PETERSBURG, Va. -- Days after four people were murdered in Petersburg last year, suspect Alexander Hill, Jr. was spotted at a Rocky Mount, North Carolina Amtrak station. Then he vanished. A year-long U.S. Marshal's manhunt had been underway ever since. The manhunt ended Thursday morning at a homeless convent in Buffalo, New York. News of Hill's capture brought a lot of hugs to Harding Street in Petersburg.
"I’m just overwhelmed with joy. I just want justice, man. I've been asking for it since last Easter," Delvonte Balthrop said. Balthrop's two-year-old son Delvair , along with three women, was murdered inside the Harding Street home.
"He was my only son,” Balthrop said. “I’m at a loss for words."
Hill, who had been a person of interest in the case, was charged just last week with four counts of murder. In the following days, investigators used a nationwide media push to look for the man who was just a week away from going on the Marshal's Top 15 Most Wanted list. He was captured without incident.
"Hill had been staying at a soup kitchen and living at a church in the city of Buffalo,” U.S. Marshal Bobby Mathieson said. “Thanks to the stars lining up, maybe some divine intervention and the media-tips coming in."
An employee at St. Luke’s Mission of Mercy told WTVR CBS 6 Hill had been staying at a convent for the homeless on church grounds. The man said Hill would help out around the church including taking the trash out. He said Hill had been at St. Luke’s for a week or less.
Marshals said Hill used the alias ‘Trent Dales’ and said initially, he wouldn't let the Feds fingerprint him.
"Now we are in it for the long haul,” Petersburg Commonwealth’s Attorney Cassandra Conover said. “It will be a long summer. I want to thank the Marshal’s service, but now it's time to begin the work of justice."
Hill has a hearing in Buffalo federal court next Thursday. Marshals will want to learn more about where he's been. St. Luke’s is just 15-minute car ride to the Peace Bridge which crosses the Canadian border.
