Johnny Edward Lind, a 36-year-old man, was found dead on May 21, 2025, inside a residence along State Route 12 in Forest Hill, West Virginia. West Virginia State Police were sent to the property at approximately 11:48 a.m. after authorities received a welfare-related call involving concerns about a missing homeowner and a strong odor of decomposition. What initially came to law enforcement as an unattended-death or welfare-check situation quickly became a homicide investigation. Inside the residence, troopers discovered Lind lying on the floor with gunshot wounds to his head. Reporting on the investigation described Lind as a tenant at the home.
Investigators obtained a search warrant and returned to process the residence in detail. At the scene, they recovered two spent shell casings and a. 380-caliber round, while neither the firearm believed to be involved nor Lind's cellphone was found inside the home.
Investigators examining the trajectory of the gunfire developed a sequence in which Lind was apparently shot once while he was seated and then shot again after he had fallen to the floor. That evidence changed the case from an unexplained death into an investigation centered on an intentional shooting.
The investigation eventually focused on Curtis Pack. According to reporting based on the police investigation, Pack had allegedly provided Lind with a. 380-caliber handgun only days before the killing. Investigators interviewed witnesses and reviewed surveillance footage that reportedly showed Pack arriving at the Forest Hill residence on the night before Lind was discovered dead. Police later recovered a. 380-caliber Ruger LCP equipped with a laser sight from a third party, and witnesses reportedly identified that firearm as one that had belonged to Lind. Authorities also developed cellphone-related evidence and witness accounts as they reconstructed Pack's movements and his connection to Lind and the gun. Pack had a prior robbery conviction and was described by investigators as legally prohibited from possessing a firearm.
After the investigation continued for several weeks, West Virginia State Police obtained a murder warrant for Pack in early July 2025. By that point, Pack was already being held at Southern Regional Jail on unrelated charges, so authorities did not have to locate him at large before pursuing the homicide case. Police charged him with Lind's murder, with some reporting describing the warrant as a first-degree murder charge. At a preliminary hearing in Summers County Magistrate Court later that month, Trooper First Class Christian Harvey testified about the evidence developed during the investigation. Magistrate Judge Jack Helms found sufficient evidence for the case to continue, and the murder prosecution was held over for consideration by a grand jury. Pack remained incarcerated without bond.
The case took another turn in 2026 when authorities investigated an alleged attempt to interfere with the jury process in the Summers County murder prosecution involving Pack. Investigators said forensic evidence from communications associated with Pack indicated concern with jury selection and an alleged plan to influence the outcome of the case. Messages attributed to Pack reportedly expressed confidence that a juror could refuse to convict him and potentially force a mistrial. Investigators subsequently interviewed James “Pistol” Payne and Elizabeth “Katie” Payne. According to the resulting allegations, Pack's girlfriend, Kayla Banks, approached the Paynes while James Payne was part of the Summers County jury pool. Authorities alleged that Banks attempted to pressure the family concerning how Payne should act as a juror, while Pack himself allegedly attempted to contact Payne through the jail telephone system. Katie Payne also told investigators that Banks threatened her with physical violence while demanding that she influence her father's decision. Troopers were seeking warrants for Banks on allegations including jury tampering, conspiracy and intimidation of witnesses.
The publicly available reporting located through August 2026 does not document a final murder conviction or acquittal for Pack in Lind's death. Instead, the later coverage continued to describe Pack as the defendant facing the murder charge while authorities dealt with the separate allegations involving attempted jury interference. The case that began with Lind being discovered on the floor of a Forest Hill residence therefore developed from an apparent unattended death into a homicide prosecution supported by ballistic evidence, surveillance, witness statements, recovered firearm evidence and cellphone-related information, followed by allegations that people connected to the defendant attempted to influence the judicial process before the murder case was resolved.
