Birmingham fugitive killed in Florida shoot-out with lawmen was charged with 2010 Hoover sex offense

5-27-2011 Alabama:

BIRMINGHAM, Alabama -- A federal fugitive shot to death in Florida Thursday night by U.S. Marshals had lived in Hoover until he was charged in December with enticing a minor for sex.

William Jimmy Page Jr., 39, was pronounced dead on the scene inside his garage apartment in St. Petersburg.

Authorities said U.S. Marshals and Tampa police entered the apartment to take Page into custody for violating conditions of his bond release. Instead, Page came down the hallway firing at them, said Marty Keely, U.S. Marshal for the Northern District of Alabama. Lawmen returned fired, killing Page.

Page, who was living on Shades Crest Road at the time, was arrested on federal charges in December 2010 after authorities say he used the internet and telephone to solicit sex from what he believed was a 13-year-old boy, according to federal court records. A criminal complaint filed against Page said he was in conversation with an undercover officer pretending to be the teen boy from July 2010 through December 2010, when he made arrangements to meet the teen at a Hoover drug store.

He offered marijuana and beer in exchange for sex.

Page was charged federally, and later released on $100,000 bond with special conditions: He was to live with his family in Georgia and wear an electronic monitoring bracelet.

On March 25, Page was discovered missing from the Metter, Georgia, home where he was supposed to be staying. His bedroom window was open, and a suicide note was left behind, Keely said. Authorities found the monitoring bracelet in the roadway about two blocks away.

A federal fugitive warrant was issued that day in Birmingham, and U.S. Marshals began their search for the man.

"A number of people had told us in all probability he would be somewhere close to the coast," Keely said. Marshals developed information that he was in the Clearwater area.

Marshals in Birmingham enlisted the help of the task force marshals in Florida. They were able to track him down to the St. Petersburg where the arrest attempt was made on Thursday. ..Source.. by Carol Robinson -- The Birmingham News