The case of a 48-year-old Rock Island man convicted of a homicide in 2015 will continue March 7 in Rock Island County Court, court records show.
Tim McVay was convicted of killing Carrie Olson, 29, of Davenport, and dumping her body before he traveled from Minnesota to Las Vegas with a friend. Court records, which do not indicate whether McVay will be present, show that a status hearing is set for March 7.
McVay, Olson’s ex-boyfriend, is being held in Menard Correctional Center, Menard, Ill., after being found guilty of her 2013 homicide.
First a missing-person case, then a homicide
Olson was last seen on Dec. 29, 2013. Her body was found April 5, 2014, in remote woods in southern Minnesota.
Her death was ruled a homicide by unspecified means.
Olson remained friends with McVay even after they no longer were romantically involved, and she had a relationship with another man.
Prosecutors said at one-point McVay used Olson’s debit card to purchase gas and that he also used her car in Davenport. Investigative reports indicated fibers in Olson’s hair matched those found in McVay’s residence in Rock Island.
At a bench trial in 2015, Judge Michael Meersman found McVay guilty on charges of first-degree murder and concealment of a homicidal death. Meersman said McVay probably killed Olson early Dec. 29, 2013, in his home.
Prosecutors said McVay then put Olson’s body in the trunk of his car and left her body in a wooded area near Hastings, Minn.
“Our Carrie Elaine is gone forever,” her mother sobbed in court. “Carrie was stolen from us. In our eyes, your honor, there simply aren’t enough years you can sentence McVay to.”
“I did not kill Carrie,” McVay maintained. “I loved her. I loved her as my best friend.”
“In this case, a woman gets killed for her car, a few bucks and a trip to Vegas,” Meersman told McVay. “And I hope you think for the rest of your life whether that trip for three days was really worth throwing your life away, because that’s really what happened.”
In 2019, the Third District Appellate Court upheld the conviction and sentence: McVay was sentenced to 40 years for the murder charge, and five years for concealment of a homicidal death, with the charges to run consecutively – one after the other.
Over the years, the case has drawn national attention and has been featured on true-crime television shows and podcasts.
According to Illinois Legal Aid Online, the Post-Conviction Hearing Act controls post-conviction petitions. A post-conviction petition challenges a sentence based on violations of constitutional rights.
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