Investigators say the witness statement from the victim’s mother frames both the motive and the final moments before gunfire near 71 Highway.
KANSAS CITY, Mo. — The most personal details in the homicide case against 19-year-old Ke’Montae Phillips come from the person who was walking beside Richaud Conley when he was killed: Conley’s mother, who told police her son appeared frightened, said they were being followed, and then tried to shield her when shots were fired.
Her account is central because it does more than describe the shooting. It gives investigators a reported motive, links the fatal encounter to an earlier confrontation and explains why detectives came to view the March 10 killing as the end of an ongoing conflict tied to a failed relationship. Prosecutors have charged Phillips with second-degree murder and armed criminal action, and the case is headed toward a bond review and an April 15 preliminary hearing.
According to the probable cause statement, Conley’s mother told detectives her son had been having ongoing trouble with his ex-girlfriend’s brother after the couple broke up. She said she believed the ex-girlfriend had a connection to apartments near where the shooting later happened. About a week before the homicide, she said, she and her son were walking near the same general area when a young Black male wearing a blue head covering approached them and made several aggressive statements about how the relationship with his sister had gone sour. The affidavit says the comments grew so hostile that Conley was struck in the face several times. The mother also told police that a second male approached during that earlier incident carrying a rifle-style weapon. Both men later left, and, she said, nothing else happened until the day of the shooting.
On March 10, the mother said, she was at a friend’s house near the area when her son came to meet her. Detectives wrote that she described him as scared. He told her something to the effect of “they are following me,” though she told officers she could not get a cohesive story about what exactly he meant. The affidavit says the two began walking home together and that she noticed Conley had a rifle tucked into his pants. That detail becomes important later because the same filing says neither Conley nor his mother was able to use that weapon when the shooting started. The papers do not say why he was carrying it, only that it was present and later ended up on the ground after the two fled toward a field.
The mother’s account of the shooting itself is short and direct. As they entered an intersection, she told police, the same male from the confrontation the week before approached on foot. The affidavit says he asked Conley something like, “you clutching?” and then pulled out a rifle-style weapon with a red laser. Detectives wrote that he began firing an automatic weapon at both of them. The mother said her son shielded her while they ran. She said they could not produce Conley’s rifle to return fire. A short distance from the intersection, in a field, she realized he had been hit. She started CPR while neighbors came outside to assist or watch. Another witness later described seeing the woman move a rifle in the aftermath and apparently discharge it once by accident. The public record does not say anyone was struck by that shot.
Investigators used her account as a frame and then looked for outside support. The prosecutor’s office says city cameras and dash camera footage captured the victims walking together when a man later identified as Phillips exited a vehicle, approached and opened fire with an automatic rifle-style firearm. The affidavit adds that detectives found 27 .300 Blackout casings, six 9 mm casings and one spent .223 casing, as well as marks in the dirt showing likely bullet paths. Multiple witnesses, police wrote, reported hearing a long burst of automatic fire followed by several separate shots from another weapon. One witness’s dash camera partly captured the shooting. Others noticed a white sedan parked nearby and saw two men near it around the time gunfire erupted. Those details gave detectives physical and electronic evidence to compare with what the mother said happened.
The same filing also shows how the mother’s earlier remarks steered the investigation toward a specific circle of people. Detectives wrote that she told them the ex-girlfriend had ties to apartments near the scene. They later traced a white Ford Fusion with a temporary Kansas tag through city cameras and an automated license plate reader. The affidavit says the vehicle was seen moving through a Family Dollar lot, a Phillips 66 station and the nearby streets in a pattern detectives considered suspicious. Plate information led police to a registered owner whose daughter, the affidavit says, had been documented in a 2023 police report as Conley’s girlfriend. That link did not prove the shooting by itself, but it aligned with the mother’s description of the dispute and the location. Investigators later obtained a search warrant for a residence of interest, where an adult woman acknowledged that Phillips drove her vehicle but denied knowing anything about the homicide.
When Phillips was questioned, according to detectives, he denied involvement and said one of the people shown in surveillance images looked like his twin. But the affidavit says investigators noticed that he identified Conley as “the guy that got murdered” before police had told him the person in the photo was the victim. After additional questioning, the filing says, he asked for an attorney and the interview stopped. Prosecutors announced the charges March 17. A judge ordered Phillips held on a $250,000 cash-only bond. The case now moves toward a scheduled bond review and a preliminary hearing on April 15. The record still leaves open whether a second man seen in the evidence will face charges and whether police recovered the rifle-style weapon they say was used.
For now, the public story of the case still turns on the mother who survived it. Her account is the thread that connects the breakup, the earlier threat, the fear she said she saw in her son, the burst of gunfire at the intersection and the CPR she performed in a field before police say a homicide case began taking shape around cameras, casings and court filings.
Author note: Last updated April 14, 2026.