On December 6, 2014, a 19-year-old woman, Jessica Chambers was found severely burned in Courtland, Mississippi. The assailant had doused her in the liquid accelerant and even poured some in her mouth before setting her and her car on fire; more than 90% of her body was burned.
When the rescue team came, they asked her if she knew who attacked her, and she managed to give a name. The name sounded like Erik or Derek. She lost her life about four hours later.
Image: The area where Jessica was burned and her car after the fire
However, in the small Mississippi town, there was no one with such a name. But, Quinton Tellis, a man with a criminal history was seen that evening with Jessica hours before the fire. Quinton's DNA was also found on Jessica's car keys.
Despite the evidence that pointed to Tellis, he was tried twice and the jury could not return a verdict; they were confused. To date, no one has been convicted on the brutal mur-der of Jessica Chambers.
Inside the Brutal Case of Jessica Chambers and Why the Jury Can't Return a Verdict
Around 8 pm on the night of December 6, 2014, a truck driver saw a burning car on Herron road close to Courtland, Mississippi, and called 911.
When the fire department arrived at the scene, they found a horrific sight. A young woman was seen fighting for her life: she was almost unclad with her whole body charred from the inferno that had enveloped her car.
That woman was 19-year-old Jessica Chambers. A vivacious woman who later lost her life, and sadly no justice has been rendered in her case.
The Beginning
Jessica Chambers was born on February 2, 1995, in Clarkdale, Mississippi, to Lisa Lynn Chambers and Ben Chambers.
Jessica's face was adorned with a pair of strikingly beautiful eyes. She was full of life and initially wanted to become a teacher, before changing her mind on that and then decided she was going to be a registered nurse.
During her high school days at South Panola High School in Batesville, Mississippi, she was actively involved in sports and was a cheerleader at her high school football games.
Jessica's childhood had a sprinkle of trauma. Her parents were divorced when she was still a child, and she was occasionally reported to be stubborn. But despite the challenges that she may have faced, none would equate to the horror of her death.
The Tragedy That Took Her Life
On December 6, 2014, when firefighters responded to a case of a car torched by the roadside, the first man on the scene, Cole Haley, saw a young woman walking towards him, she had been severely burned, and charred.
"She had her arms out, saying, "Help me, help me, help me." "Her hair was fried like it had been stuck in a light socket. Her face was black, and her body was severely burned." Those were the words of Haley as she recounted the incident. He cried, and what he saw stuck with him for months.
That night when the rescuers came, Haley asked her what her name was to which she responded, "Jessica Tambers." He then asked who had done that to her, she muttered "Eric" or "Derek" before she was airlifted to a hospital where she died hours later. Investigators focused on the names, Derek or Eric, but they could not find any suspect with similar names.
Jessica could not pronounce her name correctly because her mouth was severely burned. This was why when the investigators came up with no suspect, they suspected she was trying to say "Tellis", a friend of Jessica's.
Jessica could not pronounce her name correctly because her throat was burned, the assailant had poured the liquid accelerant into her mouth. This damage to her mouth and throat was the reason she could not correctly pronounce the name of her attacker.
Who is Tellis
Quinton Tellis and Jessica were both students of South Panola High School and grew up in the same neighborhood.
He was born on October 6, 1988, in Courtland, Mississippi, a locality with a population of about 500 people.
With a history of convictions for burglary and evading law enforcement, Tellis was out of prison since October 2014, which was two months before the murder of Chambers.
Tellis and Jessica had become friends about two weeks before her death, and the morning she was burned, they rode around town in Jessica's car.
However, Tellis wanted more than friendship, he wanted sex, and Jessica repeatedly turned him down.
That evening before Jessica was set on fire, she had been with Tellis.
When investigators put things together, they believed without any doubt that Tellis was the man behind Jessica's brutal murder. They also theorized that it was "Tellis" she wanted to pronounce when it sounded like she said "Eric or Derek." They believed he suffocated her when he was about to sexually
assault her, and that he panicked when he found her unresponsive leading to him setting the car on fire to conceal evidence.
Additionally, a DNA sample matching Tellis' was found on Jessica's car keys.
Despite what the investigators found, Tellis was not conclusively determined to be the killer because Jessica did not correctly pronounce the name of her attacker, and the DNA evidence was ruled inconclusive.
He was tried twice in the case of Jessica Chambers, but in both instances, the jury's decision was inconclusive resulting in a mistrial.
Tellis later faced a murder charge in Louisiana, linked to the brutal killing of Meing-Chen Hsiao, a 34-year-old Taiwanese graduate student from the University of Louisiana at Monroe. The charge suggests that Tellis likely inflicted over 30 stab wounds on Hsiao's face and body with a knife to force her to reveal her debit card's PIN, before her death on July 29, 2015.
Tellis pleaded guilty to three counts of unauthorized card use. Consequently, he was sentenced to serve 10 years in prison for stealing Hsiao’s debit card on the night of her murder. However, the murder charge against Tellis was dismissed by a judge.
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