SALISBURY, Md. - A Wicomico County jury has convicted a 59-year-old man of murdering a taxi cab driver on Christmas Eve in 1977.
Nathaniel Appleby-El awaits sentencing for first-degree murder, robbery with a dangerous weapon, and carrying a handgun. After the jury rendered the guilty verdict, the judge, Beau H. Oglesby, requested a pre-sentence investigation. This was a re-trial from a 1978 conviction of Appleby-El.
On Christmas Eve, 1977, the body of Charles Adkins, Jr., a Salisbury cab driver, was discovered in the area of East Rd. and Substation Rd. in the taxi cab he drove. Police say Adkins was shot and robbed of several personal items. Appleby-El was identified as a person of interest, interviewed by law enforcement and made a written statement regarding his involvement in the robbery and death.
On May 12, 1978, a Wicomico County jury found Appleby-El, then age 18, guilty of first-degree murder and carrying handgun. Appleby-El was sentenced to life imprisonment for murder and three years for carrying a handgun. However, in 2015, the Maryland Court of Special Appeals overturned Appleby-El’s 1978 murder conviction and he was awarded a new trial.
In 1984, while incarcerated for the 1978 Wicomico County conviction, Appleby-El fatally stabbed Herman Toulson, a correctional officer at the former Maryland Penitentiary in Baltimore, Md. Herman Toulson was the first correctional officer to be murdered in the State of Maryland in the line of duty.
Wicomico County Ad Interim State’s Attorney Jamie L. Dykes commended the members of the Maryland State Police and Salisbury City Police Department for their work during the 1977 investigation and assistance in the re-prosecution of this case almost forty years later.
State’s Attorney Dykes also thanks Ajene Turnbull and Andrew Illuminati, Assistant State’s Attorneys, and Investigator Carsten Wendlandt who were instrumental in the current prosecution of Appleby-El. State’s Attorney Dykes said, “The prosecution, forty years later, waschallenging in many respects, I am grateful for the hard work of all those involved that will continue to ensure the public’s safety.”
For more information or for an interview please call the Office of the State’s Attorney at (410) 548-4880.
