KANSAS CITY, Mo. — The Cameron, Missouri, Police Department recently apprehended two suspects in a 2014 murder in Oklahoma.
The department was contacted Sept. 9 by the Delaware County Sheriff’s Office in Oklahoma, which said a Cameron resident and her husband were involved in the case.
Cameron police and the Clinton County Sheriff’s Office then apprehended Penny Larson, 40, for questioning in the death of Dustin Ray Carver. She was questioned by the Delaware County Sheriff’s Office and the Oklahoma State Bureau of Investigation.
Based on the information she provided, a first-degree murder warrant was issued for both Penny and her husband, James Merritt Larson Jr.
The affidavit in the case states Carver was reported missing March 21, 2014, by his girlfriend, but he had last been seen March 3 with James and a witness.
In May 2014, the witness told investigators that James killed Carver.
He said he was at the Larson home with Penny, James, their two children and Carver when James confronted Carver about allegations he sexually assaulted Penny.
Penny allegedly told James, “I want him gone,” and “I want him dealt with,” per the court document.
The witness said Carver denied the allegations, and James grabbed for a shotgun and threatened to shoot Carver.
After leaving the residence for about three hours, the witness returned to find James smoking a cigarette and Penny cleaning up a large amount of blood from the floor of their trailer, the document stated.
The witness said James then said he had something to show him, which ended up being Carver’s body on top of a burn pile, with a knife sticking out of his chest. The court document stated the witness also saw Carver’s personal belongings ablaze in a barrel.
James allegedly threatened the witness that he would suffer “the same fate” if he told anyone what he saw.
Investigators located human remains from the Larson’s property in Kansas, Oklahoma, and discovered blood in the trailer.
However, the previous Delaware County district attorney would not file charges "until the unidentified remains were positively identified as Carver," per the court document.
The remains have still not been successfully identified due to the "amount of damage caused to them by the fire."
Eleven years later, new information in the case came to light in July from an inmate in the Clinton County Jail, police said. That inmate identified James and Penny in the case.
Penny was taken into custody Sept. 17 and is being held in the Clinton County Jail. She will be extradited to Oklahoma.
James is being held in the Western Reception, Diagnostic and Corrrectional Center in St. Joseph.
“The Clinton County Sheriff’s Office is extremely grateful for the collaboration between multiple agencies and jurisdictions to help bring justice to this family. Thank you for all the investigative work on this case,” the sheriff’s office said on social media.
—
If you have any information about a crime, you may contact your local police department directly. But if you want or need to remain anonymous, you should contact the Greater Kansas City Crime Stoppers Tips Hotline by calling 816-474-TIPS (8477), submitting the tip online or through the free mobile app at P3Tips.com. Depending on your tip, Crime Stoppers could offer you a cash reward.
Annual homicide details and data for the Kansas City area are available through the KSHB 41 News Homicide Tracker, which was launched in 2015. Read the KSHB 41 News Mug Shot Policy.
