PEORIA, Ill. – A new charge has been given to a pair of people accused in the death of a man found in a freezer this week in a Peoria East Bluff home.
The Peoria County State’s Attorney’s Office says 26-year-old Portia Stokes and 29-year-old Michael Jansen are now also charged with Dismembering a Human Body. Both were ordered held until trial at a hearing on Friday.
The pair were charged with First Degree Murder and Concealment of a Homicidal Death earlier this week in connection to the death of 41-year-old David King. King’s body was found in a freezer earlier this week during a welfare check at a home in the area of Seneca and California.
An autopsy done by Peoria County Coroner Jamie Harwood revealed that King died of ligature strangulation with suffocation. King was found to have had multiple ligature marks around his neck.
Police obtained a search warrant for Jansen’s phone, where a video was recovered that was played by prosecutors at Friday’s hearing. The video was taken while King was reportedly still alive with the defendants, and described gruesome pictures of King’s body mutilated and cut up.
Prosecutors say the video reportedly was taken on July 10th. The video was played privately to the court and defense, and only described in open court, due to the graphic nature.
The video allegedly shows King tied to a bed with a rope around his neck, with Stokes sitting on his face as King struggled to escape.
Jansen allegedly initially told police during an interview that he and Stokes killed King and moved his body to the freezer. Jansen then reportedly changed his story to say Stokes killed him.
Stokes allegedly told police during an interview that she had “stored him in the (expletive) freezer and folded him up like a (expletive) pretzel.”
