The stepmother of one of the three Kansas City Chiefs fans mysteriously found frozen to death in their friend’s yard said she had to identify his body over the phone because the remains needed to “thaw out.”
Linda Johnson gave heart-wrenching insight into her loved one Ricky Johnson Jr. and his two friends as she revealed that prosecutors are still “looking into this case fully” despite cops initially ruling out anything suspicious.
She told NewsNation Wednesday that when news broke of the deaths she sought to identify her stepson as soon as possible “because you still hold out hope that he is going to come home.”
“We were not asked to go identify the body,” she told NewsNation’s Ashleigh Banfield.
“They told us that the bodies had to thaw out. They were frozen and that could have possibly have taken” a few days, she said in a disturbing twist to the gruesome tragedy.
When she asked to go in person she was told “that’s something that you only see in movies, they don’t need people to identify bodies,” she said.
“Well, we weren’t really willing to wait that long. So, I called the medical examiner the next day, and I started describing Ricky’s tattoos and his piercings. And she told me that that was one of the deceased,” Linda explained.
Johnson, 38, and two of his friends – David Harrington, 37, and Clayton McGeeney, 36 – were found frozen in the backyard of fellow fan Jordan Willis on Jan. 9 – two whole days after they went to his home to watch the Kansas City Chiefs play the Los Angeles Raiders.
Police were quick to rule out anything suspicious and state firmly that it was not being treated as a triple homicide, angering relatives of some of the men.
Linda said her family met with Platte County prosecutors, saying it “went well.”
“We got this reassurance that they are looking into this case fully,” she said.
“They didn’t give any specifics on evidence or what they found or what they haven’t found. They just reassured us that it is being investigated.”
The prosecutors also acknowledged reports that Willis, 38, had entered rehab – but were not able to verify the claims, she added.
Willis claimed to have been asleep for almost 48 hours before his friends’ bodies were found – and was wearing underwear and holding a wine glass when police showed up once the bodies were found.
Toxicology reports for the three deceased men are still pending – though two of them allegedly arrived at the watch party with two 30-packs of beer, a neighbor said.
At least one of the men’s bodies was discovered by McGeeney’s fiancée, April Mahoney, who broke into Willis’ home after becoming worried about her partner.
“My understanding is she entered the house through the front into the basement. And she went upstairs and was looking through a window and saw the body seated on the back patio in the chair,” Linda said of Mahoney’s terrible find, though she noted that she had not spoken to her personally about what she saw.
The family was troubled to learn that Johnson’s backpack was still inside his friend Jordan Willis’ home – and that the police never retrieved it.
“They were his wallet. His car keys. He had some antacids, ibuprofen and it was in a backpack. That backpack was still in the house, in Jordan’s house,” Linda said.
At the time of the interview, it was not clear if Johnson’s family had finally received his belongings.
Earlier this week, Ricky Johnson’s brother, Jonathan Price, slammed law enforcement’s approach to the incident.
“I’m not saying there was or was not a crime, but if you immediately suspect no foul play, then you should have a story, you should have something to tell the families, and for no one to hear anything, that doesn’t make any sense,” he told Chris Cuomo.