The suspect fled after officers forced entry into the family home, then was found the next day in the basement of a nearby salon, police said.
KENOSHA, Wis. — What began as a welfare check at a home near 75th Street and 22nd Avenue quickly widened into a 30-hour search across a Kenosha neighborhood after police said the man they suspected in his estranged wife’s killing fled before officers could arrest him.
The search became one of the defining parts of the case. It kept officers focused on a small area near the homicide scene, led police to issue a shelter-in-place request and ended only when they found 33-year-old Marckus Plaza in the basement of a salon near 75th Street and 23rd Avenue on April 2. By then, prosecutors had already filed a homicide case tied to the death of 28-year-old Makayla Plaza, who police say was killed inside the couple’s home while two young children were present. The arrest did not close the story. It opened a second stage marked by officer injuries, higher bond and added charges in court.
Police say the suspect’s escape happened in the first minutes of the investigation. According to the criminal complaint, officers arrived at about 6:20 a.m. April 1 for a welfare check after a friend reported hearing violence during a phone call with Makayla Plaza. Prosecutors say Marckus Plaza answered the door, identified himself as “Allen” and then shut the door on officers. As one officer moved to the back of the home, the complaint says, he saw Plaza dragging a body through a basement window. Officers forced their way inside, but Plaza ran, jumped a fence and vanished into the surrounding area. That flight immediately turned the case into more than a homicide scene response. It required containment, neighborhood canvassing and a search for a suspect who police believed was still nearby. Court records later showed a judge issued a $750,000 cash warrant while he remained at large.
The search spilled into the public in visible ways on April 2. FOX6 reported that police asked people near 75th Street and 23rd Avenue to shelter in place as officers focused on the area where they believed Plaza was hiding. The home where Makayla Plaza was found and the place where officers eventually found the suspect were only about a block apart. That detail gave the manhunt an especially tense shape: authorities were not tracking someone far outside the city but searching close to the original crime scene, in a neighborhood where residents were still waking up to squad cars, caution tape and public warnings. Kenosha Police Chief Patrick Patton later said officers had been asked to work through scenes that no one should have to see. Police did not publicly release a full tactical timeline of the search, but the reported geography suggests an operation focused tightly on nearby buildings and yards rather than a broad regional chase.
When the search ended, police said, it ended with more violence. Authorities found Plaza in the basement of a salon. During the attempt to arrest him, police said, he injured himself with a knife and struggled with officers, leaving two officers with minor injuries that required hospital treatment before they were released. That confrontation added fresh counts to the case, according to later court coverage, including resisting or obstructing an officer. Meanwhile, the underlying homicide allegations remained severe. Prosecutors say Makayla Plaza was found dead in the basement of the family home, with blood and signs of struggle throughout the house. One child told officers, “Daddy hit mommy,” according to the complaint, and later gave investigators a more detailed statement at the Children’s Advocacy Center. In that sense, the manhunt and arrest drew much of the public attention, but the criminal case still rests on what prosecutors say happened before the suspect ran.
The neighborhood response also became part of the story’s context. Police later identified Makayla Plaza as a former member of the Kenosha County Sheriff’s Office, and local court reporting added a picture of domestic turmoil before the killing. WISN reported that records showed she had sought a temporary restraining order in February, though the request was denied, and that Marckus Plaza was also facing separate misdemeanor charges from an earlier February case. By the time he appeared in court on April 6, the case had expanded beyond homicide. Prosecutors had added two felony counts of causing mental harm to a child and a misdemeanor entry count, local reports said. A court commissioner set bond at $2 million, reflecting both the gravity of the killing allegations and the fact that Plaza had already fled once and required a police operation to capture.
The search may be over, but the case keeps moving. FOX6 reported that Plaza was due back in court in May for a competency hearing. That next step shifts the focus away from patrol activity and back into a courtroom, where prosecutors will have to organize a case that started in chaos: officers at a front door, a suspect running through backyards, a neighborhood placed on alert and an arrest one block away. For residents, the visible part of the emergency ended when the shelter-in-place order was lifted. For the courts, the harder part is only beginning, with the state still preparing to prove what happened inside the house before the search began.
The case remained active with Plaza in custody on a $2 million bond and a May hearing ahead, while Kenosha’s role in the story moved from search perimeter and shelter order to witness testimony and court filings.
Author note: Last updated April 22, 2026.