Despite statistics showing intimate partners are often responsible for female homicides, a responding officer said he didn’t believe Taylor Marshall’s boyfriend had killed her
Editor’s note: This story includes graphic details of a murder scene that may be disturbing to some readers.
A criminal trial of the man suspected in a 2023 John Street homicide and a boardwalk stabbing that occurred the same day entered its fourth day on Thursday.
Steven Jones stands accused of second-degree murder in the death of 22-year-old Taylor Marshall, as well as attempted murder for the boardwalk stabbing of Liam Frenette.
On Monday, Jones entered a not-guilty plea to both counts.
The judge-alone trial before Justice Michael Varpio is expected to take about four weeks to complete.
Dawson Mattila, 24, was Marshall’s live-in boyfriend at the time of the 2023 murder.
He testified Wednesday as part of the Crown’s examination-in-chief, describing how he found Marshall dead on the kitchen floor of the apartment she shared with Mattila at 185 John St. At one point on Wednesday, he was shown a crime scene photo of Marshall taken after she had died.
On Thursday, Dawson was cross-examined by defence attorney Andrew Furgiuele.
“Yesterday was not a good day for you?” Furgiuele asked.
“No, sir,” responded Dawson.
Furgiuele promised not to show Dawson any photos from the kitchen during cross-examination.
“I appreciate that,” said Mattila.
Furgiuele asked Dawson to clarify some comments made the previous day about the unlocked doors at the apartment.
Mattila said the dead bolt on the front door was unlocked, which would not be unusual when Marshall was home, as she would have locked the interior door accessible from the mudroom.
That wasn’t the case when he got home on Sept. 7, 2023. Instead he found the interior door was unlocked but barricaded closed from the inside by a couch.
Mattila said he knocked at the interior door before trying the unlocked door handle. Pushing hard, he was able to nudge the door open just enough to see Marshall on the floor in the kitchen before he was able to eventually gain entry.
He said he noticed the blood first, and at some point saw two pizza boxes in the living room — one on the floor and one on the back of a couch.
Furgiuele asked about items that Dawson noted were missing during the previous day’s testimony, including a hooded sweatshirt and a screwdriver — then asked if anything else was missing.
He said a broken Samsung cell phone, Marshall’s pink iPhone and a folding knife that he had given to Marshall were also missing.
Furgiuele showed a photo of the contents of Marshall’s purse, which police said was on her person when she was found. Among the items in the photo was a coin purse, a card wallet and a black folding knife that Mattila identified as the one he gave her.
Defence then asked Mattila about whether the rear window was open or closed when he left the apartment on the morning of the killing. Photos were previously presented in court on Tuesday of the window open with a slice cut into the screen.
“I know Taylor could not open it herself and I did not open it,” he replied.
Testifying next was Dawson’s mother, Nicole Mattila. She and her husband Don Ibbitson were called back to the apartment shortly after Dawson discovered the body and arrived prior to paramedics.
They had just dropped Dawson home minutes earlier after picking him up from work. They had taken Dawson to a vape shop on Great Northern Road before driving past the police scene on St. Marys River Drive, which was the scene of a stabbing attack that same day for which Jones is also charged.
When she returned to 185 John St. after the call from Dawson, Nicole ran inside to find the apartment in disarray and Marshall on the floor covered in blood.
“I went inside and I pushed the door open. I noticed there was blood everywhere,” she said.
Asked to expand on that, Nicole said blood was on the floor by the front door, on the wall and TV stand, all over the kitchen floor and on the kitchen table. She also recalled seeing some bloody hand prints in the apartment.
Dawson was on the kitchen floor calling 911 when she entered.
“We were hoping there was a chance,” said Nicole about Marshall’s condition.
Paramedics arrived and asked Dawson, Nicole and Ibbitson to leave the apartment.
“We tried not to step on anything, we tried to be careful,” she said, when asked if anything was moved while inside the apartment.
Ibbitson then testified, saying he was driving the car when Dawson called his mother in hysterics.
“I stepped on the gas and drove as fast as I could,” said Ibbitson.
He said Nicole entered the apartment first while he parked the car and followed shortly thereafter.
Ibbitson said he knew something was wrong when he entered and saw the look on his wife’s face.
Asked what he saw, Ibbitson replied, “My wife was in shock, my son bent down on the floor on the phone with the 911 operator.”
“I was going to check for a pulse, but when I touched her shoulder I knew it was too late,” he said, finding Marshall cold to the touch.
Staff Sgt. Richard Crema, a 28-year veteran officer, then testified that he and Cst. Mark Prophet were first police to respond to the John Street scene, shortly after paramedics arrived.
Crema, who held the rank of sergeant at the time, said when he walked into the apartment he found bloody footprints on the floor and a large amount of blood in the kitchen. He noted the footprints appeared to have been made by bare feet.
Marshall was on the floor, fully clothed wearing jeans, a black leather jacket and a purse on her body.
He said the disorderly placement of furniture, along with the blood, gave him reason to believe there had been a struggle.
Crema said sometime after Dawson and his parents left the scene, the young woman’s father, Ron Marshall arrived.
“I told him that Taylor was inside and deceased but I didn’t get into any detail with him on what I observed,” said Crema about that interaction.
After speaking to Dawson at the scene, Crema said he didn’t believe Taylor’s live-in boyfriend was the killer, despite citing statistics suggesting a vast majority of violent deaths of females are found to be cause by their intimate partner.
Asked why he didn’t suspect Mattila, Crema said: “Just based on his reaction, it was raw and emotional. It just didn’t fit.”
Instead, Crema said he thought at the time it appeared to be a random attack.
“It’s just not something that happens in Sault Ste. Marie, based on my experience and training,” said Crema.
He said another officer who arrived later on scene identified the tread of a bloody shoe print found outside of the apartment. By that time, Jones had been in custody for hours after being arrested at Station Mall.
Crema testified that he asked what kind of shoes the arrested man had been wearing, and was told they were the same as the ones that created the shoe print at the John Street scene.