Witnesses described financial ties between William Morrison and Johnathon Brown before Brown disappeared after a planned night of basement construction.
KANSAS CITY, Mo. — Before Johnathon Brown disappeared, witnesses told police, he and William Morrison were more than two men working on a basement project: They were business partners whose financial dealings and shared ventures had become part of the relationship investigators would examine after Brown was found dead.
Those ties now sit within a first-degree murder case that has moved to the grand jury stage. Morrison has been indicted on first-degree murder and armed criminal action charges after investigators recovered Brown’s remains beneath newly poured concrete at an Independence residence. Police say Brown, 45, had gone there with Morrison to work in the basement on May 10. Prosecutors have not established a motive in public filings, however, and the witnesses’ descriptions of financial dealings do not by themselves prove why Brown was killed or who killed him. Morrison is presumed innocent.
Investigators learned about the business relationship while interviewing people who knew the two men. The probable cause statement says witnesses described continuing dealings involving settlement money and various business activities. Some also said Morrison exercised influence over Brown’s financial affairs, housing and work. Police treated that information as background to the men’s connection. The filing does not say that a particular debt, payment or business disagreement triggered Brown’s death, and prosecutors have not publicly identified a financial dispute as the motive behind the homicide charge.
The last known project linking the men was far more ordinary on its face: concrete work in a basement. Brown was seen May 10 in an older white sedan, and investigators later located surveillance footage showing him and another man leaving an excavation and demolition business late that night. A witness told detectives Brown had said he and Morrison were going to work at an Independence property owned by Morrison. A resident there confirmed that the men arrived during the evening and began digging and preparing the basement for concrete.
What happened during the next several hours became the central question. The resident told detectives Morrison eventually asked her to arrange food for the workers. After leaving the basement and later returning, she no longer saw Brown. Morrison allegedly told her Brown had departed with another woman. Detectives checked nearby surveillance video. It showed the white sedan arriving at the home shortly before midnight and departing shortly after 3 a.m., while investigators said the only other vehicle that briefly approached appeared to be the food delivery the resident expected.
The video was significant because it gave detectives an outside record against which to compare what witnesses had been told. Brown’s cellphone supplied another. Historical data showed his device remaining in the area of the property until about 3:18 a.m., close to the sedan’s departure. Investigators said that did not fit the account that Brown had left the residence earlier with an unidentified woman. The phone subsequently moved to a location associated with one of Morrison’s businesses before beginning a longer trip south and east from the Kansas City area.
While detectives were reconstructing those movements, Brown’s continued lack of contact was becoming increasingly important. People who knew him described him as someone who regularly spoke with relatives, friends, his children and motorcycle club associates by phone, message and social media. His sudden silence was considered highly unusual. Brown’s mother told police that his last contact with her was a Mother’s Day message on May 10. Police had received the formal missing-person report on May 13.
Early information about Brown’s whereabouts pointed in another direction. An associate told police he had heard Brown was in Springfield. Investigators later determined that Morrison was the source of that information, according to the probable cause statement. Another witness connected Morrison to a white Buick and to the Independence property where the basement work had taken place. As investigators accumulated those accounts, they obtained authority to search the residence and brought cadaver dog teams there on May 23.
The search changed the case. Two dogs trained to locate human remains independently alerted in the basement around a newly poured concrete slab and a nearby dirt pile. Detectives excavated the area and uncovered a body, later identified as Brown. The Jackson County Medical Examiner’s Office determined that Brown had died from a single gunshot wound to the head and classified his death as a homicide. The publicly released records do not identify a recovered murder weapon or describe forensic testing that conclusively places a gun in Morrison’s hands.
Brown’s wallet soon became another part of the evidence described by investigators. One of Morrison’s employees told police Morrison contacted him while in jail and directed him toward cash kept at Morrison’s home. The employee also checked an area above an air duct and found a leather wallet containing Brown’s identification, according to the court filing. Rather than remove the wallet, he left it and contacted police. Detectives later obtained a warrant and recovered it from the residence. The Jackson County Prosecutor’s Office specifically cited the wallet when announcing the homicide charges.
Investigators then pursued what had happened to Brown’s cellphone after it left the area where his body was found. Location records led them toward Urich, Missouri. Video from a convenience store showed a pickup truck and a woman investigators identified as one of Morrison’s employees. Police later interviewed her, and she said Morrison had supplied two phones and told her to dispose of them while driving toward Springfield. She told detectives she changed that plan, discarded a phone case in Urich and threw the phones into a field. A later search did not recover the devices.
The phone episode became relevant for two reasons. First, investigators said the device’s recorded movement helped them reconstruct events after they believed Brown was already dead. Second, the employee’s account gave police an explanation for how the phones came to be traveling away from the Independence residence. The court filing presents that account as part of the probable cause supporting the case against Morrison. It does not accuse the employee of knowing about the homicide when she handled the devices, and her account remains evidence that can be tested in later proceedings.
Prosecutors publicly charged Morrison on Sept. 3 with first-degree murder and armed criminal action. At that stage, the case rested on a probable cause determination, not a finding of guilt. A Jackson County grand jury later returned an indictment on the same charges on Sept. 24. That procedural step eliminated the need for a preliminary hearing and moved the case directly toward circuit court proceedings. It did not resolve factual disputes or determine whether the state can prove the charges beyond a reasonable doubt at trial.
The grand jury development also makes the unresolved questions more important. Public filings explain how investigators say Brown reached the property, why police searched the basement, where his remains were discovered and how several items connected to him were traced afterward. They do not publicly establish a motive or provide a complete account of what happened inside the basement between Brown’s arrival and the departure of the white sedan. Those matters may become subjects of evidence, motions or testimony as the case progresses.
Currently, Morrison is being jailed without bond according to the latest available court reporting and he is scheduled for an arraignment at 9:30 a.m. Oct. 20. No trial date had been announced as of Oct. 19. The business and financial relationship that first helped investigators understand why the men were together remains part of the case’s background, but the ultimate questions of criminal responsibility will be decided through the court process.
Author note: Last updated October 19, 2026.