JaRay Wilson’s missing case from October 2012 remained unsolved for months until a shocking confession led police to her skeletal remains buried in a remote Oklahoma field. The 16-year-old had been shot twice in the head and then buried in a shallow grave.
The discovery was made after Cody Godfrey admitted to witnessing his friend Tucker McGee shoot JaRay while the three were hanging out in a remote location. Cody also implicated a third teenager named Caleb McLemore in the crime as an accessory to murder after the fact. All three were eventually arrested and charged.
While Cody and Caleb got away with lenient sentences, Tucker was found guilty of first-degree murder and was sentenced to life in prison with parole after 38 years.
JaRay Wilson’s disappearance and shooting death will feature on Lifetime’s #TextMeWhenYouGetHome in an all-new episode on Monday, August 14, 2023, at 8 pm ET. An official synopsis for the upcoming episode reads:
“JaRay Wilson texted her mother just minutes before she vanished, and the teen’s friends, family and community searched for answers for over a year; someone from JaRay’s inner circle later surfaced with shocking details.”
JaRay Wilson’s murder: 5 key facts to know about her disappearance and the confession about her murder
1) JaRay was last heard from in the evening hours of October 14, 2012
Sixteen-year-old Weatherford High School student JaRay Wilson was last heard from around 5 pm on the evening of October 14, 2012, and was reported missing by her concerned parents the following day.
Her parents informed authorities that the teenager had left home a week before her disappearance after they grounded her. However, she stayed in constant touch with them. Police initially believed she may have ran away before finally issuing an amber alert.
2) Phone records and surveillance were used to track her final whereabouts
While investigating JaRay Wilson’s disappearance, police heavily relied on her cell phone records to track her final moments. The phone data showed that it last pinged around 7 pm on October 14.
Moreover, The Cinemaholic reported that JaRay was also spotted on a convenience store surveillance at 5 pm that same evening. She was constantly texting on her phone and had contacted multiple people before going missing.
3) Cody Godfrey and Tucker McGee were the last people to have seen JaRay Wilson
According to several sources, police tracked JaRay’s final moments using her phone records to a gas station sometime in the afternoon, from where another friend picked her up. This friend informed police that they drove to a friend’s house, but she soon left to hang out with Cody Godfrey and Tucker McGee.
The latter two further claimed the three of them drove around for a few hours before dropping JaRay at the University Apartments around 7 pm. The story narrated by these two seemingly matched the phone records, which showed that the device last pinged around the time in that area.
Police also suspected the involvement of JaRay’s then-boyfriend, who was older than her and had a history of drug abuse and possession. But the boyfriend was in jail at the time and could not have been involved in her disappearance. In addition, the authorities followed a couple of other failed leads.
4) Cody made a shocking confession about JaRay’s whereabouts over a year later
A year passed by, but JaRay Wilson’s missing case remained unsolved. Police then focused on Cody Godfrey and Tucker McGee, who were possibly the last two people to have seen her that evening. They were suspects in the disappearance, but fourteen months later Cody admitted to police that Tucker shot 16-year-old JaRay before leading them to her remains.
Cody confessed that before picking up JaRay that evening, Tucker showed him a gun and then the two smoked some synthetic marijuana. After meeting the 16-year-old, the three drove to a remote location about two miles north of Weatherford, where they hung out for a few hours.
Reportedly, JaRay had been texting on her phone when Tucker shot her, which she didn’t see it coming. She was still alive and moaning when he fired the second shot at her head. After this, he and Cody hid the dead body. They returned to the scene the following day in Caleb McLemore’s car and buried her body in a shallow grave.
5) Prosecutors initially sought the death penalty for Tucker
After confessing to the crime and leading police to JaRay Wilson’s remains, Cody Godfrey helped police by making the alleged shooter, Tucker McGee, implicated himself during a recorded conversation. Tucker was arrested from his house and charged with first-degree murder, to which he pleaded not guilty.
Later, Caleb McLemore also confessed and provided the police with a story similar to the one given by Cody. The latter had been charged with accessory to the murder and pleaded guilty, receiving no prison time and seven years of probation. Moreover, Caleb pleaded guilty to being an accessory after the fact and was given a two-year prison sentence along with fifteen years of probation.
Tucker was convicted of the murder charge, and prosecutors initially sought the death penalty but settled for life in prison without parole. The sentence was later vacated, and during a re-sentencing in June 2018, he was given a life sentence with the possibility of parole after 38 years.
#TextMeWhenYouGetHome airs with a new episode on Monday, August 14, 2023.
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Source: newstars.edu.vn