LOCAL NEWS

Suspect in complex American Fork murder case hears new evidence in court

Jan 14, 2025, 3:08 PM | Updated: Jan 15, 2025, 12:59 pm

PROVO — New details in an American Fork murder case were revealed in court Tuesday ahead of an anticipated trial.

The defendant in the case, Kevin Ellis, 43, initially claimed he shot his brother-in-law, Matthew Restelli, 42, out of self-defense. Days after Restelli’s July 12 death, Ellis was arrested and booked on murder charges.

Months later, on Oct. 29, Ellis’ sister and Restelli’s wife, Kathryn Restelli, 36, and her mother, Tracey Grist, 59 were arrested in connection to the case.

The two of them were at the scene when responding officers arrived. One of those lead detectives, Det. Joseph Nordin with the American Fork Police Department, was the sole witness in Tuesday’s hearing, which was focused on Ellis.

“When I entered the residence, in the front room, I observed several empty shell casings on the floor,” he said from the witness stand. “I then observed a deceased body in the hallway.”

Nordin described the rest of what he saw on July 12 — a “firearm on the counter in the kitchen, along with a knife,” which had been previously reported in court documents. When the prosecutor pressed, however, Nordin described details of an upstairs bedroom that held crucial evidence in the case.

Det. Joesph Nordin with the American Fork Police Department during a hearing for Kevin Ellis in an American Fork murder case on Jan. 14, 2025. (Derek Petersen, KSL TV)

“I found a rolled-up dollar bill on a nightstand in a bedroom,” he said. “When I unrolled it I found a white powdery substance on the dollar bill.”

Nordin said he performed a field test on the substance, which came back positive for cocaine. The bedroom was also found to belong to Ellis, he said, because his California ID card was sitting next to the dollar bill. According to Nordin, the rest of the effects in the room were consistent with Ellis’ belongings.

Later, Ellis consented to a blood and urine test which he took during questioning. The results came back positive for cocaine.

Nordin was then asked to identify Kevin Ellis in the courtroom. He complied and pointed to Ellis sitting near the front.

Kevin Ellis appears in court during a preliminary hearing on Jan. 14, 2025 ahead of an expected trial where he will face charges for murder. (Derek Petersen, KSL TV)

Text messages

Court documents indicated that, ahead of Matthew Restelli’s death, he and his wife were having marriage difficulties. Kathryn Restelli traveled to American Fork from her California home with her husband where she stayed for weeks before his death. Her husband wanted her back in California, and made a plan with her: he would drive to American Fork to come get her and booked a rental car to do so.

Nordin detailed some of the results of a search warrant obtained for the cellular devices of Matthew Restelli and all the defendants in the case. By doing so, he previewed some of the evidentiary contents the trial may bring.

The first text messages read aloud were from Matthew and Kathryn Restelli. The messages confirmed that the two had made a plan for the rental car, as previously agreed.  Text messages also showed another plan Kathryn Restelli and her mother, Grist, made together to fake an ankle injury. The idea was that her husband would be forced to retrieve her from Utah.

Charging documents showed Kathryn Restelli had her sister in California place an Apple AirTag tracker on the rental. Then, the rest of her family tracked the rental, along with Restelli, as her husband drove to Utah.

When Matthew Restelli arrived at the American Fork home, he was immediately shot. Police said video footage from a neighbor’s home helped them piece together the timeline.

The street in American Fork where Matthew Restelli was killed. (KSL TV)

Defense

When Ellis’ attorney Scott Williams began questioning, he pointed out that much of the communication discussed during the hearing id not include his client.

“Exhibit after exhibit of all these communications between all these different folks in this investigation; I want to circle back to what appears to be, almost singularly, texts between Tracey Grist and Kevin as the only examples where Kevin participates in the communications.”

And Williams mentioned one other text where Ellis was notified of the AirTag location.

To elaborate, Williams asked more about the timeline.

“You got these texts because you took them from Tracey Grist’s phone,” Williams said, asking when her phone was seized.

Nordin couldn’t recall exactly but said it was several days after July 12.

“So she had gone back to living and doing whatever she was doing — she wasn’t in custody or anything right?” Williams asked.

Nordin confirmed.

“Communicating about anything she wanted, including the events of the 12th?” Williams asked. “And yet, when you seized that phone nearly a week later, it didn’t have deleted texts on it, right?”

Not that he knew of, Nordin replied.

The hearing on Tuesday was a preliminary hearing in this case. As of Tuesday afternoon, trial date details were not released.

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Suspect in complex American Fork murder case hears new evidence in court