Detectives with the Charlotte-Mecklenburg Police Department’s Homicide Cold Case Unit have arrested Steven Antonio Elam for the 2004 murder of Ronnie Dale Page.On November 21, 2004, at 6:50 p.m. Mr. Page was returning to his sister’s home with his niece at the 6500 block of Four Seasons Lane, when the suspect, Steven Page, approached the victim’s vehicle, shortly after carjacking a previous vehicle from the Sav Way on Central Avenue and demanded that he get out.
When the victim did not comply with the suspect’s demands quick enough, the suspect became agitated and fired his weapon into the driver’s side window of the vehicle, removed the victim with force and stood over Mr. Page and shot him multiple times, before fleeing the scene in the victim’s vehicle- with the child still seated in the vehicle. The suspect then drove to a location off Central Avenue and demanded that an unknown couple take the child. The suspect, Mr. Elam, left the stolen vehicle there and fled the scene on foot.
Physical evidence recovered and processed by CMPD’s Crime Lab at the request of the Homicide Unit established that the same unknown male DNA was recovered from both vehicles. This unknown sample was entered into the National DNA Database. On October 4, 2010, the database generated a match once Steve Antonio Elam’s DNA was uploaded into the database subsequent to his 2007 federal conviction for a weapons violation.
Mr. Elam was arrested today, November 3, 2010 for murder and the following subsequent charges of 2 counts of Armed Robbery, 2nd Degree Kidnapping, and Possession of Firearm by Felon. Also to note, Mr. Elam was convicted on October 31, 2002 with Possession with Intent to Sell and Deliver a Controlled Substance, which is a felony.
This is the 31st homicide case cleared by the Cold Case Unit since its inception in 2003.