Police claim Denzil Rick Moore shot and killed 55-year-old Thomas Humphries because Moore believed that his on-again, off-again friend was a child molester, then disposed of his body at a vacant home in Auburn.

Last week, King County Prosecutors charged Moore, 45, of Des Moines, with first-degree murder. Prosecutors also charged Glae Matthew Roland, 34, Des Moines, with rendering first-degree criminal assistance for allegedly helping Moore dispose of Humphries bullet-riddled body and conceal evidence.

Both men have pleaded not guilty and are awaiting trial in King County Jail.

Here is a summation of Auburn Police Detective Buie Arneson’s account of events, which forms the basis of the charges.

On Jan. 14, a man who had been hired to mow the lawn at the vacant property at 11112 SE 304th St. found a dead man in the grass and called police.

The King County Medical Examiner used the man’s fingerprints to identify him the next day as Humphries. According to the autopsy report, Humphries had sustained four gunshot wounds to his body. One had severed his aorta and killed him.

Auburn police got a break when they learned that the King County Sheriff’s Office had been talking to a witness, Glae Roland, who told them he had been in the vehicle when Humphries was shot. Roland also described the weapon as a .22-caliber handgun, which matched the bullets the medical examiner had removed from Humphries’ body.

Roland told Auburn detectives that he and Moore were friends, and that Moore had been a friend of the dead man.

Roland said that on Jan. 10, Moore called him and said that he was with Humphries at the Des Moines Goodwill store and that he, Moore, had a loaded firearm. Roland said Moore offered to drive Roland to work in Kent, and Roland took him up on the offer.

Roland met the two men in parking lot of the Goodwill store. The three men got into the vehicle and began driving toward Kent. En route, Roland told detectives, Moore accused Humphries of being a child molester, pulled out a .22-caliber handgun and pointed it at Humphries. When they stopped in a Kent parking lot, Roland told detectives, he heard a shot and saw Humphries curl up into a fetal position. He said he did not see the shot.

As they drove on, Roland told detectives, Moore allegedly ordered him to check on Humphries to determine if he was still breathing. Roland said he was. As Moore turned east onto South 277th Street from 83rd Avenue, Roland told detectives, Moore fired four more shots at Humphries. Roland told detectives that Moore then began talking about what they were going to do with the body.

Ultimately, the two men found an abandoned house in Auburn. Roland told detectives that Moore ordered him to get Humphries out of the truck. Roland said he pulled him out and onto the ground. He put his hands under the dead man’s armpits and began pulling him toward the abandoned home. At Moore’s orders, Roland said, he searched Humphries’ pockets where he found an ID belonging to somebody else, $5, and some business cards. Roland said he then dragged the body partway toward the home, where he left it.

Roland told detectives that as he and Moore drove away, he, Roland, began throwing the dead man’s property out the window. As they were driving north SR 167, Moore told Roland that if he “ratted” on him, he would kill him and his family.

Roland told detectives that he and Moore later returned to the abandoned house to properly dispose of Humphries’ body. When they got there they discovered an orange outline where the body had been. At that point they knew that police had found the body and processed the scene.

According to Arneson’s account, Roland told detectives that he and Moore tried to change the appearance of the pickup by painting it white. Roland also showed police where Moore was living in Des Moines.

On Jan. 16, police executed a search warrant on Moore’s home and truck and arrested him after finding evidence that tied him to the murder, included shattered safety glass in the the pickup truck and spent and damaged .22 cliber bullets consistent with the bullets recovered from Humphries’ body. Moore denied the murder. When detectives tried to pursue details beyond Moore’s narrative, Arneson wrote, he became upset.