Gregory "Jap" Posey

RUSSELLVILLE — If the weather was nice and the fish were biting, you could count on Patrick “P.J.” Gilbert getting out on the water to cast his line.

“He wanted to be a professional fisherman,” Gilbert’s mother, Lisa Miller, recalled with a smile. “He fished with my nephew, they had secret spots.”

Gilbert, 29, of Russellville, had also talked of going back to school to study industrial maintenance, but his life was cut short July 24 after being shot multiple times on Edwards Street in Russellville.

Gregory “Jap” Posey, 32, of Russellville, was arrested July 28 by the Russellville Police Department and charged with murder and possession of a handgun by a convicted felon. Posey came to the RPD the day after police released that he was a person of interest in the case.

Police said Posey previously made threats to Gilbert over a domestic issue and had also made threats to potential witnesses and law enforcement officers attempting to contact him.

On Monday in Logan District Court, Posey waived his right to a preliminary hearing, enabling Logan District Judge Kenneth Williams to send the case to be heard by a grand jury.

Posey, who is represented by attorney William Maddox II of the state Department of Public Advocacy, is in Logan County Detention Center under a $1 million bond.

Miller said after the court appearance that an “outpouring of love” from the community helped as she grieved the loss of her son, whose funeral was at Russellville High School, which he attended.

Gilbert’s Facebook page said he worked at Emerson Electronics in Russellville.

Miller said she has received more than 200 Facebook messages of support in the past several days.

Seeing the man accused of killing her son over the course of multiple court hearings is sure to be difficult, Miller said.

“Honestly, he does not have a look of remorse,” Miller said of Posey. “I don’t hate him, because it’s not going to bring my son back, but I don’t have pity for him.”

Federal court records show that Posey was convicted in U.S. District Court in Bowling Green in 2008 to conspiracy to distribute crack cocaine and sentenced to 18 months in prison. He was ordered to serve eight months in 2012 after being found by a federal judge to have violated the terms of his supervised release.

Lisa Miller and her husband, Johnny Miller, both wore T-shirts with pictures of Gilbert on the front.

Johnny Miller’s black T-shirt featured a picture of a smiling Gilbert in sunglasses, holding a freshly caught fish.

For Lisa Miller, Gilbert’s death underscores her frustration about gun violence, and she hopes that more community resources can be made available to youths in order to steer them away from resolving disputes with violence, something that she said Gilbert tried to avoid.

“He’d rather talk it out instead of retaliate,” Miller said. “It was senseless for this act to happen – it could have been avoided, in my eyes.”

— Follow courts reporter Justin Story on Twitter @jstorydailynews or visit bgdailynews.com.