Colorado Man Appears At Police Station With A Corpse In His Car

Robert L. Johnson

Byers, Colorado

Robert L. Johnson, 40, of Byers is currently behind bars at the Arapahoe County Jail accused of first-degree murder.

On Saturday, Johnson arrived at the Arapahoe Justice Center to surrender over a failure-to- appear warrant weighing heavy on his mind. Apparently, he wasn’t concerned about the corpse in his car. However, he did ask to speak to someone privately to “confess to a murder.”

Authorities decided to walk outside and take a look inside his vehicle, which lead to the discovery of the corpse of an 80-year-old man stuffed in the trunk. Johnson told police he waited to confess so that he could spend a day gambling with his mother.

According to the arrest affidavit, Johnson shot the man, whom he described as a friend, in the back of the head on Thursday. The victim has not been identified.

Johnson told investigators that he is gay and said the victim had been bothering him for sexual contact since December. He told investigators that he received numerous phone calls and text messages from the victim about 8 a.m. the day of the shooting. He said the calls and messages were sexual in nature.

According to the affidavit, Johnson called the victim and claimed his truck had broken down on County Road 181. He then drove from his home to a spot he knew the victim would pass and waited. When the victim arrived to help and opened his trunk to get a tow rope, Johnson, who was standing directly behind him, shot the man in the back of the head, the court document said.

The victim fell half into the trunk and Johnson shoved the body in the rest of the way, closed the trunk and wiped up some blood.

There are a couple of sweet spots to the story. After shooting the man in the head, Johnson drove to the victim's home in Byers and fed the man's cat. Johnson also "opened several cabinet and dresser drawers to make it look like a robbery took place," but decided that it was a "dumb thing to do and closed everything back up."

Johnson and his mother went to Black Hawk on Friday morning, hit several casinos and returned home to Byers about 6 p.m.

On Saturday morning, Johnson returned to the victim's home and fed the cat again before heading to the justice complex.