Collin counties from 2016 to 2018, and robbed them of their jewelry. Payne almost went on vacation with family members before she was killed in 2016.
"But she said, ‘Oh I can’t go this time, I’m hosting bridge club, I have too much going on,’" Smith recalled.
Payne’s death was initially ruled a natural cause. It was two years later that police connected the dots to other deaths.
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"I think there’s a clear path to a conviction," said attorney Russell Wilson, a former Dallas County prosecutor who is not involved in this case.
Wilson pointed out that Chemirmir is only on trial for one of those murders Monday, 81–year-old Lu Harris, who was killed in her Dallas home in 2018.
"The prosecutor doesn’t get to come in and put on all 18 victims," Wilson explained.
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The Dallas County District Attorney’s Office is seeking life in prison without parole for Chemirmir.
He’ll later be tried in at least one of the other murders in Dallas County. He could also be tried for more.
Basically, if Chemirmir isn’t convicted for Harris’ murder, he’s far from a free man.
"You know, if there’s 18 cases, you can have 18 trials," Wilson said.
Payne’s daughter doesn’t know what she would say to Chemirmir, but she’ll be in court Monday with other family members of victims seeking justice and wondering why he preyed on the elderly.
"I miss her a lot and we know we would’ve had many more years to enjoy life with her," Smith said. "She would not have expected there to be anyone in the halls that would cause any harm to her and so she just opened the door and let him in."
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