Inset: William Morrison (Jackson County Sheriff’s Office). Background: The Jackson County Detention Center in Kansas City, Mo. (Google Maps).
A Missouri man is behind bars after killing his business partner and hiding his corpse under newly poured concrete in the basement of a property owned by the defendant, Show-Me State police say.
William Morrison, 63, stands accused of one count each of first-degree murder and armed criminal action over the death and disappearance of 45-year-old Jonathan Brown, according to a press release issued by the Jackson County Prosecutor’s Office.
The investigation began in May when Brown was reported missing, according to a probable cause statement released by prosecutors. The Independence Police Department made contact with “a leader in a motorcycle club” who offered information about the victim’s location. Police later learned the witness “received that information” from the defendant, according to the charging document.
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As the investigation progressed, police learned Morrison and Brown had “ongoing financial dealings” involving “settlement money and business ventures,” according to the probable cause statement. Witnesses also described the defendant as “exercising influence over” the victim’s “finances, housing, and business activities.”
Brown was last seen alive on May 10, in surveillance footage from an excavation and demolition company, the charging document says. In the video, the victim gets out of an older model white sedan at around 11:30 p.m., police said. Minutes later, the victim and another man are seen leaving in the same car, according to law enforcement.
Witnesses told police that Brown “maintained contact with family, friends, motorcycle club members, and his children through calls, texts, social media, and in-person communication” and that it was “highly unusual” for him to “abruptly stop all communication.”
On the day of his disappearance, Brown sent his mother a “Happy Mother’s Day” text — the last she ever heard from him, police said.
Detectives learned from another witness that Brown left with Morrison on the evening of his disappearance “to perform concrete work” at a residence the defendant owns, according to the probable cause statement. Police followed that angle and learned from a woman living at the residence in question that Brown and Morrison arrived there that night “to perform basement construction work involving digging holes and preparing for concrete.”
During the construction, Morrison allegedly told the tenant “to get Taco Bell for them,” according to the charging document. So the woman left the basement and ordered Taco Bell delivery, but when she “later attempted to bring the food to the two,” Brown “was no longer there,” police said. Morrison allegedly told the woman that the victim had “left with an unknown female,” the court document says.
Surveillance footage from a nearby residence would shore up the tenant’s story, police said. In the footage, a white sedan arrives at the residence late on the night of May 10 and leaves after 3 a.m. the next morning, according to law enforcement.
“During that timeframe, only one additional vehicle briefly approached the residence with hazard lights activated before leaving, behavior consistent with a food delivery vehicle and consistent with [the tenant’s] statement regarding Taco Bell delivery,” the charging document reads.
During the investigation, detectives spoke with another woman connected to Morrison. This witness “appeared frightened during conversations regarding” the defendant and the victim’s disappearance, police claim. She identified a white Buick sedan as being “associated” with Morrison and said the defendant himself referred to the vehicle as his “do dirt car,” according to the probable cause statement.
Detectives eventually searched the residence with cadaver dogs. Two different canines “independently alerted to the odor of human remains in the basement near the northwest corner of a newly poured concrete slab and near a dirt pile located on the east side of the same slab,” the charging document says.
After excavating the property, investigators found Brown’s remains. He had been executed with a single shot to the back of the head, police said.
On the same day as the grim discovery, one of Morrison’s employees spoke with detectives and said the defendant directed him to a wallet containing a large amount of cash that was stashed in an air duct at the defendant’s residence. After finding the wallet and, based on the driver’s license, determining who it belonged to, the employee declined to take any money because he “did not want anything to do with it,” according to the probable cause statement.
Morrison remains held in the Jackson County Detention Center without bond. He is next scheduled to appear in court on Sept. 8.
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