A suspect accused of killing a 13-year-old boy in 2016 pleaded not guilty Thursday in Tazewell County Circuit Court.
Keith A. Brackett, 48, pleaded not guilty to two counts of first-degree murder and another count of concealing a homicide in the death of Robert Bee, 13, who went missing in November 2016 and was found dead on a property owned by Brackett’s aunt in July 2017.
Brackett was charged with first-degree murder on April 8 in Bee’s death and has been held at the Tazewell County Jail as prosecutors looked over 4,000 pages of discovery in the case.
During a prior court appearance on April 9, Brackett asked to be identified as a woman, to which the court obliged. Brackett is also listed as female in Tazewell County Jail and Illinois Department of Corrections records.
According to an affidavit from the Tazewell County Circuit Clerk’s Office, Lisa Bee, Robert’s mother, reported him missing on Nov. 18, 2016, to the Pekin Police Department.
As police investigated, they learned that Robert and Brackett were friends, despite an age difference of 25 years. Robert would frequently go to Brackett’s house whenever he skipped school and would even spend the night there on occasion.
Brackett was interviewed by police multiple times in 2016 in connection with the boy’s disappearance.
On July 24, 2017, skeletal remains, later revealed to be those of Robert, were found in a wooden area behind a home in the 14000 block of Illinois Route 29. Pekin police, Tazewell County sheriff’s deputies, and Illinois State Police responded to the home and found two different colors of rope, a wad of duct tape and black electrical tape with human hair stuck to it at the scene.
An investigation into the property revealed that it had been owned by Mary Baize, who said that Brackett, her nephew, maintained it. According to Baize, Brackett had been taking care of the property and had mowed it as recently as two weeks before Robert’s remains were found.
Baize said that Brackett had been living in Pekin at a home she owned in the 200 block of Cooper Street. Deputies searched the home and found rope consistent with what was found at the scene, according to court records.
A search warrant would be issued for the home, with detectives finding more rope, duct tape, electrical tape and restraints commonly used in sexual acts.
One day after his remains were discovered, a forensic pathologist confirmed they belonged to Robert. An autopsy revealed that he died from homicidal violence brought on by likely asphyxia means. Later that day, detectives spoke with Brackett and asked where the best place would be to hide a dead body on the property.
On May 23, 2018, Pekin police detectives were investigating a burglary where Brackett had been a suspect when a confidential informant told them that they had spoken with Bracket two weeks prior. They said that Brackett told them that she was going to take a train to New York so that she could get asylum from the British embassy.
A week later, the informant said that Brackett had contacted them from Maine, prompting an investigation into her whereabouts. The investigation revealed that Brackett took a train from Chicago to Washington, D.C., with a search warrant being issued for the phone number that she had called the informant from.
A GPS tracker showed that Brackett’s phone was in Bangor, Maine, with local police in that area, along with the FBI, enlisted to aid in the investigation. Brackett was found in Bangor living at a homeless encampment.
Brackett was apprehended and detained in Bangor, and she told police that she had left Illinois to escape theft charges, according to court records.
Brackett pleaded guilty to burglary and served seven years in prison before being paroled in late 2025.
Brackett will next appear in court on May 18 at 9 a.m. She is currently being held at the Tazewell County Jail awaiting trial.
This article originally appeared on Journal Star: Keith Brackett pleads not guilty to killing Robert Bee in 2016
Reporting by Zach Roth, Peoria Journal Star / Journal Star
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