Left to right: Trenton Ivy (Racine County Sheriff’s Office) and Marquisha Williams (St. Louis Police Department).
A 34-year-old man in Missouri will spend more than four decades in prison for killing the mother of his four children, beating and strangling her to death and leaving her body in an Illinois nature preserve.
Trenton D. Ivy on Monday pleaded guilty to one count of second-degree murder, one count of second-degree tampering with a motor vehicle and two counts of tampering with physical evidence in the death of 29-year-old Marquisha Williams, court records show.
St. Louis County Judge Stanley James Wallach sentenced Ivy to 30 years for the murder and four years for each of the remaining three counts, to be served consecutively, for a total of 42 years.
Williams’ children were in the courtroom for the sentencing and confronted their father, asking, “Why did you do this?” according to a report from St. Louis NBC affiliate KSDK.
Williams’ mother, Norvette Chavis, also addressed the court before sentencing.
“I lived through a nightmare,” Chavis told the judge, recounting how she searched for her daughter for days in the December cold, according to St. Louis CBS affiliate KMOV.
Chavis ended her statement with a message to Ivy about the bond Williams shared with her children.
“You may have taken my daughter’s life,” Chavis said, “but you will never take her love.”
Williams’ cousin, Cori Curry, wrote a victim impact statement that was read aloud during the hearing.
“They lost the person who should have been there for their birthdays, graduations, holidays, accomplishments, disappointments, and ordinary moments,” Curry reportedly wrote.
As Law&Crime previously reported, Williams was reported missing in December 2023 after failing to show up for work. Family members told police that Williams and Ivy had dropped off their children at daycare centers and relatives’ homes before leaving together in her 2020 Jeep Compass.
Ivy was arrested Dec. 22, 2023, in Racine County, Wisconsin, on unrelated charges. He was alone in Williams’ Jeep when he was taken into custody, and investigators found what police described as “apparent blood and biological material” inside the vehicle, along with Williams’ personal belongings.
During an interview with Racine detectives, Ivy admitted that he killed Williams in St. Louis following a physical altercation and then disposed of her body in Illinois, according to the St. Louis County Police Department.
“During a post-Miranda interview with detectives of the Racine Police Department, the defendant admitted to killing Williams in St. Louis,” police said following Ivy’s arrest. “The defendant further admitted to having a physical altercation with Williams, which resulted in her death. He then admitted to disposing of her body in an unknown location.”
Williams’ body was found Dec. 28 in an Illinois nature preserve. The Cook County Medical Examiner determined that the manner of death was homicide and the cause was strangulation.
Ivy was originally charged with first-degree murder, abandonment of a corpse and two counts of tampering with physical evidence. Those charges were later downgraded as part of his plea agreement.
Sandy Bagley, Williams’ aunt, previously offered what she believed was the motive for the murder in an interview with KSDK. Bagley said the couple had separated earlier in the year. While they were working on co-parenting their children, Bagley said her niece “started seeing someone else,” which angered Ivy.
