Kansas City man sentenced to prison for 2017 killing of 3-year-old Marcus Haislip III

A Kansas City man will be sent to prison for the death of Marcus Haislip III, a 3-year-old boy who was killed in a triple shooting in the Blue Hills neighborhood while he was strapped into his car seat on May 12, 2017.

Derrick D. Wren Jr., 30, pleaded guilty to voluntary manslaughter and other charges during a hearing Friday morning in Jackson County Circuit Court.

Jackson County Circuit Court Judge S. Margene Burnett sentenced Wren on four felony charges, including one count of voluntary manslaughter, two counts of assault in the second degree, and one count of tampering with evidence.

The first count of assault in the second degree concerns Marcus Haislip III. The second count concerns the boy’s father, Marcus Haislip Jr.

Wren was sentenced to 12 years for voluntary manslaughter, 10 years for each assault count and five years for tampering with evidence. The sentences were set to run concurrently.

The boy’s mother, Angela Brown, gave a statement shortly before Wren was sentenced and thanked the judge for letting the family move forward.

“You don’t prepare yourself for things like this,” she said. “One hour you’re getting kisses and ‘I love you’s, and an hour later you’re in the hospital.”

2017 shooting of Marcus Haislip III

The shooting unfolded in broad daylight on a residential street near the corner of 54th Street and Park Avenue. Haislip was in a car with his father and another relative when the gunman opened fire.

A volley of at least 10 bullets struck the vehicle, busting out its windows and striking all three inside. Afterward, the boy — who was struck in the head, neck and elsewhere — was rushed in the bullet-riddled car to the hospital, where he was pronounced dead.

Four years went by before a case was made and Jackson County prosecutors filed charges against Wren. It was investigated by Kansas City police with assistance from the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms and state police.

Eyewitness statements helped lead police to Wren as a suspect early on in the long-running investigation.

Descriptions included accounts that described a heavyset man firing a long gun from the front porch of a house on the block that was known to police for a number of violent offenses. Witnesses said the shooter fled the scene in a gray Dodge.

Detectives attempted to interview Wren about the shooting in November 2018, but that ended when he asked for a lawyer, according to court papers.

In 2019, the Missouri State Highway Patrol matched DNA found on a styrofoam cup found near the crime scene to Wren’s profile in a state criminal database.

Then in late 2020, two witnesses allegedly known to Wren were interviewed by police and claimed he had confessed to the boy’s killing. They said he was known to carry a short rifle with a wooden stock that he kept loaded with a large ammunition clip.

One witness told investigators Wren made the admission one day while crying, saying: “This (expletive) wasn’t supposed to happen.”

In February 2021, Jackson County prosecutors charged Wren with second-degree murder, armed criminal action and first-degree assault.

He will not be the first to go to prison in connection with the toddler’s killing.

Others prosecuted

Roughly a year after the triple shooting, Marcus D. Haislip Jr. — the boy’s father — allegedly walked into a gas station at 37th and Broadway firing a 9mm handgun. He first shot a customer, later identified as a person of interest in his son’s killing. After he saw the security guard, he allegedly shot him too.

Authorities quickly concluded the shooting was retaliatory in motive.

The elder Haislip pleaded guilty in September to one count of second-degree assault and unlawful firearm possession. He was sentenced last month to seven years in state prison.

Also connected to the shooting as part of a federal investigation led by the ATF was Mickael N. Oliver, 28, who lived at the house where witnesses pointed early on as the place where the gunshots may have come from.

Witnesses said the shooting suspect possibly came from and fled into Oliver’s nearby residence that afternoon. But Oliver, when interviewed by police at the time, provided a statement that “lacked any substance to identify the shooter or procure charges.”

In 2017, The Star reported that Oliver’s house had been tied to a “staggering amount” of violence, including the death of a man who was fatally shot in the driveway. A prosecutor once called Oliver’s potential risk to public safety “off the chart.”

Oliver was found guilty by a federal jury in December 2021 in the Western District of Missouri of selling stolen firearms and selling a firearm to a convicted felon, among other crimes. On Oct. 12, he was sentenced to 17 years in federal prison.

The Star’s Luke Nozicka and Glenn E. Rice contributed to this report.