Incident report

REPORTING OFFICER'S NARRATIVE (Brief narrative of the facts surrounding the offense and the arrest.)

At 7:35 p.m., Dispatch received a 911 call reporting a dead body in the women's restroom of the Kangaroo Express on 1724 University Avenue. The caller identified himself as Jimmy Carnes (Person 2), the store clerk who was on duty and found the body.

Yoknapatawpha County Sheriff's Unit 209 (Officer P. Winston) and YCFD ambulance unit (EMTs Bill Harcourt and Ned Keller) were immediately dispatched. R/O Winston arrived at the scene at 7:51 p.m. Upon verification of the presence of a body at 7:53 p.m., R/O notified Dispatch and requested backup and detectives.

Detectives Armstrong and Murphy were assigned and proceeded directly to the scene. At R/Is' request, Coroner's Inspector L. Johnson and a CSU team were notified to respond to the scene.

Reporting Investigators (R/Is) arrived at the scene at 8:10 p.m. and found Officer Winston had secured the area. Environmental conditions at the scene upon arrival are as follows: Weather: Clear; Exterior Ambient Temperature: 36°F / 2°C; Exterior Relative Humidity: 70%; Interior Ambient Temperature: 70°F / 21°C; Interior Relative Humidity: 40%.

R/O Winston made the following verbal report, which is stated in summary and not verbatim.

R/O was met outside of the bathroom door by Jimmy Carnes, who then led R/O into the women's restroom where R/O observed the body of an apparently dead adult female, later identified as Katie Marie Masters (Person 1).

At R/O's request, Carnes exited the restroom area and proceeded outside to direct backup and medical personnel to the site.

R/O added that a second witness, Rosalie Hansen (Person 3) was also present upon his arrival and was reportedly with Carnes when Carnes found the body. R/O said Hansen appeared highly emotional following the discovery and was secured in his patrol car at the time of his verbal report.

R/O further said YCFD EMTs R. Peterson and J. Bilkey arrived at approximately 8:10 p.m., and after confirming the victim was deceased, withdrew from the crime scene.

R/O Winston further stated that, to the best of his knowledge, the following personnel had occasion to enter the crime scene area and must be documented by CSU personnel: witness Jimmy Carnes, witness Rosalie Hansen, EMT Peterson, EMT Bilkey, and himself.

After receiving the report from R/O Winston, R/Is requested that R/O supervise the transportation of the witnesses to the Yoknapatawpha County Sheriff's Department for subsequent interviews.

R/Is then conducted a preliminary inspection of the scene. Inside the restroom on the floor, R/Is observed a lifeless human body, a female apparently in her late teens.

Visual inspection indicated the victim was wearing a pink, black and white plaid button-up shirt and black shorts. The victim was also wearing neon green hoop pierced earrings, white roller skates and white ankle socks. A platinum blond hairpiece was attached at the back of her head.

The body lay on its left side with the head pointing north. The legs were bent at the knees, both knees facing eastward, the left leg was underneath the right leg. The feet were to the south. The left arm was outstretched and slightly angled to the left with the left side of the head/face resting on it. The right arm was bent at the elbow and the fingers were pointing east.

Further visual inspection revealed the victim's right shirt sleeve was ripped, and there were cut marks on the upper right arm. R/Is delayed further inspection of the body until the arrival of the Coroner's Inspector.

Just north of the victim's head, R/Is also observed what appeared to be a message reading "TTFn" was written on the floor in a reddish-brown substance.

Coroner's Inspector Luwinda Johnson arrived at the scene at approximately 8:35 p.m. and joined R/Is at the body's location. Inspector Johnson pronounced the victim deceased at 8:42 p.m. by visual observation that the victim was not breathing and by tactile observation that the victim did not have a palpable carotid pulse.

Inspector Johnson visually examined the body and observed multiple sharp force wounds on the right side, just above the waist, on the upper right arm, and to the stomach area. Inspector Johnson speculated that the death may have been the result of those wounds. Inspector Johnson indicated that further details would be available in the official autopsy report.

CSU arrived at the scene at approximately 9:15 p.m., and after Inspector Johnson completed her initial inspection of the body, she stayed with the CSU team to ensure the integrity of the body, while the team took photographs of the scene and performed preliminary analyses, until the body could be removed from the scene without affecting other evidence.

Luminol testing at the scene found blood residue in the sink of the bathroom where the body was found.

A preliminary search of the immediate area for the weapon(s) causing the injury to the victim met with negative results. CSU will conduct a more intensive search and report their findings.

R/Is left the scene at 10:05 p.m. to conduct interviews with the witnesses who had been transported to the YCSD. Before leaving, R/I Murphy instructed CSU to seal the scene upon completion or end of day suspension of processing. CSU to notify R/Is of progress by the end of this date. As of this filing, CSU is still actively processing at the scene.

The body of the deceased was remanded into the custody of Coroner's Inspector Luwinda Johnson. The deceased was removed from the scene at 10:55 p.m. and transported to the coroner's office for autopsy.

Evidence remanded into the custody of Forensics Officer T. R. Douglas for transport to the State Crime Lab for routine analysis. CSU is expected to submit an inventory of items taken into evidence within fourteen days of this report, with detailed report(s) of their findings to follow at a later date.

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