Eight-time felon convicted of murder, rape of two women abandoned in Atlanta home

Heather Camp was found dead on a back-room floor of a house wrapped in a bed sheet. 

Her legs were spread open and mouth was wrapped with duct tape. 

Hours later, Atlanta police found Nicole Sartell’s body badly decomposed with strangulation marks on her neck. 

Now, nearly three years after their bodies were discovered, a jury found Ardentric Dion Johnson guilty of their murders.

Johnson, an eight-time felon, was also convicted of rape, aggravated sodomy, aggravated assault, false imprisonment and concealing a dead body in the December 19, 2014 discovery inside a Madrona Street home in northwest Atlanta, the Fulton County District Attorney’s Office said. 

Johnson’s mother made the first discovery when she walked inside the abandoned home, known for illicit activity, authorities said. 

Investigators discovered that Camp, 33, was badly beaten, sexually assaulted and strangled, Fulton District Attorney spokesman Dexter Bond Jr. said. 

Officials didn’t find 31-year-old Sartell’s body until after a search warrant was secured for the home, according to a police report. She had been missing for four months.  

During the investigation, officers discovered the women were last seen with Johnson, who stayed at the home — owned by his family — with no running water or electricity and was known in the community as a “drug house,” Bond said. 

Police caught up with Johnson a week and a half later and served him with murder warrants at the Fulton County jail, where he was being held for a probation violation.  

Johnson had been in and out of the Fulton County jail since 1996 on battery, forgery, false imprisonment and drug charges. Under Georgia law, as a recidivist, Johnson will be sentenced Friday to life without the possibility of parole. 

REPRINTED FROM ajc.com

UPDATE: Victim found shot and killed in abandoned house identified

BATON ROUGE, La (LOCAL 33) (FOX 44) - UPDATE:

The victim has been identified as 42-year-old Brian Allen Cook from Kyle, Texas.

There are still no known suspects or motives at this time.

This investigation remains ongoing.

ORIGINAL STORY:

Investigators are working to connect the dots after a man was found shot to death in an abandoned house on Dayton Street late Wednesday morning.

According to BRPD, an unidentified man was discovered at 2526 Dayton Street around 11:50 a.m. on December 5, 2018.

We're told there are no proposed suspects or motives at this time.

If you have any information regarding this homicide, you are strongly urged to contact the Violent Crimes Unit at 389-4869 or Crime Stoppers at 344-7867.

Stay with BRProud.com for the very latest on this developing story.

REPRINTED FROM brproud.com

Police: Teen found shot dead in abandoned house died during "Russian roulette"

LAS VEGAS — A teenager found dead in an abandoned house in a Las Vegas suburb last week was killed while playing "Russian roulette," investigators have concluded. Las Vegas resident Matthew Minkler, 17, was with two other teenagers when the gun went off Friday, according to a probable cause report obtained by the Las Vegas Review-Journal.

The two other teenagers, Jaiden Caruso, 16,  and Kody Harlan, 17, allegedly ran from the Henderson house after the shot went off but returned later to clean up the scene and hide the body in a downstairs closet. Detectives later found an expletive spray-painted on the closet door.

According to the paper, however, Minkler's family is disputing the police account of the events leading up to their son's death.

"We know this wasn't Russian roulette," Minkler's mother Jamie Shanklin told the Las Vegas Review-Journal. 

Both teenagers have been charged as adults in Minkler's death. Caruso faces a charge of murder with a deadly weapon, and Harlan faces charges of accessory to murder after the fact and destroying evidence.

Authorities discovered Minkler's body after arresting Harlan for leading police on a car chase in a stolen Mercedes. The teen allegedly told police he had been involved with a murder earlier in the day.

Minkler's wallet was found inside the stolen car, police said.

He was found dead in the house with a gunshot wound to the head.

When police searched Caruso's cellphone, they found several videos from the scene of the shooting, the report said. In one, Caruso reportedly speaks into the camera, saying, "Bro, I just caught a body."

In another video, a voice can reportedly be heard in the background asking what to do with Matthew's body. Caruso then reportedly "calmly walks to the kitchen sink, wets his hands and begins to clean his shoes."  

Caruso told police he was involved in the shooting and that it was accidental, police said.

Matthew had reportedly just completed his junior year at Silverado High School and was set to graduate next year. Shanklin, his mother, told the paper that he told his family as he was leaving the house on the day he was killed to tell her that he loved her.

"My baby never came home," she said.

REPRINTED FROM cbsnews.com