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Mystery surrounding 3 Kansas City Chiefs fans found dead outside man's home leads to accusations from victim's family
Authorities still haven't said how Ricky Johnson, Clayton McGeeney and David Harrington died, but police said they have no evidence of foul play.
www.cbsnews.com
It has been three weeks since three Kansas City fans joined friends to watch the Chiefs play the Los Angeles Chargers in the final game of the regular season. Two days later, their bodies were found in the backyard of the home of their friend Jordan Willis.
While Willis has denied any knowledge about his friends' deaths, one of the victims' brothers told CBS News that "he's not telling the truth."
Police still haven't said how the men died, but affirmed this weekend amid intense public speculation that they still have no evidence of foul play.
It's common for police to decline to comment much on an investigation before it's complete. So here's a look at what's known and not known in a mystery that has gained widespread attention on social media and the internet despite — or perhaps because of — the lack of solid information.
Police accounts say Ricky Johnson, 38; Clayton McGeeney, 36; and David Harrington, 37, went to the home of a friend in Kansas City, Missouri, to watch the Chiefs game Jan. 7. Police have not publicly named the homeowner but victims' families have identified him as Willis.
None of them made it home. Two nights later, McGeeney's fiancée went to the home looking for him.
"When there was no answer at the door, she broke into the basement of the residence and located an unknown dead body on the back porch. Officers responded to the back porch and confirmed there was a dead body. Upon further investigation, officers located two other dead bodies in the back yard," an initial police report on the incident said. "There were no obvious signs of foul play observed at or near the crime scene."
Johnson's brother, Jonathan Price, told CBS News' Michael George that his family "deserves answers."
"The only thing I know for a fact is that I don't accept that my brother just froze to death," Price said. "There has to be something else involved. Whether it's drugs or something else, I have no idea."
Police say there are still no signs that any crime was committed.
"This still remains a death investigation and nothing more," Officer Alayna Gonzalez, a spokeswoman for the Kansas City Police Department, said in an email Saturday to The Associated Press. "We still have no evidence or indication of foul play, no one is in police custody."
Investigators have not said publicly whether they believe drugs or alcohol were involved in what might have been three relatively sudden and simultaneous deaths, though it's clear that that's a possibility they are considering. Weather records indicate the low temperature that night was around 33 degrees.
"This incident has been gathering a significant amount of media attention and we (KCPD) would like answers on the cause of death just as much as everyone else does," Gonzalez wrote.
The department is still waiting on a ruling on the cause of death from Frontier Forensics, Gonzalez said. It's a private company that provides autopsy services for numerous counties across Kansas and Missouri. Once police get the cause of death back, she said, they will be able to provide additional updates on the investigation.
"They are an entirely separate entity from the police department, so we have zero impact on the timeline of their medical findings," Gonzalez wrote. "We have been notified it could be as much as an additional six or more weeks to receive the toxicology reports."
One factor fueling the speculation has been that the homeowner, Willis, says he didn't know the bodies of his three longtime friends were on his back porch and in his backyard for the two days before they were found.
But Gonzalez affirmed that Willis has cooperated with the investigation, an assertion that his lawyer, John Picerno, also has been making.
"Jordan has absolutely nothing to do with the deaths of his three friends," Picerno told CBS News.
But Price, Johnson's brother, told CBS News that he thinks Willis is not sharing everything he knows.
"I know that his story does not add up and I know that he's not telling the truth in some way or fashion," Price said.
Picerno said in a statement to Kansas City media earlier this month that his client was devastated by the deaths of his friends and that he didn't know that they were still in his backyard — or that they needed medical attention — until police showed up. Picerno said the last time that the homeowner saw them was when they left and he went to bed, and that he didn't know how they died.
The attorney said his client was "anxiously awaiting the results of the autopsy and toxicology report," and that they both wanted "to express our deepest sympathies to the friends and family members of these young men, and our thoughts and prayers are with them."
Among the questions raging on social media are: "Why hasn't the owner been named a suspect?" and "What's taking so long to determine a cause of death?" The mystery has gone viral on TikTok and other social platforms for its true-crime overtones. And family members of the three men have taken their frustrations to Kansas City-area media.
"My son and these other men were wonderful people. They deserve justice," Jennifer Marquez, Harrington's mother, told WDAF-TV. "The story, the whole story needs to come out."
But the statements from police indicate that it could still be weeks before they can provide definitive answers.
"How are you supposed to heal from something that you don't even know what happened?" Price told CBS News.
