Items left behind Cracker Barrel lead to arrest in 1985 death of a salesman

Items discarded behind a Cracker Barrel restaurant in Georgia played a key role in helping Ohio prosecutors secure an arrest in connection with the killing of a traveling salesman more than 40 years ago, authorities said Monday.

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A Warren County grand jury issued a two-count indictment accusing Randy Lane McAllister, a 62-year-old Columbus resident, of playing a role in the Oct. 17, 1985, slaying of John Christopher Warren.

Warren, 44, was found dead in his room at a since-shuttered Holiday Inn in Middletown, just outside Cincinnati, county prosecutors said.

McAllister is charged with killing Warren “while committing or attempting to commit the offense of aggravated robbery,” according to the indictment. The victim’s car, a 1985 Oldsmobile, and other belongings were taken, prosecutors said.

McAllister’s criminal defense lawyer did not immediately return a message seeking comment Tuesday.

Days after the slaying, “police in Dalton, Georgia, recovered some of Warren’s property and other relevant items discarded behind a Cracker Barrel restaurant ” about 400 miles away, prosecutors said.

Warren’s car was found in Redington Beach, Florida, about 1,000 miles from where Warren was killed.

The slaying went unsolved for decades before Warren County Sheriff’s detectives sent items “recovered from all three crime scenes” to a lab for further analysis in 2019, officials said.

Those findings led detectives to name McAllister “and a now-deceased accomplice as potential suspects,” prosecutors said.

It wasn’t clear how investigators initially connected the Cracker Barrel items to Warren’s slaying or what sparked the new interest in the case in 2019, according to the indictment and the prosecutor’s statement on Monday.

“Everything I intend to say is on social media. I don’t have any further comment,” Warren County Prosecuting Attorney David Fornshell told NBC News on Tuesday.

Messages left for several of McAllister’s family members, who have phone listings in Ohio, Georgia and Florida, were not immediately returned.

At the time of his death, Warren lived in Kent, about 230 miles from where he was killed. He worked at an auto parts company and was in town for meetings, prosecutors said.

McAllister remained in custody on Tuesday, held in lieu of a $500,000 bond, jail records showed.