Left: Gabrielle A. Stine (McLean County Jail). Right: Jamere Bew (Minor-Morris Funeral Home).
A 25-year-old woman in Illinois will spend several decades behind bars for her role in the brutal killing of her boyfriend, who was beaten with a baseball bat and shot multiple times two years ago.
McLean County Circuit Judge William Yoder on Tuesday ordered Gabrielle A. Stine to serve 40 years in a state correctional facility for the slaying of 31-year-old Jamere Bew, court records reviewed by Law&Crime show.
Yoder handed down the sentence immediately after Stine formally pleaded guilty to one count of first-degree murder. In exchange for pleading to Bew”s murder, prosecutors agreed to dismiss one count of kidnapping while armed with a firearm, per court records.
Stine was credited with 475 days of time already served. Following the end of her incarceration, which must be served in-full, she will be required to serve an additional three years on supervised release.
Stine’s two co-defendants in the case, 28-year-old Justin G. Kletz and 20-year-old Derek Siebring, both already pleaded guilty to charges of first-degree murder. Siebring in March was handed a 65-year sentence while Kletz, who entered his plea last month, is scheduled to appear for his sentencing hearing on Nov. 25. He faces between 35 and 75 years.
Left: Justin G. Kletz (McLean County Jail) and Derek Siebring (McLean County Jail).
Court records obtained by The Pentagraph provided additional details about the circumstances of Bew’s murder and the defendants’ roles in the violent slaying.
According to the report, deputies with the McLean County Sheriff’s Office at about 7 a.m. on Nov. 25, 2023, responded to the rural area of 1375 East Road and 700 North Road after Stine called 911 and reported that her friend had been shot.
Bew’s body was soon found in a nearby ditch. He appeared to have been restrained, beaten and shot.
Investigators reportedly discovered that the previous evening, Bew was at Kletz’s apartment in the 1600 block of Springfield Road in Bloomington, Illinois. Deputies, accompanied by officers from the Bloomington Police Department, responded to the residence and described smelling bleach and finding blood-stained clothing and a couch in the dumpster.
Authorities said they knocked on the front door of the apartment and heard someone inside the residence say they had to “burn it all.”
It was later revealed that Stine had told Kletz and Siebring that Bew had sexually assaulted her in her sleep, per the report. Enraged, the two men reportedly beat Bew with a baseball bat, restrained him with duct tape, then stuffed him in the trunk of Stine’s car and drove him out to a rural area in Funks Grove Township. There, they threw Bew in a ditch and repeatedly shot him, then went back to the apartment and attempted to align their stories about the previous night.
At some point after the murder, prosecutors said Stine burglarized Bew’s apartment, local NBC and ABC affiliate WEEK reported.
Before charging Stine with murder, investigators said they discovered that she had taken cellphone videos and photographs of a bloodied and bound Bew just before he was killed.
“The details surrounding this case are horrific, and the knowledge that the victim’s family and friends now carry of the victim’s final moments is a burden nobody should have to endure,” McLean County State’s Attorney Erika Reynolds said in a statement. “It is our hope that the victim’s family and friends will find some peace knowing this chapter is closed.”
