Overland Park detectives want to interview woman in killing of horticulturalist
Detectives are hoping to speak with a woman involved in a recent custody battle with a horticulturalist who was fatally shot Monday morning outside his office in Overland Park.
Police want to interview Samantha Andrada, 40, in relation to the killing of 59-year-old David Flick, of Cass County, according to the Overland Park Police Department.
The woman is not considered a suspect, police said.
“We are trying to contact her,” said Officer John Lacy, a police spokesman. “We reached out to her a couple of times.”
Flick, a founder of Terra Technologies, an environmental consulting firm, was shot dead outside the Deer Creek Office Center, where his office was located, in the 6200 block of West 135th Street. Police have not released a motive.
Hours after the killing, Clay County deputies in Kearney pulled over an SUV that matched a vehicle description released by Overland Park police in Flick’s death. The only person in the vehicle, Scott MacDonald, 60, fired a gunshot and died by suicide, officials said.
“It’s related, definitely so,” Lacy said Tuesday. “We are not actively looking for anybody else in this case.”
Custody battle
Andrada and Flick had been in a years-long custody battle. More than two years ago, Andrada filed a motion to modify a judgment in the custody battle that she once called “nasty.”
As part of the custody battle, a Cass County judge in 2017 signed an order that the child was to have no contact with MacDonald during Andrada’s parenting time. MacDonald was described as having been in a relationship with Andrada.
Reached by phone Tuesday, Andrada told a reporter from The Star: “I have no comment for you. Thank you.” She then hung up.
Flick’s attorney in the custody battle, Joshua Jones, said Flick expressed concern in court about his safety because of threats Andrada made against him. Flick was also worried about MacDonald because of his past, Jones said.
“David was a man who loved his children,” Jones said. “He spent a number of years in this action fighting to make sure that his son was safe and in the best possible situation.”
Flick’s sons are now 11 and 6, his relatives said. His wife is 3 months pregnant, his brother said.
In a statement Tuesday, John Kahl, co-owner of Terra Technologies, said the company remained committed to Flick’s legacy of land conservation, hard work and service to its clients.
“We will continue to honor those principles moving forward,” Kahl said.
MacDonald’s criminal history
Before the shooting Monday, MacDonald spent more than a decade in prison.
In 1986, MacDonald was sentenced to 21 years in prison after he pleaded guilty to first-degree assault in Jefferson County Circuit Court, according to a story in the St. Louis Post-Dispatch.
Police said MacDonald stabbed his mother seven times in the neck with a screwdriver before he beat her in the head and face with a wrench and shovel, according to the newspaper’s archives.
After the beating, MacDonald placed his wounded mother in a car and drove it off a highway to make the assault look like an accident, police said at the time. He then set the car ablaze, the newspaper reported.
As part of MacDonald’s plea deal, his remaining charges were dismissed. Prosecutors said they settled the case because it was difficult for his traumatized mother to be involved. His initial charges carried a maximum sentence of life in prison, the paper reported.
Authorities blocked MacDonald from trying to send his mother flowers in the hospital, according to the Post-Dispatch.
Then in 1995, MacDonald was sentenced to three years in prison after pleading guilty in Cole County Circuit Court to delivering or possessing a controlled substance at a correctional facility, according to court records. Details of that case were not available.
This story was originally published October 29, 2019 at 3:05 PM.
