FEB 5, 2020
Court documents outline new details in Mackenzie Lueck murder case
Ayoola Adisa Ajayi claimed he was burning pallets in his backyard.
But the man who was renting the basement Airbnb in Ajayi’s house told police he couldn’t believe Ajayi ignited such a fire in the Fairpark neighborhood, according to newly released court documents.
“Ayoola had the pallets and what he described as a
white door on fire behind the garage. He said he stayed on the patio and did not approach the fire. (He) said a neighbor lady then started yelling at Ayoola and telling him if he did not put the fire out she was going to call the fire department. (The renter) said he could not believe Ayoola had ignited the fire in his backyard and went inside because he did not want to be involved with the incident,” according to a search warrant affidavit filed in 3rd District Court.
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The Salt Lake County District Attorney’s Office could not comment Wednesday on whether investigators believe there was a second woman at Hatch Park, stating only that the warrants are based on preliminary information available to police at the time, and additional information will be flushed out during court proceedings.
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Other warrants state that at least one man and possibly two were staying at Ajayi’s house at the time Lueck was allegedly killed.
One man, from Texas, said he awoke on June 17 to find Ajayi already awake, the warrant states.
“(He) walked outside to the driveway from the basement Airbnb apartment. (He) said Ayoola was sitting on a trash can in front of his open garage next to his Kia Optima. (He) said Ayoola asked him if he knew how to get gas out of a vehicle. (Ajayi) went on to say he had been trying to siphon gas out of his car and had been unsuccessful. ... Ayoola told him he wanted to burn some pallets that were stacked against the fence in the driveway,” the warrant states.
“Ayoola then told him he had been up all night and was ‘going on no sleep.’”
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According to the returns on some of those warrants, some of the items seized by police from Ajayi’s house as potential evidence included knives, razors blades, scissors,
a stun gun, sweatpants and a hoodie with bleach stains, shoes and socks with blood stains located near a washing machine, and “multiple pieces of cut up bone, located in (an) upstairs bathroom garbage.”
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On July 15, Salt Lake
police announced that new items of evidence related to the Lueck case were found in the Jordan River. According to a recently unsealed warrant, those items included Lueck’s University of Utah student ID card and “multiple items of women’s clothing strung along the bank of the Jordan River.
“All of the clothing found was cut with a sharp cutting instrument consistent with a knife, scissors, razor blade, etc. Among the items recovered was a bra which had been partially burned and melted and is consistent with articles of clothing that were burned at the initial dig site,” police wrote in the affidavits.
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