Killer of April Millsap denied appeal, judge cites ‘plenty of circumstantial evidence'

Welcome to Crime Watch Daily Update briefings. Today we are looking back at the July 2014 murder of 14-year-old April Milsap in Armada, Michigan, which Crime Watch Daily covered in 2016.

April was walking her dog on a warm night when she went missing. Police found her body and started investigating her death, which was the first murder in the area in 41 years. Her fitness tracker blew the case wide open, and James VanCallis Jr. was convicted of murder, kidnapping, and assault with intent to rape in June 2016. He was sentenced to life in prison without the possibility of parole, but has maintained his innocence the whole time because he argued no physical evidence connected him to the girl's murder.

In 2018, VanCallis appealed his conviction, but the Michigan Court of Appeals upheld the decision, writing, "Although there was no physical evidence tying defendant to the crime, there was plenty of circumstantial evidence from which a jury could conclude that defendant was the perpetrator."

In 2019, the Michigan Supreme Court also denied VanCallis' appeal.

Now, let's look back at the case.