Although we’re all tasked with the humane responsibility of being a stand-up citizen in society, expectations are understandably higher for those who’ve dedicated their lives to attending church and spreading His word. That’s why it comes as a bone-chilling surprise that a Chicago deacon would bring himself to murder the mother of his five children in cold blood merely hours before Sunday service.
45-year-old Eddie Jenkins has been charged in the January 2026 killing of his estranged wife, Kiara Jenkins, who prosecutors say he mercilessly shot seven times before proceeding to take their children to church.
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Although Eddie Jenkins may talk a good game in the clip seen above, it appears he was simply using the Lord’s name in vain. According to the Chicago Sun-Times, 36-year-old Kiara Jenkins was leaving her home on January 18 near the 6400 block of South Drexel Avenue in the Woodlawn neighborhood when she was shot seven times in the eye, abdomen, thigh, leg and back. She was found unresponsive around 4:30 a.m. and pronounced dead on the scene. In addition to a documented history of spousal abuse when they were together, Eddie is also facing charges for fleeing a police traffic stop just over a week after Kiara’s murder and illegal possession of a gun during his arrest over five months later in Douglass Park.
More details below on the circumstances that led to such a tragedy, via Chicago Sun-Times:
“Kiara and Eddie Jenkins had been living separately for about a year at the time of her killing. Their three youngest daughters lived at her home, prosecutors said.
The day before the murder, Eddie Jenkins allegedly picked up the daughters and told them they’d be staying at his house, prosecutors said.
Around 4 a.m. the next day, Eddie Jenkin’s white Buick was seen on video leaving his home and parking a block away from Kiara Jenkin’s apartment, prosecutors said.
Shortly after, neighbors report hearing a female and male arguing. They heard the man call the woman profanities. She accused him of cheating. Then, neighbors heard multiple gunshots and a female crying out in pain.
A man who appears to be Eddie Jenkins is captured on video leaving the scene, according to prosecutors. He returned to his home, woke up his children up and took them to church, prosecutors said.”
Adding insult to injury, Eddie took his act of malevolence even further by screengrabbing images of Kiara’s dead body as friends sent him video calls of concern after they discovered her lying lifeless in the backyard of her home. This sadly wasn’t the first occurrence of violence in their relationship since getting married back in 2009, including Eddie’s arrest that same year for strangling Kiara, hitting her in 2011, an order of protection against him in 2018, Eddie’s protective order against Kiara in 2024 and her permanently moving out in 2025 after a domestic dispute just one month prior to the killing.
Although assistant public defender Eleanor Roos has argued that no evidence explicitly shows Eddie driving to Kiara on that fateful January, nor any forensic evidence linking him to the murder — the handgun he was caught with during his arrest wasn’t the same weapon used in the crime at hand — prosecutors (and anyone with a brain!) believe otherwise. His next court date is set for July 22.
With deacons like these, who needs sinners?
