Carroll County, Arkansas, Sheriff Daniel Klatt said in a Monday press release that a person of interest in connection with a double homicide in northwest Arkansas was found dead at the Pittsburg County Jail on Sunday.
Klatt said 56-year-old Travis Lee McConnell took his own life by hanging while he awaited extradition back to Missouri and Arkansas. McConnell was a person of interest in connection with the deaths of his parents, Joy Bennett Willmeth, 77, and Robert Leo Willmeth, 71.
According to Klatt’s press release, Carroll County Sheriff’s deputies first became involved on Nov. 14, when they conducted a welfare check at the couple’s residence and discovered them dead from apparent gunshot wounds. Investigators said they learned McConnell lived at the home but was missing, along with his father’s vehicle.
Klatt said the sheriff’s office issued a BOLO alert, and investigators soon received contact from Lawrence County, Missouri, authorities, who reported McConnell was already a suspect in a Nov. 12 assault in which he allegedly rammed a female acquaintance with a white truck and opened fire on her with a .22-caliber pistol. During the attack, he reportedly claimed he had “killed people in Arkansas.”
Using information shared among law enforcement agencies, Klatt said investigators tracked McConnell from Arkansas into Missouri and then into Oklahoma.
At approximately 1:58 p.m. on Nov. 14, members of the U.S. Marshals Service and the Oklahoma District 18 District Attorney’s Office located McConnell in Pittsburg County, still driving the missing truck, and took him into custody, Klatt said.
Klatt said investigators from the Arkansas State Police and his office traveled to the Pittsburg County Jail to interview McConnell and collect evidence, but he refused to speak. The investigators retrieved clothing and firearms from the arrest to process as evidence in the case.
On Sunday, Klatt said the Pittsburg County Sheriff’s Office informed Arkansas investigators that McConnell had died by suicide in his cell.
Klatt said investigators continue processing evidence and the case remains open, though officials say they have found no indication of any ongoing threat to the public.
Pittsburg County Sheriff Frankie McClendon said in a Monday video posted on social media McConnell was housed in the cell alone and was found unresponsive by staff during the evening meal pass.
McClendon said the Oklahoma State Bureau of Investigation will conduct an independent investigation of the in-custody death and his office will fully cooperate with OSBI.