Suspect charged with murder of Henry County, Ky. man found in burned-out car

SMITHFIELD, Ky. (WDRB) -- A Smithfield, Kentucky, suspect has been charged with the murder of a man whose body was found in a burned-out car last week in Henry County.

According to court documents, 20-year-old Gregory Heightchew is accused of shooting at two men on the night of Monday, Oct. 2, at a home on Lake Jericho Road. One of the two men has been identified as 22-year-old Elijah Creekmore.

Creekmore's body was later found miles away in a car that had been burned.

A citation says Heightchew pulled the trigger several times, but the gun didn’t fire because the safety was on. The two men ran from the house, but Heightchew continued to fire. Court documents say one of the two men who was shot at was found and was not harmed.

Police later found Creekmore's body inside his own burned-out car in a rural area of Six Mile Creek Road on the morning of Oct. 3.

Heightchew was arrested and initially charged with attempted murder and wanton endangerment. At the time, authorities said they would not charge him in connection with the body found in the vehicle because the body had not yet been positively identified.

"We don't ever want to jump to any conclusions," Dykes said at the time. "It's certainly something that is being looked at very closely to see if there is a correlation."

But on Friday afternoon, police charged Heightchew with Creekmore's murder, after they say they were able to identify the body as Creekmore. Police say Creekmore's family has been notified.

Heightchew was already being held at the Oldham County Detention Center on his initial charges when Kentucky State Police served him with the murder warrant Friday afternoon. He now faces that charge in addition to his original charges.

A second suspect, 22-year-old Joshua Jackson, was also arrested last week and charged with tampering with physical evidence in connection to the incident. An arrest report states his mother told police that Jackson “burned his clothes … then took a shower using alcohol on his body.”

Both men are being held at the Oldham County Detention Center.