A pair of suspects have been charged in connection with the deaths of three Kansas City Chiefs fans whose frozen bodies were found outside a home days after they watched the final football game of the regular season together, officials announced.
“After an investigation of nearly 14 months, two suspects are now facing felony charges in Platte County, including involuntary manslaughter, related to the deaths of three Chiefs fans in January of 2024,” the Kansas City Missouri Police Department said in an update on Wednesday,
Jordan Willis and Ivory Carson are also facing two counts of delivery of a controlled substance in relation to the deaths of Ricky Johnson, 38, Clayton McGeeney, 36, and David Harrington, 37. All three men, who had been friends since high school, were found dead in the backyard of Willis’ house on NW 83rd Terrace in the city Jan. 9, 2024.
Witnesses said the friends were using cocaine when they got together first at Harrington’s home and later Willis’ on Jan. 7, 2024, to watch the Chiefs play the Los Angeles Chargers.
The temperatures dropped below freezing on the night of the game, and their autopsies showed the trio died of combined cocaine and fentanyl toxicity.
“This case is a tragic reminder of the dangers of street drugs,” Platte County Prosecutor Eric Zahnd told a news conference Wednesday. “But make no mistake, the people who supply those drugs can and will be held accountable when people overdose.”
Willis has claimed he went to bed in the early hours of Jan. 8, unaware his friends were still outside at the time.
“It has been a very, very long year for Jordan,” his lawyer, John Picerno said. “He’s lost his job. He’s lost his home. He’s lost his friends. The public are pointing at him as someone who essentially killed them. And nothing could be further from the truth.”
Carson, meanwhile, has admitted to selling cocaine to Johnson, Willis, Harrington and McGeeney before Jan. 1, 2024, per the probable cause statement.
Both men were being held on $100,000 cash bond.