KSP: Ellis murder investigation still ongoing, reward money still available

By JIM BROOKS
Nelson County Gazette / WBRT Radio

KSP Trooper Lt. Jeremy Thompson speaks Tuesday morning during a press conference at the Nelson County Sheriff’s Office.

Tuesday, Jan. 13, 2015, 12:30 p.m. — Investigators in the murder of Bardstown Police Officer Jason Ellis are turning to the public and the media for help in finding leads in the 19-month-old case.

At a press conference Tuesday at the Nelson County Sheriff’s Office, KSP Trooper Jeremy Thompson, operations lieutenant at the Elizabethtown post, stressed that the Ellis murder case is not cold. Investigators have pursued hundreds of tips and leads but have not come up with a definite motive or a suspect/suspects.

A KSP investigator is assigned full-time to the Ellis murder case, he said, and while the case is still open, Thompson said investigators have been able to rule out the improbable.

Investigators have conducted interviews with individuals incarcerated in prisons in Kentucky and around the country.

“We’re not working with any assumptions,” he said. “Someone out there has the right information to solve this case. If we had that information we wouldn’t need to be at this press conference.”

A total of $185,000 in reward money for information leading to an arrest and conviction is still available — a total that doesn’t include the $33,000 reward offered by a Louisville businessman, he said.

Bardstown Police Chief Rick McCubbin responds to media questions during Tuesday’s press conference at the Nelson County Sheriff’s Office.

Thompson said investigators believe the Ellis murder was a coordinated effort involving two or more people. He asked anyone who might have been involved in even a minor role to talk to investigators, even if they are afraid of reprisals.

“No one in this room cares why they come forward,” Thompson said, referring to nearly two dozen officers attending the conference. “Come forward, talk to us, and we can help you,” he said, adding that police can protect witnesses with information.

The lack of new information in the case is “frustrating for everyone involved,” he said. “There’s a widow and two children to whom we have an obligation to solve this murder.”

Bardstown Police Chief Rick McCubbin told the media that he and his officers have pressed forward in their jobs. “We that even if there’s a cop-killer in this community, we still have to go out and do our jobs, and they’ve done a wonderful job of it.”

Since Jason Ellis’ murder in May 2013, 20 officers have died in ambush attacks, Thompson said. “Law enforcement, for all of us standing up here, has changed.”

Officers have been assaulted with firearms in California, Pennsylvania, West Virginia, Utah, Georgia and Florida.

Thompson said KSP investigators are still working on the murders of Botland residents Kathy and Samantha Netherland, which also remains unsolved.

There are individuals who have information that can solve these murders, and Thompson asked these individuals to come forward, no matter if their motivation was to do the right thing or to collect the reward money.

Those with information can contact the KSP Elizabethtown post at (270) 766-5078 or the Bardstown Police Department, (502) 348-6811.

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