A Brooklyn convict indicted last week for the 2003 cold-case killing of his pregnant girlfriend said she told him about a week before her murder that he might not be the baby’s father, newly released court papers state.
Jefferson Jones, 41, made the startling statement to detectives as they questioned him about the murder of Lamethia “Mimi” McCollum, 28, in 2003 – even though he wasn’t collared until over a decade later.
“He said they had been arguing and the last time he saw her was about a week ago on his block on Montgomery Street when she told him that the baby may not be his,” the court papers state.
Jones added that he got a letter from his “on-again, off-again” girlfriend McCollum that said, “She did not want him in the baby’s life and to give up all rights towards the child,” according to the court papers.
Investigators cracked the cold case when they matched the gun Jones used during a Queens home invasion to the weapon that killed McCollum.
When Jones was questioned about the murder – while he served time in state prison for the home invasion – he would “yawn or belch into his shirt” when detectives asked specific questions about the crime.
McCollum family members who attended Jones’ arraignment said McCollum’s daughter, who was only 8 years old when she found her mother shot dead in their apartment, has been emotionally devastated by Jones’ arrest.
“Victoria’s not well. That’s why she’s not here,” said the slain woman’s aunt, Carla Boone.
“She went back into a kind of depression [when Jones was arrested]. It opened it up all over again.”