A 25-year-old Arkansas man has been charged with murder in the shooting death of a 68-year-old man at a park in Coal Hill.
Arkansas State Police said that a Coal Hill police officer found the body of Kenneth E. Michaels mid-afternoon on Tuesday in Coal Hill City Park.
Colton T. Contant was identified as the killer and was seen fleeing the park. He was quickly located and taken into custody by Coal Hill officers, state troopers, and Johnson County deputies.
Contant has been booked into the Johnson County jail on a first degree murder charge and is being held without bond.
No further information about the shooting incident was made available.
The River Valley Democrat Gazette reported that Contant and 24-year-old Abigail L. Sill were charged in October with domestic battery and endangering the welfare of a child. A no-contact order later barred Sill from contacting Contant, according to court records.
Both are due back in court on December 2. The court records show that Contant and Sill have a 2-year-old child together.
Contant also pleaded guilty in 2022 to second-degree terroristic threatening, obstructing governmental operations and harassing communications charges, according to Crawford County court records. He was sentenced to 12 months in jail with 11 of them suspended and ordered to have no contact with Sill, who was the victim.
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[Featured image: Colton Contant/Johnson County Sheriff’s Office]
