Man accused of fatally shooting Kansas City motorist with AR-style rifle

A 27-year-old man is charged with second-degree murder in the killing of a man who was found shot to death inside a crashed SUV in Kansas City’s Park Farms neighborhood last week.

Charles F. Miller Jr., of Kansas City, was arrested Thursday on the murder charge along with two counts of armed criminal action, unlawful firearm possession and unlawful weapon use. He made his first appearance in Jackson County Circuit Court on Friday.

Miller is accused of killing 34-year-old Marvin Yancey in the early hours of July 16. Authorities allege he shot Yancey with an AR-style rifle that was tracked to an abandoned car later that day through investigators’ analysis of traffic cameras and private surveillance footage.

According to court records, Kansas City police officers were first called at 12:50 a.m. July 16 to the intersection of East 83rd Street and Blue Ridge Boulevard to investigate the sound of gunfire in the area. Officers found no evidence of a crime scene and the 911 call was determined to be unfounded.

At 10:30 that morning, roughly 10 hours after the initial call, police were again dispatched to the neighborhood — this time in response to an injury accident one block away in the 8200 block of Blue Ridge Boulevard. Inside a Chevy Tahoe, which had wrecked into a tree in a yard there, police found Yancey dead of gunshot wounds.

Investigators noted at the crime scene that the front passenger-side glass of the SUV had been shattered and an apparent bullet hole was seen in the bottom part of the window frame. Also seen was what appeared to be silver paint on the front bumper that was suspected to have been transferred from another vehicle.

Traffic cameras showed Yancey was driving north on Blue Ridge Boulevard from 87th Street around 12:45 a.m., a few minutes before gunfire was reported. A silver sedan was at the intersection there too.

The cameras captured a photograph of the vehicle’s license plate. The car was then tracked, using license-plate-reading technology, to a nearby gas station. Surveillance video from that location showed a man with a distinctive hairstyle wearing a T-shirt and shorts who was holding a rifle in his right hand, court papers say.

The vehicle was registered to a woman identified in court papers as J.S. The car was also under a lien and was being monitored by GPS, detectives learned. Based on information provided by the loaning company, police tracked the car to a different gas station where it was found abandoned by the pumps.

Before police arrived, private security officers were called to the sedan in response to an AR-style rifle being seen on the passenger floorboard. The gun was removed from the vehicle by the security officers before being taken into police custody as evidence, according to court records.

Detectives interviewed the owner of the car. She told police she had been drinking with Miller, the accused shooter, that night at her home in south Kansas City before the pair left together to pick up her driver.

The witness said she drifted off to sleep then awoke to Miller pointing a rifle at her with one hand while driving with the other. She told detectives he was yelling at her and described being involved in a single-vehicle car crash where they struck a highway median. She said she got out of the car and left after the crash because she was afraid of Miller.

A Kansas City crime lab analysis showed the rifle that was in the car that day was the same one used in the shooting. It was compared with a bullet removed from Yancey during an autopsy, court records show.

Miller had previous felony convictions on his record for fleeing the scene of an accident and resisting arrest stemming from an incident nearly 10 years ago. His criminal history bars him from possessing a firearm under state and federal laws.

Miller was being held without bond as of Friday. He was due in court for a bond review hearing on Aug. 1.

Court papers did not list a defense attorney for Miller who could speak on his behalf.