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S.J. man sentenced to life in '89 Philly rape-murders

Twenty-seven years after the bodies of Ruby Ellis and Cheryl Hanible were found strangled and in squalor, a Philadelphia jury on Monday said Rudolph Churchill was the man who killed them.

Rudolph Churchill.
Rudolph Churchill.Read more

Twenty-seven years after the bodies of Ruby Ellis and Cheryl Hanible were found strangled and in squalor, a Philadelphia jury on Monday said Rudolph Churchill was the man who killed them.

Churchill, 54, of Paulsboro, was found guilty of two counts of first-degree murder and two weapons counts involving the twine and shoelace used to strangle the women.

But the jury acquitted the Gloucester County man of two counts of rape and two counts of involuntary deviate sexual intercourse, an apparent acknowledgment that none of Churchill's DNA was found on or in the bodies of Ellis and Hanible.

The verdict from the Common Pleas Court jury of eight women and four men was met with silence from Hanible's family and Churchill's mother and sister, and was followed by a demonstration of compassion by both families.

Churchill's mother, Anna Sheard, walked over and offered condolences to Catherine McCants, one of Hanible's sisters, and said she was "glad you are finally able to get some closure."

McCants thanked Sheard and assured her that the Hanible family bore her no ill will.

Churchill was sentenced immediately after the verdicts to the mandatory life in prison without parole. Judge Rose Marie DeFino-Nastasi ordered the sentences served consecutively and tacked on five to 10 years for the two convictions for possession of an instrument of crime.

Before he was sentenced, Churchill, an only child born in East Orange, N.J., described a childhood that included 12 years in foster care before he returned to live with his mother in 1972.

"One thing my mother instilled in me was to always be a gentleman," Churchill told the judge. "Through all my years of addiction and burglaries and whatever shortcomings I had, I never hurt anybody and I didn't kill those women."

Churchill's mother and sister, at least one of whom had attended every trial session, declined to comment as they left court with defense attorney Gina Capuano. Capuano could not be immediately reached for comment on a possible appeal.

For Hanible's family, the verdict was a bittersweet recognition of what happened to the baby of 13 siblings, and the mother of two children, in April 1989.

Three relatives made victim-impact statements and all three assured Churchill they did not hate him.

John Hanible, Cheryl's brother, wept as he recalled his sister's disappearance just days before her birthday.

"You are still my brother," Hanible said, addressing Churchill. "I don't hate you, my man. I hope no harm comes to you while you spend your time in prison."

Afterward, the Hanibles spilled out memories.

"We all waiting so long, so long for this," McCants said through tears. "I'm glad I'm here to see it because my health is not good at all."

"Do you see how God works?" asked another sister, Louise. "This is the same day our mother died, and he has brought us to justice."

Hanible disputed the description of her sister as a drug-addicted prostitute. She said Cheryl Hanible worked two jobs and was a lesbian: "She would have fought him."

The jury deliberated about 90 minutes Friday and six hours Monday before returning the verdict.

Ellis, 19, was found dead on March 17, 1989, in an abandoned car in a lot near 15th and Thompson Streets. On April 23, 1989, the body of Hanible, 33, was found in a burned-out abandoned bar in the 1200 block of West Girard Avenue. Both women were addicted to drugs and Assistant District Attorney Gwenn Cujdik said they turned to prostitution to buy drugs.

In 2013, Philadelphia police, testing for DNA in cold cases under a federal grant, came up with a match for Churchill in an FBI database.

At the time of the slayings, Churchill lived in the 1300 block of Ridge Avenue in North Philadelphia, a few blocks from where the women's bodies were found.

Churchill was never a suspect until DNA analysts said his DNA - provided to a federal database in 2007 when he was released from a Georgia prison after serving three years for burglary - matched DNA on a bloody paper towel found in the car under Ellis' head, and on Hanible's sneaker, from which the killer removed a lace to strangle her.

Although none of Churchill's DNA was found in or on either woman's body, Cujdik said the manner in which the bodies were left and the bow-tied knots used to strangle them proved that the killer was one person.

Cujdik argued that the odds of Churchill's accidentally leaving his DNA where two women were raped and strangled was greater than "the odds of winning the Powerball and Mega Millions in one lifetime."

Capuano said the DNA evidence linking Churchill was tenuous and compromised by the mishandling and storage of other physical evidence, including rape-kit slides from the autopsies, missing since 1989.

jslobodzian@phillynews.com

215-854-2985 @joeslobo

www.philly.com/crimeandpunishment