Photo: Shawn Cone
A former Mountain Home resident who faces murder charges in Craighead County was moved to the Arkansas Department of Correction Friday.
In committing crimes in Jonesboro, including the alleged murder of 50-year-old Alissa Reynolds in early December last year and stealing almost $18,000 in checks from the mailbox of a flooring business, 48-year-old Shawn Gregory Cone violated his parole in a Baxter County criminal case.
Cone was first moved to the Ouachita River Unit of the state prison system. Prior to that, he was being held in the Craighead County jail with bond set at $5M cash.
The Ouachita River Unit is in Malvern. One of its functions is to serve as an intake center for inmates entering the system. From intake, Cone will be assigned to another unit within the system.
In Baxter County, Cone was charged with selling a 78-foot houseboat, named the “Never Enuff,” for $275,000 without having paid for the craft.
Cone was sentenced to 10 years in prison in 2015 and was on parole in the Baxter County case when the Jonesboro woman was killed and the checks stolen.
The bogus boat sale came to light when a local bank contacted the buyers who had purchased the “Never Enuff” from Cone thinking it was free and clear. They were told Cone had not paid off a loan due the bank on the boat.
The houseboat was seized.
In addition to the prison time, Cone was ordered to pay victim restitution of $191,000. Initially, the restitution was paid to the couple that bought the houseboat, but the $500 per-month payments were eventually signed over to a local bank as part of a settlement.
Prior to recent events that left Cone sitting in jails in Florida and Arkansas, the Mountain Home bank filed a motion with the court alleging Cone had stopped making the monthly restitution payments in August and was in violation of the Baxter County Circuit Courts order requiring those payments.
The felony charges in Baxter County have also resulted in Cone being charged as a habitual offender in the Craighead County cases.
Cone is accused of killing Reynolds in her home along Brac Place in Jonesboro. According to investigative records, Cone and the victim shared the home and had been in a dating relationship for about 18 months prior to the murder.
Cone is being charged with first-degree murder, abuse of a corpse, theft of a vehicle, theft of a credit/debit card, non-financial identity theft, tampering with physical evidence and fraudulent use of a credit card.
Cone is facing a prison sentence of up to life.
Jonesboro Police Department (JPD) reports show Reynolds’ body was discovered Dec. 8 when JPD officers went to her residence in response to a request for a “welfare check.”
Worried friends and family members had called police when they were unable to contact her after several attempts.
A family member said he had tried to call the victim on Dec. 6 and 7, but told police it was not Reynolds who answered her phone, but Cone.
The relative said he customarily went by the victim’s house every Friday and entered the home by way of the garage. He said when he attempted to get into the house on Dec. 6, the entry code to the garage would not work.
A friend of the murdered woman said she had sent Reynolds a text Dec. 8 when she did not show up at a Jonesboro restaurant to have lunch with several acquaintances.
The friend reported receiving a reply from the victim’s phone saying she had missed the lunch because she had been in an accident that sent her to a local hospital.
Friends also told police they had been at the house earlier in an attempt to make direct contact with Reynolds. They reported seeing her dogs running loose in the house and a pile of blankets on the couch.
They told police this was unusual since Reynolds always put the dogs in a “kennel” if she was away and was known to keep her house in a neat and orderly fashion, making the pile of blankets on the couch out-of-place.
Many of the friends and relatives questioned by police said while they had received replies to their text messages from Reynolds’ phone, no one had actually seen her since Nov. 29.
A JPD officer who went to Reynolds’ home in response to the welfare check request made his way around the brick-and-frame structure and reported detecting the distinctive odor of decomposition coming from the interior of the residence.
Police made a forced entry into the house. They reported when the blankets on the couch were raised slightly, a body was visible underneath.
Detectives were called and began to process the scene. They reported Reynolds’ body was lying on its back, and she appeared to have been dead for a number of days. In criminal information filed in the Craighead County Circuit Court for the Western Division Dec. 27, the murder and related other crimes were alleged to have taken place on or about Dec. 2.
The victim was reported to have multiple puncture wounds on the face, hands and arms.
Neighbors reported seeing Cone driving the victim’s car on Dec. 6 and standing outside the residence at one point during the same day. In the murder case, Cone is also charged with stealing Reynolds’ car her personal and work cellphones and credit and debit cards.
According to investigative reports, it is alleged Cone had cleaned up the crime scene and disposed of evidence.
Cone appeared in Craighead County Circuit Court Dec. 6 on theft charges brought against him. If the estimated time of Reynolds’ death is correct, it appears she could have been dead for several days at the time Cone made his court appearance.
Investigators in Jonesboro were able to quickly focus on Cone as a prime suspect in Reynolds’ death. In addition, they determined he was expected to travel out of Memphis for Miami Dec. 9. His itinerary called for a change of planes in Miami for the 58-minute flight to Key West.
The airline was contacted, confirmed he was on the Memphis-Miami-Key West flight and provided authorities with his seat number. Officers were waiting for him as he stepped off the airplane. He was handcuffed and booked into the Monroe County, Florida jail to await his return to Jonesboro to face charges in Reynolds’ death.
When arrested, he was alleged to have had a credit card belonging to Reynolds in his possession.
Cone has been denied the services of a public defender because on his application to have a lawyer appointed for him, he said he had between $7,000 and $8,000 in cash. Cone told the court the money had all been confiscated when he was arrested.
According to court records in Jonesboro and Craighead County, in a very short time leading up to the murder, Cone had been traveling a rough road.
It appears from a review of those records, Cone’s world was in the process of crashing down around him prior to Reynolds’ death.
– A case was filed Nov. 25 in which Cone was charged with driving while intoxicated, having an open container of alcohol in his vehicle, not having liability insurance and failure to register a motor vehicle.
– An eviction notice was filed in the civil division of Craighead County Circuit Court Nov. 29 seeking to kick Cone out of a commercial building along Stadium Drive in Jonesboro. It was alleged Cone had not been paying rent.
– In early December, Cone was accused of stealing about $17,400 in checks made out to a Jonesboro flooring company from the firm’s mailbox. It is alleged he put the money in his own account during a period beginning in May and running through August. It was this case in which Cone went to court Dec. 6. According to court records, Cone listed the dead woman as the person who would ensure he attended court sessions related to the check theft charge.
Reynolds, who was a graduate of Arkansas State University in Jonesboro, worked in human resources at a Paragould firm, which manufacturers axles for railroad cars.
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