Judge certifies murder, weapon charges against Comer to June 5 grand jury
~ PVN staff report
LURAY, May 16 — Following more than two-and-a-half hours of testimony and 13 witnesses presented by the prosecution, a general district court judge on Thursday certified three felony charges against Timothy Thomas Comer to a June 5 grand jury in circuit court. The most shocking testimony given during the preliminary hearing came from a former inmate, who stated that Comer not only told him details about the June 29, 2023 shooting of Greg Williams…but also how he shot his grandmother and nephew before pouring gasoline on their bodies and burning them inside their home.
Comer was the subject of a two-week manhunt last summer in the Jollet Hollow area of southern Page County. The first 11 days of the 15-day search for Comer following the shooting of Williams utilized resources from the sheriff’s office in Page, Rockingham and Shenandoah counties, as well as the Virginia State Police. The search was joined by U.S. Marshals and the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives soon after a fatal fire on the same block of Jollett Road claimed two lives on Sunday, July 9, 2023. Found the next day among the debris, the remains of two bodies were sent to the Chief Medical Examiner in Manassas. The two victims were believed to be an elderly woman and her grandson, who lived at the residence.
John McClure, a recently released inmate housed in the same jail as Comer, testified on Thursday that over a two-week period of conversations in jail Comer talked about the details of all three murders. Although court-appointed public defender Peter McDermott tried to point to inconsistencies in McClure’s testimony and highlight his criminal record, the former inmate stated that Comer told him he killed his grandmother and nephew as revenge for them selling his property “out from under him” while he was previously incarcerated. Williams’ shooting was also over property disputes, according to McClure’s testimony.
At about 5:05 p.m. on June 29, the Page County Emergency Communications Center (ECC) received a 911 call in reference to a “man down” in the 5600 block of Jollett Road. The site actually has an Elkton mailing address, but sits within the southern boundary of Page County not far from Naked Creek.
Upon the arrival of first responders from fire, emergency medical services (EMS) and law enforcement, a male identified as Gregory Lee Williams, 69, of the 5600 block of Jollett Road, was “located on his property deceased from an apparent gunshot wound,” according to a press release issued by the Page County Sheriff’s Office on July 1, 2023. The investigation was immediately handled as a homicide.
The first person to actually find Williams’ body was Steve Breeden, a friend and hunting buddy who served as the prosecution’s first witness on Thursday. On the day of the shooting, Breeden stated he received a call from Williams’ wife and went looking for his friend. He found his lifeless body near a fence line with Comer’s property. Breeden testified that his all-terrain vehicle (side-by-side) was still running, with Williams’ rifle strapped in between the seats. He returned to Williams’ home, informed his wife, and called law enforcement.
McClure testified that Comer told him he was arguing with some guy over property, and he told the other guy “if I can’t have it, no one else can have it either.” He then stated that he shot him with a .45 pistol, unloading the entire clip, according to McClure. The former inmate shared other details from Comer’s story, such as the four-wheeler was still running.
The two-week manhunt for Comer that took place after the June 29 shooting was conducted in the Jollett Hollow area — a remote and rugged region in which Comer reportedly knew well and never left. Some sources have indicated that Comer may have been living in a small trailer in the Jollett area for a while with no electricity or running water. Mixed reports at the time indicated the fugitive may have been avoiding law enforcement through the area’s many trails and thickets, or possibly by getting some help from close-by friends and relatives. Shenandoah National Park temporarily shut down some trails in that area during the most intensive portion of the search. Some in the area had also mentioned some potential squabbling among the neighbors prior to the shooting.
On July 11, 2023, federal marshals started offering a $2,500 reward for information on the whereabouts of Comer. Two days later, ATF joined the search and added another $7,500 to the reward purse. At 9:37 p.m. on Thursday, July 13, 2023 — just a few hours after the reward money increased three-fold to $10,000 — Comer was in custody.
The sheriff’s office received numerous tips from citizens during the search, but seemed to arrive at some sites just after Comer had reportedly left the area. That ended when a tip came in around 6 p.m. on July 13, 2023 “that Comer was seen entering a vacant home in the 4000 block of Jollett Road.” Although deputies arrived within minutes, verified that Comer was inside the residence and established a perimeter, according to the report, it would be more than three hours before Comer was arrested.
The delay was fueled by Comer’s defiance to multiple commands by law enforcement to exit the residence, the report stated. Gas was used to push him out of the structure. He was eventually taken into custody by a state police tactical team.
While Page County Sheriff Chad Cubbage at one point during the investigation indicated that Comer was being sought for “possible arson” as well, no such charge has been placed against the suspect, or anyone since the July 9, 2023 Jollet Hollow blaze that consumed two bodies.
The shocking testimony of McClure on Thursday left family members in the courtroom in tears, as he described how Comer told him he used a .22 rifle to shoot his grandmother in the head, and then shoot his nephew. He recalled how Comer had bragged that police would never find the gun because he surrounded the bodies with gasoline and burned the trailer down on top of them.
When Comer asked McClure how he could get away with murder, the former inmate suggested pleading insanity. A short time later, Comer was in the medical block of Central Virginia Regional Jail appearing to take that advice, according to McClure’s testimony. Unlike most jailhouse informants, McClure’s testimony did not come in exchange for any accommodation or reduced sentence, as he had already completed his sentence.
Last July soon after his capture, Comer, 56, was officially charged in general district court with a Class 2 felony for the first degree murder of Greg Williams, an unclassified felony for use of a firearm in the commission of a felony, and a Class 6 felony for the possession of a firearm as a convicted felon.
On Thursday, Richard Bruce testified to giving Comer a ride around June 2023 and during that ride Comer placed a green and black handgun on the floor. While the defense tried to establish during cross examination that this ride occurred before the shooting or the manhunt, the prosecution simply wanted to establish that Comer was in felony possession of the weapon around the same time. The prosecution would also provide evidence showing that a green and black .45 caliber handgun was found inside the trailer that Comer was hiding in and laboratory ballistics testing would later match the .45 shell casing recovered at the
scene of Williams’ murder to the handgun.
When the autopsy report came back, it stated that Greg Williams died of a gunshot wound to the head. The bullet appeared to enter just below his left eye, and exited at the back of his head. Based on blood at the scene, he appeared to have fallen backwards after being shot from the front, and the shell casing was to the right of where the shooter would have been standing facing him.
Commonwealth Attorney Bryan Cave presented multiple witnesses and evidence outlining the prosecution’s arguments for motive, opportunity, possession of the murder weapon, flight after the shooting, and a confession. While a preliminary hearing is similar to a trial, only the prosecution presents the testimony of witnesses before a judge. There is no jury, and the defense does not present any evidence. The judge does not decide guilt or innocence, but instead simply makes a determination if there is enough probable cause to believe that the crime may have been committed.
By the end of the nearly three-hour preliminary hearing, Judge Kenneth Alger II determined that the prosecution had shown sufficient evidence to certify the charges to a circuit court grand jury, which next meets on Wednesday, June 5.
For more information on Page County courts,
visit https://www.pagecounty.virginia.gov/150/Courts
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