A U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs officer was being held without bond Thursday after prosecutors filed an upgraded charge of murder against him in the Jan. 3 shooting death of a 42-year-old military veteran near Lowell.
Attorneys for Timothy R. Thomas, 40, of Highland, filed a petition to let bond in the case.
Thomas is accused of murdering Nicholas Lile, a Merrillville native and a 22-year veteran of the U.S. Navy who served as a corpsman attached to a U.S. Marines battalion on seven combat deployments to Iraq and Afghanistan.
Thomas told police he shot Lile to death in the basement of Lile’s home outside Lowell in self-defense. Lile’s family disputed Thomas’ version of events.
Thomas initially was charged with voluntary manslaughter, a level 2 felony, and released from jail Jan. 5 after posting a $5,000 cash bond. He was taken back into custody Wednesday and will be held in jail until a court decides whether to grant his petition for bond.
Lake Criminal Court magistrates typically preside over hearings on murder defendants’ bond hearings and make recommendations to the judges. If the court determines, after the yet-to-be scheduled hearings, that the presumption of Thomas’ guilt on a murder charge is not strong, he could again be granted bail.
Lake County Prosecutor Bernard Carter declined to comment on why his office decided to file the upgraded charge. In general, it’s not uncommon for his office to amend charges in a case after a review, he said.
Defense attorney Christopher Cooper said he was retained through the Fraternal Order of Police to represent Thomas and is addressing employment issues that come up whenever a police officer has been charged with a crime.
Thomas also is a veteran who served in the U.S. Army in Afghanistan and Iraq, Cooper said.
“He defended himself and was being attacked,” Cooper said. “There’s more to the story than it appears.”
Lile’s brother Patrick Lile said the family was pleased to see an upgraded charge was filed.
Lile’s wife, Jessika Lile, one of two eyewitnesses in the case, said, “We have to imagine that the prosecutors have to be pretty confident in whatever evidence they have gathered that would lead them to change this charge.”
Thomas told Lake County sheriff’s police he “put two shots” in Lile’s chest after Lile attacked him, threatened to kill him and didn’t allow him to leave.
Thomas had joined a woman, Lile and Lile’s wife for drinks in the Liles’ basement the night of the shooting, according to court records.
Thomas claimed Lile “started acting crazy,” grabbed him by the throat, threw him down, choked him, punched him, lunged at him and threatened to kill him when he said he would leave Lile’s home.
Jessika Lile told police she and her friend, who was dating Thomas, were at the bar in her basement talking when she heard two shots and saw her husband on the ground. She said the two men had argued over their military experience, but she was not concerned because it appeared to be “good-natured joking,” court records state.
Jessika Lile’s friend was too intoxicated to give police a statement the night of the shooting. The following day, she told police she saw “pushing and shoving” between Thomas and Nicholas Lile but “cannot remember what they were saying to one another” and “could not hear a verbal argument.”
Police wrote in court filings the basement “appeared to be neat and in order with no signs of a struggle.”
Investigators also wrote they observed “slight redness on the left side of (Thomas’) nose, as well as what appeared to be a small scratch above the defendant’s left eyebrow.”
Patrick Lile previously said Thomas’ story didn’t add up, because his brother was a big man and there would have been signs of a struggle in the basement if he had fought with Thomas.
Lile’s friends said he sometimes joked with others about military service, but was never known to fight anyone over it.
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