Two Kansas City men, Raynal King, 26, and Howard R. Ross, III, 23, known as “Lil’ Howard” and “Shooter,” were convicted today by a federal jury on multiple charges tied to the 2016 kidnapping and murder of Jaime Patton. The verdict ends a years-long hunt for justice in a case that exposed the brutal underbelly of street crime, jailhouse scheming, and digital evidence that sealed their fates.
On Sept. 6, 2016, Patton, a father and family caretaker, was returning home before dawn after tending to a loved one at the hospital when King and Ross ambushed him. They forced him at gunpoint into his own 2014 Jeep Patriot, initiating a violent carjacking that spiraled into a full-scale kidnapping. The pair drove Patton to multiple ATMs, demanding his PIN to drain his account. When he couldn’t produce one that worked, they shot him in the thigh in a Mazuma Credit Union parking lot to show they weren’t bluffing.
With Patton bleeding and terrified, King and Ross sped south on Holmes Road, debating what to do next. At approximately 6:30 a.m., just past 135th Street, Patton made a desperate leap from the moving Jeep. As he fled, they opened fire, striking him multiple times. He collapsed on the asphalt, left to die while the killers fled in his stolen vehicle.
Prosecutors laid bare a chilling premeditation. Days before the attack, King had expressed financial desperation over his inability to pay for a new silver Pontiac Grand Prix. Text messages recovered from both defendants revealed planning for robbery. Ross, already on state probation for a prior robbery, had been flaunting a .45-caliber pistol on social media—photos that matched the caliber of the bullet that killed Patton. Weeks after the murder, he tried to sell the weapon.
Jailhouse calls further unraveled their defense. While held in Jackson County Jail, Ross made recorded calls discussing how to hide evidence, including the location of his iPhone. That phone became a trove of incriminating data—photos of the gun, messages about selling it, and digital breadcrumbs leading investigators to the truth. King’s Android yielded photos of the stolen Jeep and messages attempting to offload it for quick cash to cover his car payment.
Convicted on all counts—including conspiracy to commit kidnapping, aiding and abetting kidnapping resulting in death, carjacking resulting in death, use of a firearm in furtherance of kidnapping and carjacking, and felon-in-possession charges—King and Ross now face life in federal prison. The jury’s verdict sends a hard message: in the grim arithmetic of violent crime, the trail of blood, bullets, and texts always leads back to justice.
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Key Facts
- State: Missouri
- Agency: DOJ USAO
- Category: Violent Crime
- Source: Official Source ↗
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