Local News

Acquaintance Charged with Murder of Carrboro Woman

Posted Updated

CARRBORO — May 13, 1996, 11:25 a.m. EDT

An Orange County man free on bond on charges of assault and kidnapping has been charged in last week's beating death of a 24-year-old Carrboro woman.

Stacy N. Jones was being held without bail in the Orange County Jail on a first-degree murder charge. He was arrested early Sunday morning.

Jones, 28, was charged last month with abducting and beating the victim, Heather Dawn Prather. He was arrested in Washington, D.C., and brought back to North Carolina to stand charges in connection with the April 13 incident.

Police said that Prather and Jones once dated.

On Friday, police found Prather dead in her Estes Park apartment. Police came to the apartment after finding her car abandoned. She had been beaten to death, and she also suffered a knife wound.

Prather lived alone and worked for both Marriott Corporation and Gold's Gym. Investigators think she was killed between 2 a.m. and 5 a.m. Friday by a lone assailant who then took her car.

The car was found off N.C. 54 near Hatch Road in a residential area. Police said there was no sign anyone had broken into her apartment or that she had been robbed or sexually assaulted.

Prather's death was the first homicide in Carrboro this year

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