White/Caucasian male David Grunwald, age 16, vanished from Palmer, Alaska on November 13, 2016. He had told his family he was on his way home, but he never arrived. The next day, searchers found his Ford Bronco abandoned and burned on a remote road, a grim clue that transformed a missing-person alert into a homicide investigation. For more than two weeks, Alaska State Troopers and a swelling group of volunteers combed the frozen brushlands outside Palmer.
On December 2, 2016, guided by information developed during the investigation, troopers located the body of David Grunwald in rugged terrain off Knik River Road. He had been killed by a single gunshot.
Detectives soon pieced together a chilling sequence. According to prosecutors, four local teenagers lured the 16-year-old to a camper in the Butte area, beat him with a pistol, and drove him out into the woods. There, they marched him into the darkness and executed him before torching his Bronco to destroy evidence. The brutality of the attack and the deliberate effort to hide the crime stunned the Mat-Su community and drew an outpouring of support for searchers and for the Grunwald family.
Arrests followed within weeks. Erick Almandinger, Dominic Johnson, Bradley Renfro, and Austin Barrett were taken into custody and charged in connection with the kidnapping and murder. Over the next several years, as the cases moved through the courts, prosecutors detailed how the teens coordinated the assault, the abduction, the killing, and the arson. Juries convicted Almandinger, Johnson, and Renfro of murder, kidnapping, and related counts; Barrett entered a plea to lesser charges tied to his role.
Sentences reflected the gravity of the crime. Erick Almandinger received a 99-year term. Dominic Johnson was also sentenced to 99 years. Bradley Renfro, the last of the four to be sentenced, was ordered to serve a 105-year sentence with a substantial portion to serve. Austin Barrett, who pleaded to second-degree murder and kidnapping, received a 45-year sentence. With those outcomes, the case that began with the disappearance of a 16-year-old on a November night and the discovery of his body on December 2, 2016, concluded with four perpetrators held to account for a killing that shook Palmer and the state of Alaska.
