Authorities say Daniel Tenner confessed to killing and robbing a Pascagoula, Mississippi woman he lured to Terrytown on the pretext of selling a cell phone through the Facebook online marketplace.

When Tenner, 20, of Jackson, Mississippi, allegedly expressed remorse for the grisly crime that took place in front of the victim’s girlfriend and a toddler, investigators from the Jefferson Parish Sheriff’s Office asked to Tenner if he wanted to apologize to the victim’s family.

“We gave him a pad and a pen so he could write a letter, and he did,” JPSO homicide detective Harold Wischan said Monday during a hearing on the case. probable cause in Jefferson Parish District Court.

Authorities have not released the contents of the letter they say Tenner wrote to relatives of 24-year-old Morgan Tyrone, who was shot during the April 10 heist. Tenner is charged with first degree murder, armed robbery and two counts of attempted first degree murder.

blood everywhere

Tyrone and his 22-year-old girlfriend had purchased a new cell phone and settled on an iPhone 13 offered on Facebook Marketplace, Wischan said. Tyrone and the seller negotiated a price of $300.

Although she looked for phones for sale in the Jackson area, the seller revealed that he was actually in New Orleans, according to Wischan. The two met on April 10.

Tyrone, his girlfriend, and the girlfriend’s infant son drove to the 300 block of Friedrichs Road in Terrytown, the location given to them by the salesman. They arrived around 10:30 p.m.

The 22-year-old told detectives Tyrone and the seller walked back and forth, each asking the other to hand over their part of the deal first, Wischan said. But Tyrone, who was sitting in the driver’s seat of a minivan, began to have a “bad feeling” about the whole encounter.

When Tyrone turned to put the money in the center console of the vehicle, the salesman, who was standing outside the vehicle at the driver’s side window, pulled out a gun and shot Tyrone once in the head, Wischan testified, spraying blood all over the interior of the vehicle. vehicle.

The man pointed his gun at the woman and the toddler, threatened to kill them and demanded the money.

“The surviving victim had just seen his girlfriend murdered. She carried her blood and her brains. She truly believed that she and her child would be murdered next,” Wischan said.

The woman handed the gunman the blood-stained money and he fled.

Hint and confession

Detectives analyzed Tyrone’s cell phone and confirmed she had spoken to a potential seller about an iPhone, according to Wischan. All communication was done through Facebook Messenger, he said.

Tenner was not the owner of that Facebook account, authorities said. Detectives have spoken with the account owner. But Wischan and Jefferson Parish Assistant District Attorney Thomas Block did not identify the person during Monday’s hearing.

Wischan, however, said investigators found evidence linking that Facebook account to Tenner, including photos and other social media and digital accounts.

Wischan admitted authorities couldn’t say for sure if it was Tenner messaging Tyrone via Facebook. But Wischan noted that Tenner later admitted to doing so.

Investigators tracked Tenner’s cell phone and determined it was in the vicinity of the homicide at the time Tyrone was killed, authorities said.

They later determined that Tenner had come to Terrytown from Jackson on April 3 and was staying with someone in an apartment about a block from the murder scene, Wischan said. The apartment resident flew Tenner back to Jackson on April 12.

About three weeks after the homicide, the sheriff’s office received a Crimestoppers tip naming Tenner as a suspect, Wischan said. The tipster provided quite a bit of information and told authorities that Tenner bragged about Jackson’s murder, even sharing a news article about the murder.

probable cause

The US Marshals Service arrested Tenner in Jackson on May 17. Tyrone’s girlfriend identified him as the shooter in the case, according to Wischan.

Crime Commissioner Paul Schneider ruled there was probable cause to continue to hold Tenner without bond on the first-degree murder charge. But he ruled there was insufficient cause to hold Tenner for attempted murder, saying there was no evidence of intent to kill.

Tenner was returned to Jefferson Parish Correctional Center in Gretna.