OMAHA, Neb. (KMTV) -- — Authorities reveal a man found dead in a couch was there for almost two weeks.
On August 6, 2019; Kelly Barges, 55, was located by police dead rolled in a rug and stuffed in a couch in an apartment at Decatur St. and NW Radial HWY. Barges had been there for 12 days before he was discovered. He lived in the building in a different apartment.
Douglas County Judge Thomas Harmon find enough evidence to move Louis French Jr., 36, to district court on Wednesday. Authorities detail how French carried out the brutal murder. He's charged with 1st Degree Murder and Use of a Deadly Weapon.
Omaha Police Dept. Detective Wendi Dye testifies that French invited Barges into the apartment Coletta Cornett because Barges had beer. Dye said barges talked too much or may have said something to make French mad.
French allegedly hit Barges in the head, then beat him with a chain, and choked him until he was unconscious. Barges apparently wakes up when French allegedly stomped him in the head, asking ‘why won't you just die?’
Detectives say that's when he made the 3 others participate by choking him with a phone cord.
“He was really upset and then he told them that all 4 were going to come over and they were all going to pull on the cord because they were all going to get their fingerprints on it because he was not going to go down for it alone,” Det. Dye explained.
Joel Jensen, Autumn Jones, and Coletta Cornett are all charged with Accessory to Murder.
French hasn’t been assigned a district court judge yet.
