Man sentenced to more than 20 years in prison for fatal shooting last summer

A Kansas City man who pleaded guilty to second-degree murder was sentenced to 22 years for fatally shooting a woman last June.

Richard Gerard Harris Jr., 37, was convicted of shooting Taylor Thomas, 29, on June 17 and sentenced on Friday by the Jackson County prosecutor’s office. Harris was initially also charged with three counts of armed criminal action, two counts of unlawful use of a weapon and one count of tampering with a motor vehicle, according to court records.

Thomas, a Kansas City mother of seven, had celebrated her 29th birthday two days before the shooting. A memorial service was held on July 6, 2024.

“Domestic violence far too often escalates and ends in tragedy, as we saw in this case,” Jackson County Prosecutor Melesa Johnson said in a news release. “We remain committed to pursuing justice for victims and intervening earlier during cycles of violence to prevent homicides before they happen.”

Kansas City police officers found Thomas unresponsive early in the morning outside an apartment building at 3200 East Linwood Boulevard, according to court records. Thomas had sustained injuries to the head and neck and died at a local hospital on June 19, according to relatives.

An eyewitness told investigators that Thomas and Harris had been seen together in the area, hours before the shooting, and that they had been arguing, according to court documents.

Surveillance footage captured between midnight and 1 a.m. on the morning of the shooting shows Thomas and Harris arriving together in a red Kia and interacting with occupants of another car before seeming to search for something in the Kia, according to court documents.

The footage then shows Harris attacking Thomas from behind, throwing her to the ground, shooting her and driving away, according to court documents. Witnesses told investigators that Thomas and Harris may have been romantically involved, according to court documents, and that he was known to be violent with her.

One witness also told investigators that Harris controlled Thomas’s access to money and may have coerced her into acts of prostitution, which he organized and profited from.

Thomas’ death was the 71st homicide reported in Kansas City in 2024, according to data collected by The Star.

The Star’s Ilana Arougheti contributed to this reporting.