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Kansas City police confirmed there was no foul play in the deaths of three friends found frozen in their buddy’s backyard over a year ago — putting to rest boundless theories that dogged the bizarre tragedy.
The friends — Ricky Johnson Jr., 38; David Harrington, 37; and Clayton McGeeney, 36 — each died of “fentanyl and cocaine toxicity,” officials revealed Wednesday, according to the Kansas City Star.
Bags of the dangerous drugs were found inside 39-year-old Jordan Willis’s home, where the friends had been hanging out to watch a Kansas City Chiefs football game together on Jan. 7, 2024. Two days later their bodies were found frozen out back by concerned friends — while Willis had been inside and apparently failed to notice them.
The trio’s family and friends long pressed for answers about how they were left out in the cold to die while Willis claimed to be completely ignorant of his pals’ bodies right outside his door.
Finally, their loved ones will get some answers. Kansas City police have now concluded their investigation — announcing on Wednesday that they were bringing involuntary manslaughter charges against Willis and his alleged drug dealer, 42-year-old Ivory Carson.
Both men were arrested Wednesday afternoon.
“This case is a tragic reminder of the dangers of street drugs,” Platte County Prosecutor Eric Zahnd said Wednesday. “But make no mistake, the people who supply those drugs can and will be held accountable when people overdose.”
Willis’ DNA was predominantly found on the cocaine bag, while the fentanyl bag had a significant amount of Carson’s, Zahnd said.
Text messages between Carson and victim Harrington also indicated he had sold drugs to the friends, something he later fessed up to.
Willis — an HIV researcher — claimed that he went to bed early on the night of the deaths and didn’t hear friends and family pounding on his doors because he said he was sleeping with headphones on and a fan running.
In addition to missing the sight of his three friends frozen and dead in his backyard, Willis managed to overlook their cars parked out front until McGeeney’s fiancée broke down a door and forced her way inside.
Those bizarre details — and Willis’ career — sparked wild speculation that he had poisoned his buddies with some concoction of his own making.
Such theories were fanned by claims from McGeeney’s cousin, who told NewsNation that Willis was known as “The Chemist” by his friends because he liked to whip up cocktails of drugs to help them get high.
Sources close to Willis outright refuted those stories, however, explaining that his job had nothing to do with lab science but was based entirely on computational data.
An attorney for Willis says he was not the one who bought the drugs that led to his friends’ overdose deaths.
“Jordan maintains that he is not responsible for purchasing or supplying the drugs that led to the deaths of his three friends,” attorney John Picerno told the Kansas City Star after his client’s arrest. “We are very much looking forward to the day a jury gets to hear all of the evidence in this case.”
