Court records say officers had been sent repeatedly to the home where Alan Groom’s remains were eventually found concealed in September.
COLORADO SPRINGS, Colo. — Long before police discovered Alan Groom’s remains concealed inside his Colorado Springs home, officers had repeatedly been called to the address over allegations involving the 73-year-old and the woman who cared for him, according to an arrest affidavit that now forms part of a second-degree murder case.
Police records cited in the affidavit show 18 calls for service at the Tappan Drive residence beginning in December 2024. Some involved allegations that Sheldon “Shelly” Wilson, 62, was abusing Groom, who had suffered strokes, used a wheelchair and needed help with daily movement. Those earlier contacts have taken on new significance since Sept. 19, when Wilson and her daughter went to the Colorado Springs Police Operations Center and reported that Groom had been dead for months. Wilson was arrested after officers found his dismembered remains concealed in the home.
The earlier calls do not establish what caused Groom’s death, and authorities have not publicly released a final cause and manner in the sources reviewed for this report. But they provide a documented backdrop to investigators’ allegations that the relationship had included repeated violence before Groom was found unresponsive in March. Wilson faces accusations of second-degree murder, tampering with a deceased human body and tampering with physical evidence. The charges are allegations, and no court finding establishing her guilt was located in the reporting reviewed through Nov. 7.
One episode described in court records occurred in December, when a relative allegedly received more than 40 calls from Wilson during a single day. According to the affidavit, the relative reported that Wilson expressed a desire to kill Groom. Police also received complaints from family members and, according to local reporting on the court records, from people associated with hospice care. Exactly what officers found or concluded during every earlier call has not been made public in the reports reviewed for this article.
Groom’s declining health was central to the household arrangement described by investigators. Wilson told detectives that he had suffered multiple strokes and had at one point entered hospice care. She said he improved enough to leave hospice but remained physically limited. Court records described Wilson as his primary caregiver, responsible for helping him move in and out of his wheelchair. She allegedly told detectives Groom had become too weak to hurt her, a statement investigators included while documenting her own account of prior violence toward him.
Wilson allegedly told police that she drank heavily and sometimes lost her memory of what occurred. She said there had been occasions when, after drinking, she later found Groom injured and believed she had caused the injuries. According to the affidavit, she estimated that she had done “bad things” to him at least 10 times while intoxicated. Police did not present those statements as independent proof of every alleged incident, but investigators included them as part of Wilson’s account of the relationship before Groom died.
The night before Groom was found unresponsive became the critical period in the homicide investigation. March 16 was his birthday. Wilson allegedly told detectives she had set out to buy a cake but instead purchased several small bottles of liquor. She drank before returning home and later could not remember much of the evening, according to court records. The following morning, she said, she woke beside an unresponsive Groom. Her reported reaction was to wonder what she had done.
Wilson allegedly did not call 911 or report a death. Instead, the affidavit says, she covered Groom with blankets and left for work. She told detectives that she hoped he might be alive when she returned. When she came home and found him still unresponsive, she concluded he had died. Investigators have accused Wilson of killing Groom, but the public record summarized by police and local news organizations leaves an important distinction: Wilson told detectives she feared she might have caused the death, while the coroner’s definitive cause and manner were not publicly available in the material reviewed.
What followed was not a prompt death report but months of concealment, according to investigators. Groom’s body remained inside the home, initially covered, the affidavit says. Wilson allegedly told detectives she later dismembered the remains, placed them in storage totes and kept the containers inside the residence. The dismemberment occurred months after Groom was found unresponsive, according to accounts of the court records, making the alleged concealment a separate sequence from the still-unresolved question of precisely how Groom died.
As spring turned to summer, relatives were allegedly given explanations for Groom’s absence. Family members told police they had heard that he was staying with relatives outside Colorado or otherwise away from the home. Meanwhile, Wilson allegedly continued living at the residence. Investigators say she monitored the odor from the decomposing remains and slept on a different level of the house because she was having nightmares. Those allegations come from Wilson’s reported interview with detectives and have not been tested before a jury.
Family concern eventually forced the question of Groom’s whereabouts back in front of police. On Sept. 17, officers went to the home for a welfare check after relatives said they had been unable to reach him. Wilson allegedly gave officers an explanation involving hospice care. She later told investigators that the visit made her realize the situation could no longer remain hidden. The welfare check did not immediately produce the discovery of Groom’s remains, but it became the event Wilson said pushed her toward telling her daughters what had happened.
Two days later, Wilson and a daughter arrived at the Police Operations Center. She told officers Groom had been dead since March and warned that the situation at the house was serious. Police were sent to the 4000 block of Tappan Drive. Inside the residence, investigators reported detecting the smell of decomposition and finding human remains in storage containers and bags. A mattress with dark staining that appeared to be biological material was also recovered from an area behind a privacy fence, according to the affidavit.
The discovery changed the meaning of the earlier service calls without answering whether a different police response in those earlier encounters could have prevented Groom’s death. The available reports do not establish what evidence officers had at each call, what Groom may have told them, whether allegations could be substantiated or what legal options were available at those moments. Those unanswered questions matter because an arrest affidavit summarizes evidence supporting a later arrest; it is not a complete administrative review of every prior police contact.
Public records reported by The Gazette add another piece of background: Wilson had earlier Colorado convictions in domestic violence-related cases between 2015 and 2019, including harassment and third-degree assault. Those cases predated Groom’s death by years and do not prove the new allegations. Their relevance, if any, to the current prosecution would be governed by court rules and decisions about admissible evidence rather than by the existence of the records alone.
After the Sept. 19 search, police arrested Wilson. Court records cited by news organizations describe second-degree murder, tampering with a deceased human body and tampering with physical evidence among the allegations. Wilson also allegedly told investigators that she expected trouble over Groom’s Social Security payments because she had continued receiving money after his death. The sources reviewed for this article did not confirm that a separate financial charge was later filed, so that reported statement remains distinct from the charges publicly documented in the homicide case.
Groom was not publicly named in the first reports. The El Paso County Coroner’s Office conducted an autopsy on Sept. 21 and confirmed his identity on Sept. 24. Colorado Springs police announced the identification and said the death was being investigated as a homicide. Police also said Groom’s death was the city’s 11th homicide of 2026 at that point, compared with 25 by the same time the previous year.
The case now carries two parallel public questions. One concerns criminal responsibility for Groom’s death and the alleged concealment that followed. The other concerns the history preceding his death: repeated calls to the home, allegations of abuse, Groom’s physical dependence on Wilson and the warnings described in the affidavit. The first question belongs to the criminal process. The second cannot be answered simply by counting police visits; it would require a fuller accounting of what was known during each encounter and what actions were taken.
Eighteen earlier calls to the Tappan Drive home are now part of the documented history surrounding Groom’s death, but the available record does not show that authorities have completed any broader review of those contacts. Wilson’s criminal case remains unresolved, and no final coroner determination was located in the public reporting reviewed through Nov. 7. Any assessment of criminal responsibility will ultimately depend on evidence presented through the court process.
Author note: Last updated Nov. 7, 2026.