Amended charges filed against woman suspected of killing Mountain Home man

By: Philip Launius

The first-degree murder charge on which 38-year-old Kristy Shay Johnston was initially booked into the Baxter County jail has been amended based on a review of currently available evidence in the case.

Johnston's arrest stemmed from the shooting death of 48-year-old Mark Dennis Mucha. His body was found May 20 at Johnston's home along Old Arkana Road.

An autopsy listed the cause of death to be "gunshot wound" to the head.

Prosecutor David Ethredge said he had reviewed the case and met with an investigator with the Baxter County Sheriff's Office late last week. He said the review showed evidence in the case was not presently sufficient to support a first-degree murder charge.

Johnston is being charged with two felonies — abuse of a corpse and tampering with evidence.

Johnston's bond was originally set at $250,000. It was reduced to $50,000 when the amended charges were filed. As of Monday morning, she remained an inmate in the Baxter County Detention Center.

RELATIVES ASK FOR WELFARE CHECK

According to a Baxter County Sheriff's office incident report, relatives of Johnston, including her father, told deputies that Johnston had "been hanging out with a new guy for a couple of days" and that she had been acting "weird." They identified the man as Mucha.

Johnston's father told deputies his daughter had been dealing with "mental issues" and he asked deputies to go to his daughter's home and check on her welfare.

He also requested that Mucha be removed from the house where his daughter lived. Deputies said they would do the welfare check, but Johnston had to be the one to ask that Mucha be removed from her property.

When two deputies arrived at Johnston's house to check on her, they found Mucha's corpse in an open doorway at the front of the residence.

They said Mucha's body — described as being pale white — was face up in the doorway. They reported the presence of "dried up blood all over his face."

According to investigators, evidence showed Mucha was shot just inside the front door of the house "and fell backward," partially lying both inside and outside the threshold of the door.

The body was hidden behind an inner tube that had been draped with a towel and propped against the front door. Investigators said both the front and screen door were open.

Before the crime was discovered, Johnston's 16-year-old daughter and aunt came to the house about 5:30 p.m. on the day of the shooting. They told investigators the towel draped inner tube was in place at the front door when they arrived. Both reported Johnston had told them not to look behind the inner tube and not to go into the house, according to the probable cause affidavit.

The daughter told investigators her mother called her where she was staying on the day of the shooting and told her that Mucha "wanted to hurt her and not to come home."

Investigators located a .380-caliber shell casing close to the front door of the residence. A Hi-Point.380-caliber semi-automatic handgun and a fixed-blade knife were found inside a folded rug sitting on a rock in the front yard.

Both the knife and pistol were reported to have blood on them. Investigators found that the gun had been left behind at Johnston's request by her former husband when the couple divorced about five years ago.

As the deputies made their way to the rear of the house, they saw a female, later identified as Johnston, "peeking through glass in the backdoor."

She was told to raise her hands and checked for weapons. Johnston was reported as telling the deputies that Mucha, "was a really bad guy and I did what I had to do to get away."

According to a press release from the Baxter County Sheriff's Office, after Johnston was read her rights at the scene and asked to answer questions, she refused and asked for an attorney.

Investigators observed several dogs running in an out of the house over Mucha's body.

In summarizing their findings, investigators said Johnston had failed to notify law enforcement or emergency medical personnel of Mucha's injuries, concealed the body by placing the towel draped inner tube in such a way that the body was hidden from view, hid the handgun suspected of being used to kill Mucha and allowing dogs to run over his body while coming in and out of the residence.

TORCHED OWN HOUSES

Mucha has dealt with issues of his own through the years. His actions have led to two run-ins with law enforcement, according to electronic court records.

In the most serious of the incidents, Mucha pled guilty to burning down two residences he owned. One of the houses, located along Hickory Flats Lane, had been owned by Mucha's mother until her death.

He was put on probation for six years after pleading guilty to two counts of reckless burning. The state dropped the arson charges. He was given an early discharge from probation in late August 2021. He had served half of his six year sentence.

Mucha was reported to have lived with his mother in the Hickory Flats Lane house and, from time to time, in a structure he referred to as his "second home" located along Buffalo Rapids Lane in the Buford area.

Together, the structures were valued at about $270,000. Property records show the house along Hickory Flats Lane to have been a single-family dwelling containing 1,564-square-feet. The living area in what Mucha referred to as his "second home" was listed at 850-square-feet.

Mucha called 911 just after 3 a.m. on May 15, 2017, and reported he had just "lit his house on fire." He called again about two hours later and said he had also set fire to his "second home."

Both structures were destroyed.

Mucha eventually turned himself in at the Ozark County, Missouri sheriff's office. He was said to have reported that he had set fire to his two residences and that Baxter County authorities were looking for him.

Mucha was said not to have provided details of the crimes and said he only "vaguely remembered" being involved. He would not discuss the incident further and no motive for setting the two fires is provided in public records.

According to recent postings on the social media sites of two local non-profit organizations, Mucha was volunteering his time at both. One entry dated just before Mucha was killed features a photo of a landscaping project he had done.

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