On Sunday, February 21, 2021, the quiet community of Avilla, Missouri, was shaken by a violent discovery at a residence on Greenfield Street. Inside the home, 34-year-old Mason McClure was found deceased alongside 34-year-old Nicole Hodges. Both victims had sustained multiple gunshot wounds, a grim scene that immediately launched a homicide investigation by the Jasper County Sheriff’s Office. The presence of shell casings at the scene confirmed the violent nature of the event, and law enforcement quickly began piecing together the timeline of the double homicide.
As investigators worked to identify a suspect, a complex web of relationships and retaliatory violence emerged. Authorities soon focused their attention on 24-year-old Kevin Clay Johnson of Reeds, Missouri. The investigation revealed that Johnson had traveled to the Avilla home believing that McClure and Hodges were responsible for the death of his girlfriend, Brylee O'Banion, also known as Keegan Miles. O'Banion’s body had been discovered just a day prior in a ditch in Newton County, leading Johnson to confront the pair in an act of vigilante justice. According to court documents, Johnson admitted that after arriving at the residence, he used a firearm taken from his father's house to shoot both victims, striking McClure in the back.
Law enforcement officers arrested Johnson in the early morning hours of the following Monday. He was initially charged with two counts of first-degree murder and armed criminal action. During the legal proceedings, the connection between the three deaths was pivotal, painting a tragic picture of assumed guilt and lethal reaction. Johnson ultimately avoided a trial by reaching a plea agreement with prosecutors. He pled guilty to two counts of second-degree murder, and in exchange, the armed criminal action charges were dismissed. The court sentenced him to 28 years in prison for the killings of Mason McClure and Nicole Hodges.
