SEATTLE — Court documents suggest a landlord accused of killing his two tenants and abandoning their remains in suitcases on Alki Beach in West Seattle may have had help in the murders.
KING 5 NEWS reports 62-year-old Michael Dudley was charged Monday with two counts of murder in the second degree. The remains of 35-year-old Jessica Lewis and 27-year-old Austin Wenner were found in bags on Alki on June 19.
Court documents allege Dudley dismembered Lewis and Wenner after killing them, separated their bodies into multiple bags and tried to hide them in different bodies of water.
Dr. Kathy Taylor, Washington state forensic anthropologist, told Seattle police she believed there were possibly multiple people involved, because the cuts on Lewis and Wenner’s bodies were “disorganized” and done in different manners with different tools.
Lewis and Wenner were renting a room in Dudley’s Burien home, and court documents indicate they got into a dispute over rent money.