COOK COUNTY CRIMINAL COURTHOUSE — When police found Tiara Groves in an abandoned building on July 23, 2013, she was naked and decomposed with a gag tied around her head.
The 20-year-old Austin woman had been missing since July 14, when she was last seen arguing with neighbor Leondra Martin outside a Cicero liquor store, prosecutors and family said.
Now, nearly two years later, prosecutors have charged Martin, 30, and Desmond Collins, 38, with concealing a death and moving a body.
After the two were arrested separately Wednesday, they told police that Groves died of a drug overdose inside a Cicero motel that July, Assistant State's Attorney Sarah Karr said during a bond hearing Friday.
The pair told authorities they wrapped Groves' body in a sheet and brought her to the Austin warehouse at 4655 W. Arthington St., according to Karr.
Police found Groves inside an office in the building, Karr said. Thin wire was wrapped around the arms of a nearby chair and found laying near Groves' body. A gag was wrapped loosely around Groves' head, and her clothes were never found, according to prosecutors.
Groves' death was ruled a homicide by the Cook County Medical Examiner's Office, but the exact cause was never revealed. The examiner said Groves had heroin in her system, and neither an overdose nor asphyxiation could be ruled out.
DNA pulled from Groves' fingernails and the wire on the chair proved to be a positive match to Collins, Karr said.
After Friday's bond hearing, Groves' family cornered prosecutors outside the courtroom and ripped their decision not to charge Martin and Collins with murder.
"This is not justice," mother Alice Groves later said, fighting tears.
"They moved her body, took her elsewhere and tied her up," brother Tyshawn Groves added. "If this is your friend, why take your friend — instead of calling an ambulance — take her to an abandoned building, strip her clothes, gag her mouth, tie her arms, tie her legs to a chair?"
Tiara Groves' case first made headlines in April 2014, when Chicago Magazine published an article claiming the Chicago Police Department tinkered with crime statistics to downplay citywide crime.
Police originally classified Groves' case as a homicide, but changed it to "noncriminal death investigation" on Dec. 18, 2013, allegedly because the medical examiner couldn't conclusively name a cause of death. The magazine found nine other cases where brutal deaths, including suffocations and shootings, were ruled noncriminal.
On Friday, Groves' family said they lived next door to Martin from 2010 to 2014, but she moved away two months after Tiara Groves was found. During the nine days Groves was missing, Martin helped the family pass out missing-person flyers, sister Kenyatta Groves said.
"She ate at our house, she slept at our house," Kenyatta Groves said. "If that was her friend, why did she take her and do all this unnecessary stuff?"
Groves' family said they didn't know Collins.
Collins, of the 1500 block of South Tripp Avenue, was also charged this week with failure to register as a sex offender. Prosecutors said he was convicted of aggravated criminal sexual assault in 1997 after he allegedly tied a 10-year-old girl to his bed and attacked her.
Collins was previously convicted of nine felonies, Karr said, including aggravated DUI, living within 500 feet of a school as a registered sex offender, drug possession and possession of stolen cars.
Cook County Judge James Brown ordered Collins held in lieu of $300,000 bail. Collins' attorney said he's engaged, has two children and works in demolition with his father.
Martin, who lives in Wisconsin, was held in lieu of $100,000 bail. Her attorney said she has two children.
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