Prosecutors in Florida have now formally charged the estranged husband who they say shot and killed his wife in a storage unit and covered her body with tires.
Cory Hill, 51, is charged with second-degree murder in the death of Shakeira Rucker. He’s also charged with attempted murder after he allegedly shot up his girlfriend’s house hours after police say he killed Rucker.
The Orange County Sheriff’s Office originally arrested Hill on a first-degree murder charge, but the Ninth Circuit State Attorney’s Office said in a press release it filed the second-degree murder charge on Friday so Hill could continue to be held in jail without bond. A first-degree murder charge can be filed at a later time.
On Saturday, Rucker’s family held a celebration-of-life service in honor of the mother of four.
“She was full of life, joy, and she was a woman of God, she praised God,” Dedra Rucker, Shakeira’s sister, said, according to Orlando NBC outlet WESH. “That’s what we did today. We really represented her. She’s going to be well remembered.”
Her family also took time to speak out against domestic violence.
“No man or woman should be abused physically, mentally, emotionally,” said the pastor presiding over the funeral, per Orlando ABC outlet WFTV. “Check yourself.”
Shakeira Rucker was found dead in a Florida storage unit Nov. 18 after she had been missing for a week. Her estranged husband Cory Hill is facing murder charges in her death. (Rucker: Winter Springs Police Department; Cory Hill: Orange County Jail)
As Law&Crime previously reported, Rucker was last seen on Nov. 11 and wasn’t found until a week later on Nov. 18 when a “distinct odor of human decomposition” was emanating from the storage locker in Apopka, a suburb of Orlando, a probable cause affidavit said. Detectives found four spent cartridge casings, including one in her hair, and blood on the walls and floor.
Rucker left her Winter Springs home with Hill on Nov. 11 and they were seen on surveillance video later that day about 50 miles away at a retail store and restaurant in Davenport. Video surveillance reportedly later showed a car with two people inside fitting the descriptions of Hill and Rucker drive into a storage facility and Hill punch in his code to enter his unit shortly after 6:30 a.m. Nov. 12.
Hill left the facility alone about 20 minutes later. Rucker’s family contacted him to ask about her whereabouts but Hill said he was not with her. Her family also received a text message around 6:45 a.m. that she was on her way home, the affidavit said.
Detectives wrote that Rucker had recently found out that Hill had been in a romantic relationship with another woman. Neither woman had been aware of the other, investigators said. The ex-girlfriend ended the relationship after she learned Hill was married, investigators said.
Hill’s ex-girlfriend told Orange County Sheriff’s deputies she was standing outside her Kissimmee home on Nov. 12 with her cousin and her two children when she noticed Hill’s vehicle. Hill got out of his car and started shooting at them, according to a probable cause arrest affidavit reviewed by Law&Crime. She and her family ran into the home and she heard what she believed was a “bullet fly closely by her ear.”
Once inside the home, the ex-girlfriend went to hide in a bathroom while her cousin hid in another room with the children. Hill allegedly broke a kitchen window to get inside and started screaming her name. Hill then broke down the bedroom door where the cousin and children were hiding and said to one of them “take me to your mommy” while holding the gun at his side, the affidavit said. The woman said she dated Hill for about two months but he became upset when she called a woman later identified as his wife. Hill said she would “regret it,” according to the affidavit.
Deputies found four bullets in the home, and home surveillance video showed Hill inside with a gun, detectives wrote. Hill was arrested on four counts of attempted murder and was in jail without bond before the murder charge for Rucker’s death. He has not cooperated with detectives regarding the Rucker case, authorities said.
If Hill is found guilty of killing Rucker, it will be his second murder conviction. More than 30 years ago, Hill was charged with second-degree murder in a Dec. 23, 1992, shooting death of an 18-year-old man in Suffolk, Virginia, court records and news archives show. The Virginia Daily Press reported at the time that Hill, then 20, shot and killed a man who he thought had stolen his 1988 Ford Tempo with his daughter still inside weeks earlier. Hill went to the teen’s home and shot him several times after an argument. A jury convicted Hill the next year and he was sentenced to 20 years in prison.
The murder conviction was news to the Rucker family.
“He had like a history we never knew,” Dedra Rucker told WFTV. “He was supposed to be a man of God in the church. We never knew.”
The death has left her family devastated. Now they want justice.
“He needs to go down for everything, everything he is,” Clarence Thorton, Rucker’s brother, told WFTV. “My sister should have never been in that situation. Not in a million years I would have thought my sister (to) ever been in that situation.”
Shakeira Rucker leaves behind four children, ages 7, 9, 16 and 18. The family has started a GoFundMe account for her kids which has raised around $34,000.
“She was a loving mother to four beautiful children and a victim of senseless violence,” Debra Rucker wrote.
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