An ISU student, Atiba A. Spellman, who Ames police named as a “person of interest” in Saturday’s double homicide, is the ex-boyfriend of the female victim, the victim’s brother said.

Police are asking the public’s assistance in locating Spellman, 33, sophomore in computer engineering. Spellman has an extensive criminal history, which includes domestic abuse, theft, trespassing and violations of no-contact orders.

Although Kinte Varnell, of Houston, Texas, would not tell the Daily the name of his sister, court records show a woman named Shakena Varnell filed multiple petitions against Spellman for relief from domestic abuse.

“She was moving on. He couldn’t stand her moving on and I guess he just went crazy or whatever,” Varnell said. “I’m sure the city of Ames, Iowa knows the history, the things they’ve been going through with so many restraining orders against each other. It’s just sad that he decided to go this route, to take someone’s life, and take someone else’s life just for envy and jealousy.”

Jim Robinson, Ames police investigations commander, is not naming Spellman as a suspect, however he said Spellman may have information that is important to the case.

According to a press release, police responded to a call at 2:17 a.m. that reported a man lying on the ground in the 1100 block of Pinon Drive. Police found the man dead. The officers found blood on the ground leading to an apartment at 1103 Pinon Drive where they found the body of a woman. Police were unable to release the names of the victims pending notification of their families.

Emberly Lashley, junior in psychology and resident on Pinon Drive, said she heard noises between 1 and 2 a.m. that sounded like people running up and down the stairs. She said she lives next door to college students who sometimes have parties on the weekends, and thought it might have been them.

“I looked out my window to see if I could see anything but I couldn’t see anything. I just went ahead and went back to sleep. About an hour later, the police are banging on my door really loud,” she said.

Lashley said the police arrived around 2:30 a.m. and asked her if she knew who lived next door and if she heard anything “weird” that night. After she told the police what she heard, they told her there had been a double homicide.

“That’s when I realized that Michael had been killed,” Lashley said.

She said the male victim, Michael, whose last name is unknown, lived alone in the apartment next door to her, but she knew he had a visitor that night because his car was parked outside. She said when he had a visitor at his apartment, he parked the visitor’s car in the garage and his own car in the lot.

Lashley said Michael’s apartment door was about two feet from her own door. In an interview with the Daily on Sunday evening, she said she had just finished cleaning blood off the porch they shared.

“Apparently he ran through my walkway to get out and there was blood across my steps and through the snow and on my kids’ toys,” she said. “There was blood on my barbecue, there was blood on my door and blood on my wall. So there was like blood kind of splattered everywhere on my side. But on his side, it was just one great big puddle of blood right on the doormat.”

Nick Roberts, junior in construction engineering, was downstairs playing video games at 3:30 a.m. when police came to his apartment on Pinon Drive.

“My roommate had mentioned to the cops that he had heard yelling and stuff outside but thought it was just drunk people so he didn’t bother to get out of bed and look,” Roberts said. “Had he, I suppose he would have seen something because, I mean, it was out in front of our window. The apartment where it happened was directly across from us.”

Roberts said he saw the male victim’s body covered with a tarp and also the trail of blood. He said his roommate saw the female victim’s body being carried out of the apartment by officials. Roberts said neither he nor any of his roommates saw any of the victims’ faces.

Roberts said he would occasionally wave and say ‘hi’ to his neighbor, the male victim, but he said he didn’t know his name.

He said he will continue to live in his apartment, despite the homicides, because he doesn’t feel like the acts of violence were random.

Dean of Students Dione Somerville said since Spellman has been labeled as a person of interest and not necessarily a suspect, she couldn’t speculate on the actions of Judicial Affairs.

“At this point it’s really premature to say anything about what could happen, because my understanding is that Ames police wants to talk to him,” Somerville said. “We need to let the police investigation continue before we really even get into some of the hypotheticals.”

Somerville said Jerry Stewart, director of public safety, notified her on Saturday regarding Spellman as a person of interest.

An ISU Alert was issued at about 10:30 a.m. Saturday, notifying receivers of the double homicide. It also provided a description of Spellman and asked for information regarding the case and assistance in locating him.

The decision to initiate the ISU Alert system was that of the university, Somerville said.

Atiba Spellman is described as:

According to the press release, Spellman is described as a 33-year-old black male, 5 feet 6 inches tall, and weighing approximately 200 pounds.

Spellman may be driving a blue, 1995 four-door Buick LeSabre bearing Iowa license plate 686 TOT. The vehicle may have a cracked windshield.

Anyone with critical information relating to Atiba Spellman or this investigation is asked to contact the Ames Police Department at 515-239-5133.