PORTAGE, MI — Police were met with a gruesome scene at the Romence Road home of Gary and Laura Johnson, as detailed in court documents that link the Portage couple’s son to their killing.
Signs of violence that initially led police to suspect foul play in the disappearance of Gary, 65, and Laura, 64, included blood splatter on walls and ceilings, a spent 9mm shell casing in a Volvo parked in the garage and bloody linens and couch cushions in the washing machine, according to the documents filed in Kalamazoo County District Court. Investigators also found a freshly dug hole in the backyard.
Those discoveries, and more, quickly turned a Feb. 9 welfare check on Gary Johnson into a three-day, around-the-clock investigation that led to the discovery of the couple’s bodies buried in the Gourdneck State Game Area on Friday, Feb. 12.
Related: Bodies unearthed in Portage woods those of Gary and Laura Johnson
The couple’s only child, 27-year-old Nicholas Alexander Johnson, who according to court documents has been homeless on and off throughout his adult years, now faces two counts of open murder and multiple other felony charges in the deaths of his parents.
What led police to the state game area, and eventually the couple’s bodies, was the GPS tracker on Laura Johnson’s Ford Escape, documents state.
The Escape, which was not at the Romence Road house when police arrived Feb. 9, was found by pinging Laura Johnson’s cell phone not long after the search for the couple began. The Escape was located in a parking lot at Mallard Cove Apartments, about a mile from Gary and Laura Johnson’s home, documents state.
Related: Portage couple found dead were ‘stable’ and dedicated people, brother says
Upon locating the vehicle, police also located Nicholas Johnson hiding in a nearby storage shed at the complex. When they found Nicholas Johnson, he had a loaded 9mm pistol, an additional magazine filled with ammunition, the IDs of both his parents, their financial information, valuable property from the home and his mother’s cell phone, documents state.
On the cell phone, police located recent internet searches that occurred after Laura and Gary Johnson went missing. The searches included how to transfer money from a trust, if Ring security devices — such as the one at the couple’s home — record after the base has been removed, and how much the narcotics that were in Nicholas Johnson’s possession, and prescribed to his mother, were worth, documents state.
Investigators, who later learned the younger Johnson was the sole beneficiary of his parents’ trust, arrested Johnson that day on felony weapons charges and outstanding warrants. Johnson admitted to police, at the time, that he had been in possession of his mother’s Escape and was the only driver of the vehicle for the past several days, police said.
In addition to finding blood inside the vehicle, police used the Escape’s GPS to discover it had made several trips to and from the Johnson residence to Mallard Cove Apartments, and also to an area near Vanderbilt Road and Angling Road where a small dirt parking lot that abuts the state game area.
Related: Police believe they have found burial site of missing Portage couple
Investigators moved the search for the couple to the state game area late Thursday, Feb. 11, and located freshly disturbed ground about 75-100 feet south of the parking lot, documents state. A cadaver dog then came in and alerted police to the same spot.
On Friday, Feb. 12, Gary and Laura Johnson’s bodies were discovered in shallow graves, wrapped in tarps.
Both were positively identified over that weekend, and it was determined they both died from gunshot wounds to the head, with bullets located in their remains having markings/fluting consistent with the bullets found in Nicholas Johnson’s gun, documents state. Nicholas Johnson was then charged with two counts of open murder.
Related: Son charged with two counts of open murder in death of Portage couple
Nicholas Johnson has “emphatically denied” involvement in his parents’ death, his attorney Zoe Hutchins said at his Feb. 18 arraignment.
Johnson, who has a history of violence and home invasions involving his parents, did; however, admit to police that he removed a couch from his parents’ house by cutting it into multiple pieces, placed the pieces into garbage bags and transported them in his mother’s Escape, documents state.
Nicholas Johnson’s criminal record consists of four felony convictions, among them a January 2019 home invasion at his parents’ Romence Road home, in which he also assaulted his father Gary Johnson, documents state. He was sentenced to 30 days in jail after pleading guilty in that case.
Johnson’s parents had a personal protection order filed against him prior to the January 2019 home invasion. After getting out of jail, he violated parole conditions in September 2019 and was charged with anther felony home invasion at his parents’ home, when he allegedly entered through a broken window and stole $1,000 cash from his father’s dresser.
The 27-year-old admitted to the September act during an October interview with police, documents state.
Johnson, who still faces charges in the September incident, again violated bond conditions when he showed up at his parents’ home in November 2019 and “was belligerent and threatened to beat them up if they didn’t let him stay at the home,” documents state.
Gary and Laura Johnson, in response, offered their son money and transportation to seek mental health help, court documents state.
Nicholas Johnson is due back in Kalamazoo County District Court on March 2 for a probable cause conference on the two murder charges.
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