Plea Deal Reached In Murders Of Teen Black Lives Matter Activist And 75-Year-Old
A Florida man who kidnapped and murdered a Black Lives Matter student activist and a retired state worker will face life in prison, after taking a plea deal confessing to the two women’s deaths.
Aaron Glee, 52, avoided the death penalty last month after he pleaded guilty to the kidnapping and murder of Victoria “Vicki” Sims, 75, and Oluwatoyin Salau, 19, as part of an agreement with prosecutors.
Oluwatoyin Ruth Salau and Victoria Sims.
State Attorney Jack Campbell told the Tallahassee Democrat that his office weighed several factors and spent time with the victims’ families as they considered how to best serve justice.
“We’re not in any way suggesting that he doesn’t deserve the death penalty for what he did to those women,” Campbell said. “But at the same time, those are serious conversations, and in this decision, I think justice was served.”
According to Glee’s probable cause affidavit, on June 6, 2020, Salau reported to Tallahassee police that she’d been sexually assaulted by a man after he offered her a ride to his home and a place to stay.
That same day, in a now-deleted Twitter thread, Salau, a community college student, shared what had happened to her.
“I was molested in Tallahassee, Florida by a black man this morning at 5:30 on Richview and Park Ave,” Salau wrote. “The man offered to give me a ride to find someplace to sleep and recollect my belongings from a church I refuged to a couple days back to escape unjust living conditions.”
At the time, police determined that Salau was a victim of battery, but she wasn’t immediately able to identify for officers the home where the crime took place. That afternoon, after making her report to police, she met Glee at a bus stop, and he offered her a place to shower and sleep.
According to the affidavit, Salau’s mother reported her missing two days later, on June 8, prompting a search by local activist groups and police.
On June 11, according to a search warrant, one activist group searching for Salau received a threatening message from someone who claimed they were holding Salau hostage and would kill her.
“All I need is your cooperation and you will get her back safely! I am dangerous don’t joke with this,” the message read. “Killing is nothing to me... she will be dead soon! Be warned.”
Salau’s body, along with Sims’, would not be found until days later.
According to the probable cause affidavit, Sims was reported missing on June 13, 2020, after a family friend requested a wellness check on her because they hadn’t seen her in two days.
Officers who arrived at Sims’ home said it looked as though a burglary had taken place, and her car was missing from the driveway. They began to search for the 75-year-old, and cellphone data showed that her phone was at Glee’s home.
Investigators learned that Sims had often prepared and delivered meals to Glee’s home and would occasionally provide him with transportation, the affidavit said.
At Glee’s home, officers found Sims’ car outside covered in mud. On the property, they found her dead, with her hands and feet tied behind her. They also found Salau’s body. She was wearing the same clothes she’d worn when she spoke with police on June 6.
Aaron Glee Jr. in a police booking photograph on June 14, 2020.
Glee, who’d purchased a Greyhound bus ticket, was arrested in West Palm Beach, where he was taken to a local hospital after complaining of difficulty breathing.
At the hospital, Glee admitted to meeting Salau on June 6, when she told him she’d been sexually assaulted and did not have a home, authorities said. He admitted to taking her to his home, where he imprisoned her, bound her and sexually assaulted her multiple times for three to five days, police said.
Glee initially pleaded not guilty, but entered into the plea agreement on June 8 of this year. He is scheduled to be formally sentenced in September.
Salau’s disappearance and death sparked conversations about the violence that Black women face. Her friends mourned her death online, honoring her legacy as an activist and noting the many injustices she’d contended with.
Before Salau and Sims’ murders, Glee had been arrested and charged with battery in connection with an incident where he allegedly kicked another unhoused woman in the stomach after she rejected his sexual advances on May 29, 2020.
“[The woman] told him no so Glee became angry, shoved [her] to the ground and began kicking her in the abdomen,” court records said.
According to data from the National Center on Violence Against Women in the Black Community, 25% of Black girls in the U.S. are the victims of sexual abuse before the age of 18, and 1 in 5 Black women report that they are survivors of rape.
Need help? Visit RAINN’s National Sexual Assault Online Hotline or the National Sexual Violence Resource Center’s website.