Richard Lee Bishop, a 38-year-old White man, was fatally shot inside a home in the 6000 block of Big Otter Highway in the Ivydale area of Clay County, West Virginia, along with Brenda Lee Dennis, 54, with whom he was in a relationship. Public accounts differ on the precise date of Bishop’s death. Several initial reports described the victims as being discovered on Thursday, April 3, 2025, and some reports consequently dated the killings to that day.
However, Bishop’s funeral-home obituary states that he died April 1, and another report based on court records specifically states that the shooting occurred Tuesday, April 1. The detailed chronology attributed to the accused also places the confrontation on April 1, after events beginning the previous day.
The case came to the attention of authorities after the victims could not be contacted and their bodies were discovered inside Dennis’s residence. Robert Daniel Dennis was identified in local reporting as the person who found Bishop and Dennis. When West Virginia State Police reached the scene, investigators found that Bishop had suffered three gunshot wounds, while Dennis had been shot once. A more detailed local account described Bishop’s wounds as being to the chest, back and head and Dennis’s wound as being to the chest. Investigators also recovered multiple spent 9mm shell casings from the living room, immediately focusing the investigation on a shooting that had taken place inside the home.
Attention quickly turned to Michael Wayne Adkins of Duck, West Virginia. Witness information portrayed a tense situation involving Adkins, Dennis and Bishop. Investigators were told that Bishop and Dennis were dating, while Adkins spent considerable time around Dennis and her home. A witness told police that Adkins appeared obsessed with Dennis and that Adkins and Bishop did not get along. Dennis’s son gave investigators an especially significant piece of information, reporting that Adkins had previously made statements that he would someday kill Bishop. Those reported threats gave police evidence that the hostility between the two men had existed before the fatal encounter rather than beginning spontaneously that night.
According to the account Adkins gave investigators, he had gone to Dennis’s home on Monday, March 31, to take her to a bank and remained there overnight. He said the two argued the following day, causing him to leave, but Dennis later called and asked him to return. Adkins said Dennis then borrowed his vehicle and came back with Bishop. At some point afterward, according to Adkins’s version of events, Bishop threatened to beat him. Adkins told investigators that he responded by drawing a 9mm handgun and shooting Bishop in the chest. After Bishop fell to the floor, Adkins admitted firing two additional shots into him. He then turned the weapon on Dennis and shot her once. Adkins also told police that he had known Dennis for approximately three years, had regularly driven her places and done things she requested, and had grown tired of what he characterized as being used by her.
Investigators were also able to recover the suspected murder weapon. Local reporting identified it as a Sig Sauer P250 handgun. Rather than being left at the scene, the pistol had been concealed beneath an outbuilding at another property. Police reported that Adkins directed investigators to the location after consenting to a search, and the firearm was recovered. That discovery, combined with the shell casings at the residence, the earlier reported threats toward Bishop and Adkins’s recorded admissions concerning the shootings, formed the core of the criminal case against him.
Adkins was taken into custody and initially charged with two counts of first-degree murder for the deaths of Bishop and Dennis. He was booked into the Central Regional Jail early on April 4, 2025, and was initially held without bond. He was arraigned in Clay County Magistrate Court that morning. Public reporting consistently identified Adkins as the sole suspect and defendant in the double homicide; no second shooter or additional charged suspect was identified in the available accounts.
The prosecution ultimately resulted in a lengthy prison sentence. On July 1, 2026, Clay County Circuit Court sentenced Michael Wayne Adkins, then 59, to 40 years in prison on each of two murder counts arising from the killings of Bishop and Dennis. Prosecutors said the two 40-year terms would run concurrently, meaning they would be served at the same time rather than consecutively. The sentencing report did not explain whether the final disposition resulted from a negotiated plea or a trial, nor did it provide a detailed account of any plea hearing or verdict, but it confirmed that Adkins had progressed from the original first-degree murder charges to sentencing on both killings.
