EXCLUSIVE: ‘We All Knew He Was Off,’ Says Ex-Friend of Trans Defendant in Ohio Boy’s Killing
From hatchet threats to alleged assaults, a former friend sheds light on Kirby Rankin’s disturbing past.
A former close friend of Kirby Rankin, 33, says the allegations leveled against the trans-identifying man charged in 7-year-old William Evans-Ellis’ killing are horrifying—but not entirely out of character.
In an exclusive statement to Restoration News, Rankin's former friend, Jason Sheffield* said, “I mean, we all knew he was off.”
Kirby Rankin's mugshot
Sheffield said he knew Rankin by his birth name, Nathan, or Nate for short. The pair met in or around 2015, when they both lived in Kentucky and frequented the same hookah bar.
“His nickname was Weird Nate,” Sheffield recalled, noting that there were two Nates in their friend group. “We had Weird Nate and Beard Nate, so we all knew Nate was off—but not to the point where we thought something like this would happen.”
Rankin—alongside William’s mother, Kaitlin Evans, and Nessa Keaney, another trans-identifying male—pleaded not guilty on Aug. 14 to 13 charges in connection with the Ohio boy’s death. The charges include counts of aggravated murder, murder, kidnapping, felonious assault, endangering children, and conspiracy.
Investigators say the boy was found beaten to death in a closet of the apartment he shared with the three defendants, who acted as his “co-parents,” on Aug. 6. His body was reportedly bound with duct tape and showed signs of abuse, including water and burn torture. The Hamilton County coroner concluded that William’s official cause of death was blunt trauma to the head, though she disclosed at a press conference that he also had a broken arm and “bruises that were too numerous to count,” including older bruises inflicted over the past two months.
A recording of the 911 call that led police to William’s body reveals that a barefoot Kaitlin Evans arrived at a local emergency room hours before officers found her son’s body. On the recording, a nurse tells the dispatcher that Evans, rocking back and forth on the floor, claimed her partner was trying to kill her and had taken her son. When prompted for a name, Evans’ reply is audible: “Kirby Rankin.”
A History of Violence
The latest allegations of violence are not the first Rankin has faced this year. Just last month, he pleaded guilty to two misdemeanor charges of aggravated menacing and assault in connection with a January altercation in which he punched a woman in the face in a grocery store parking lot and threatened to shoot her. The victim in that case, Amy Bunnell, told local reporters that William was present for that incident, causing her to fear for the boy’s safety.
“I told them,” Bunnell told Local 12 WKRC through tears. “I told them I was worried about that little boy in here, and he’s killed him.”
Bunnell said she and her husband fought for Rankin’s charges to be elevated to felonies, but prosecutors rejected their requests. “It all could’ve been prevented if he’d been in jail,” she said.
Sheffield, noting that prior incident, said such erratic and violent behavior aligns perfectly with the Rankin he knew.
“Assaulting someone and pulling a firearm? Yeah, that sounds about right,” Sheffield said.
He recalled an incident in which he said Rankin threatened a man with a hatchet. “Somebody had a party at their apartment, and somebody got too handsy with a girl,” Sheffield said. “Nate found out about it, and then later that week, we were hanging out at that hookah bar, and Nate pulled a hatchet out of his backpack and threatened that guy.”
Sheffield also alleged that Rankin assaulted two of his former roommates. “[Rankin] chased the homeowner into his bedroom with a hatchet, and then the other one, he tried to choke him out at least once, maybe more,” he said.
What doesn’t add up for Sheffield is the thought of Rankin attacking an innocent child. “That really is strange to me,” he said. “Going after a kid . . . That doesn’t sound like the person I knew. But, clearly, he’s not the guy I knew.”
Sheffield said he lost touch with Rankin around the start of the COVID-19 pandemic. “That’s when things started escalating,” he noted. It was also around that time that Rankin started his gender transition. “Things started falling apart after that,” he said.
Sheffield, who has been following the murder case closely, said he has never met Evans or her son but is “horrified by” the reports. “I think everyone who’s seen it has been.”
In Ohio, aggravated murder is punishable by death or life imprisonment without parole. As the investigation is ongoing, prosecutors have yet to decide whether they will seek the death penalty for the three defendants.
*Jason Sheffield is a pseudonym used by Restoration News to protect the identity of Rankin's former friend.
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