The mystery surrounding the deaths of three men whose bodies were found outside a friend’s house after a football watch party has yet to be unraveled one year after authorities began investigating the case.
Clayton McGreeney, 36, David Harrington, 37, and Ricky Johnson, 38, were all mysteriously found dead outside the rental home of their friend Jordan Willis on Jan. 9, 2024 — two days after the group of four gathered at the property to watch a Kansas Chiefs game.
It wasn’t until McGreeney’s fiancée went to the home and gained access to the property that she found the bodies of all three men on the back porch and in the backyard.
Willis’ attorney claims his client had no clue how they ended up dead. Willis reportedly dozed off at some point during the gathering but stated that he saw his friends leave. He had no idea that their bodies had been outside for two days.
A fifth friend, who has not been publicly identified, was also at the get-together but left early. However, he said when he left the home around midnight, Willis and the other three men were still awake.
That friend also recalled hearing from McGreeney’s fiancée and Johnson’s mother about their loved ones’ whereabouts and texted Willis. Willis’ attorney maintains that Willis never received any texts or calls, but was contacted by the men’s families through Facebook Messenger.
Because of conflicting accounts and an indefinite timeline, authorities are still investigating what really happened that night.
Weeks after the investigation was launched, officials released a toxicology report showing that all three men had consumed cocaine and fentanyl before they died. Their autopsies were also completed, but their official causes of death still have not been released to the public.
Willis moved out of the rental property and checked himself into a rehabilitation facility to address his addiction issues.
Authorities say the case is still ongoing.
Although Willis hasn’t been charged with a crime, his attorney John Picerno wants authorities to clear his name publicly.
“Obviously, the public still thinks he’s somehow involved in the deaths of these guys. If you [the authorities] know that he didn’t have anything to do with it, why don’t you come out publicly and clear him?” Picerno told People magazine.
The families of the men who passed have previously expressed uncertainty about the nature of their deaths.
“I’m not arguing that that was what they found in his system, but how it got into the system, we still don’t know,” Harrington told People in 2024. He added that his son “loved life,” and was “incredibly sure that the outcome of this was not intended.”
“If I were to give a hypothesis … for the three men to die in the way that they did, something had to have been in their system,” Johnson’s brother, Jonathan Price, remarked last year. “Whether or not it was taken knowingly, I wouldn’t answer that.”
A police spokesman said no new information has been released and that the case remains a death investigation.
“It has been a long and complex investigation, but we will not give up on trying to determine who is responsible for the deaths of these young men,” Platte County District Attorney Eric Zahnd told USA Today.
