International Courant
A person has been discovered responsible within the loss of life of a girl whose stays have been discovered inside a duffel bag alongside a rural northwest Missouri street nearly two weeks after she was killed at a Kansas Metropolis resort.
Marcus Brooks was convicted Thursday of first-degree homicide within the loss of life of 21-year-old Ariel Starcher, a mom of two from Independence, The St. Joseph Information-Press stories.
A Missouri Transportation Division employee discovered the bag with Starcher’s physique inside it in February 2020 round 45 miles north of Kansas Metropolis. She had died of suffocation, and likewise suffered a damaged neck.
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Key testimony towards him got here from Taylor Stoughton, who pleaded responsible final yr to second-degree homicide, as Brooks’ confederate. She and Brooks have been arrested a yr after the killing.
On the time, Starcher’s grandfather, Jim Starcher, informed WDAF-TV that his granddaughter knew Brooks and typically known as him for rides. Her associates had made the household nervous, he informed The Kansas Metropolis Star.
A person has been convicted of killing a girl in Kansas Metropolis, Missouri, earlier than stuffing her physique right into a duffel bag and dumping it on a street within the Present-Me State’s rural northwest. (Fox Information Digital)
“I at all times frightened about her, the life she was going by,” he informed The Kansas Metropolis Star. “She was making an attempt to vary her life, get her life straightened out. But it surely’s only one step ahead and 4 steps again.”
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The protection argued that Stoughton was the one to suffocate and bind Starcher. Brooks stated he was within the bathe on the time and solely helped get rid of the physique. Particular Public Defender Steven Willibey additionally questioned Stoughton’s testimony, noting {that a} plea settlement shortens her potential sentence.
However Buchanan County Prosecuting Legal professional Michelle Davidson stated Brooks’ DNA was discovered beneath Starcher’s fingernails and that one was torn, suggesting she had been killed making an attempt to battle off her attacker.
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Stoughton might be sentenced Nov. 20 and Brooks on Dec. 21.
Man convicted of killing girl, dumping physique in duffel bag on rural Missouri street
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