Man charged in fatal shooting of 31-year-old found burned at apparent KC homeless camp
A Columbia, Missouri, resident was charged Monday in the killing of a man who was found shot and burned earlier this year in an apparent homeless camp in Kansas City, according to prosecutors.
Mark Salisbury, 41, was charged with second-degree murder and other crimes in the fatal shooting of Derrick Wallace, 31, earlier this year.
The investigation began on the morning of Feb. 2, when a 911 caller told officers that a body had been found in the area of Hardesty Avenue and East Ninth Street. It was burned beyond recognition.
Detectives found the body, later identified as Wallace, on top of a burned shopping cart in an area that appeared to be an abandoned homeless camp.
Police determined Wallace was killed four or five days earlier at 5209 Independence Ave. He had been shot multiple times.
Salisbury was arrested after he confessed to a witness that he killed Wallace and bragged about his involvement to another person, according to the Jackson County Prosecutor’s Office.
The day after Wallace was apparently killed, Salisbury messaged a woman on Facebook to say Wallace was dead, police said. He said he had shot Wallace and another person hit him with a machete, according to police.
A lab analysis confirmed one of two handguns police found from Salisbury’s apartment fired a bullet recovered in Wallace’s body, according to charging documents.
In an interview with detectives, Salisbury said Wallace was identified as one of five men who allegedly raped one of Salisbury’s relatives. He and another person decided to scare Wallace out of the city’s northeast area by going to his apartment, he told police.
The other person struck Wallace with a machete, Salisbury told police. Salisbury, who was armed with a firearm, claimed he was talking with his hands when the gun “went off.” It scared him and he ran out of the apartment, he told detectives.
As he left, Salisbury heard Wallace yell: “Stop, I’ll leave,” he said. Later, the other person told Salisbury, “it’s been taken care of,” he told detectives. Salisbury told police he assumed at the time that meant Wallace had left the northeast.
Prosecutors requested Salisbury’s bond be set at $250,000 cash.
Salisbury did not yet have an attorney listed in court records who could be reached for comment.
