Ohio Man Charged With Killing Girlfriend, Allegedly Dumped Her Body In His Sister's Pennsylvania Yard
The FBI and local police are searching for a Cleveland man charged with killing his missing girlfriend.
Cleveland Police announced Monday that they had issued an arrest warrant for Anthony Kennedy, 43, on charges of aggravated murder in the death of Adrianna Kiri Taylor, 24. Taylor and Kennedy were purportedly in a relationship and had been living together before she was reported missing by her family.
In the Friday warrant, obtained by Cleveland CBS affiliate WOIO, the police wrote that Taylor was reported missing by her family on Nov. 13. In the initial missing person announcement, police at the time said her family last had contact with her on Oct. 8, the station reported.
Police said Taylor's car was later spotted by a license plate camera in Pennsylvania, where it was eventually recovered and then returned to Cleveland for processing at the crime lab.
Kennedy previously lived in the Pennsylvania and still had relatives there, the warrant said.
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Taylor's body was later recovered in the backyard of a home belonging to Kennedy's sister in Wilkinsburg, Pennsylvania — an eastern suburb of Pittsburgh around 150 miles from Cleveland — on Thanksgiving, according to the warrant and Pittsburgh CBS radio news station KDKA.
Anthony Kennedy Photo: Cuyahoga County Sheriff's Office
Surveillance footage viewed by Pittsburgh ABC affiliate WTAE reportedly showed an unknown vehicle pulling up outside the home shortly before 5:00 p.m. on Thanksgiving Day. A passenger is then seen opening up the trunk of a dark colored sedan before walking to the backyard of the home.
Police arrived at the house around 8:45 p.m., according to KDKA, and stayed for several hours. The warrant for Kennedy's arrest says that Taylor's body was buried in the backyard and recovered on Thursday — and that he was "recently observed within the rear yard" of the home.
An autopsy performed by the Allegheny County Medical Examiner over the weekend showed that Taylor was killed by a gunshot wound to the head, WOIO reported.
Adrianna Kiri Taylor Photo: Instagram
The arrest warrant issued in Cleveland indicates that police believe she was killed there rather than in Pennsylvania. Kennedy's sister's neighbors in Wilkinsburg told KDKA they didn't hear any gunshots on Thanksgiving before Taylor's body was unearthed.
Edgar Hoyle, a friend of Taylor's for more than a decade, told the station that he was one of the last people to speak to her in October, and that a number of her friends became worried after she didn't make contact with any of them for several days.
He said he'd had concerns about her relationship with Kennedy, but hadn't expressed them to her before her murder, which he now regrets.
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"I had a red flag," Hoyle told KDKA. "I didn't say anything 'cause I'm like, 'You're grown, it's your business, I'm not your father, I'm your friend.'"
He said he hopes Kennedy is convicted and gets a long prison sentence.
"You did something very, very wrong," Hoyle told the station of his friend's alleged killer. "And you deserve all the time they're going to give you."
Police encourage anyone with information in the case to contact them at 216-623-5464. Crimestoppers, which is offering $5,000 for information leading to Kennedy's arrest, can be contacted anonymously at 216-25-CRIME or via their website.
