{"id":6807,"date":"2017-11-18T23:00:29","date_gmt":"2017-11-19T07:00:29","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.newsmolo.com\/EDC\/2019\/?p=6807"},"modified":"2025-12-08T23:01:41","modified_gmt":"2025-12-09T07:01:41","slug":"accused-cold-case-killer-of-child-arrested-while-visiting-brother-in-placerville-courthouse","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/www.newsmolo.com\/EDC\/2019\/2017\/11\/18\/accused-cold-case-killer-of-child-arrested-while-visiting-brother-in-placerville-courthouse\/","title":{"rendered":"Accused Cold-Case Killer of Child Arrested While Visiting Brother in Placerville Courthouse"},"content":{"rendered":"

PRpond, Booking Photo, Joseph Ray Messer]<\/em><\/p>\n

Man accused in decades-old Desert Hot Springs murder of teen in front of family was taken into custody as he was attending a sentencing hearing for his brother in a robbery case.<\/p>\n

Messer was arrested Monday at a courthouse in El Dorado County. \u00a0He was booked Friday morning into the Robert Presley Detention Center in Riverside, where he was being held on $1 million bail. \u00a0Messer is expected to be arraigned on the new charges Tuesday.<\/p>\n

Joseph Ray Messer, 41, is accused of shooting 17-year-old Jamie Brown in front of friends and family on July 27, 1996 after confronting a group of teens outside the boy\u2019s home. \u00a0Messer was charged with the murder in 2014, but prosecutors dropped the charges after concluding the evidence wasn\u2019t strong enough at the time to convict him.<\/p>\n

The cold-case was recently reopened by Riverside County prosecutors:<\/p>\n

Messer, who was 20 at the time of shooting, allegedly approached Brown\u2019s younger brother and several other teens while they rode skateboards just after 1 a.m. outside the Browns\u2019 home at 13405 Ramona Drive.<\/p>\n

After being asked for a cigarette, Messer allegedly stared down the group and said \u201cI\u2019ll smoke you, fat boy,\u201d an arrest warrant declaration states. He then allegedly added \u201cI\u2019ll smoke all you guys,\u201d while keeping his right hand at his waistband and concealing it behind a baseball cap.<\/p>\n

Jamie Brown was inside the home when the confrontation started, but was retrieved by his brother, who said there was a \u201ccrazy guy out front starting (expletive),\u201d according to the declaration. Brown and some of the other teens followed Messer into an open desert area north of the home, where the shooting occurred.<\/p>\n

Messer allegedly fired a shot into the air then three to four gunshots at the group of teens, striking Brown, who was taken to Desert Regional Medical Center in Palm Springs, where he later died.<\/p>\n

The alleged murder weapon, a .38 caliber revolver, was found later that day by a resident, who told police that Messer, who appeared \u201cextremely agitated,\u201d asked him for a ride out of town, according to the declaration. After a police car drove past, Messer allegedly tossed the gun and ran. The gun, which matched the weapon used to kill Brown, was found to be registered to one of Messer\u2019s relatives, the declaration states.<\/p>\n

Messer later claimed to an investigator that the shooting was in self-defense. He denied confronting the teens and said that one of them claimed \u201cLet\u2019s kick this dude\u2019s ass\u201d as he walked past the house. The group then chased him with \u201cbats, bottles and everything,\u201d he said, forcing him to fire on them when they wouldn\u2019t back off.<\/p>\n

Messer was identified early on as a person of interest in the case, but a \u201clack of positive suspect identification\u201d prevented prosecutors from charging him in 1996, the declaration states.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

PRpond, Booking Photo, Joseph Ray Messer] Man accused in decades-old Desert Hot Springs murder of teen in front<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[19],"tags":[],"featured_image_urls":{"full":"","thumbnail":"","medium":"","medium_large":"","large":"","1536x1536":"","2048x2048":"","darknews-slider-full":"","darknews-featured":"","darknews-medium":"","darknews-medium-square":""},"author_info":{"display_name":"News MoLo","author_link":"http:\/\/www.newsmolo.com\/EDC\/2019\/author\/admin\/"},"category_info":"Crime<\/a>","tag_info":"Crime","comment_count":"0","_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.newsmolo.com\/EDC\/2019\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6807"}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.newsmolo.com\/EDC\/2019\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.newsmolo.com\/EDC\/2019\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.newsmolo.com\/EDC\/2019\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.newsmolo.com\/EDC\/2019\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=6807"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"http:\/\/www.newsmolo.com\/EDC\/2019\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6807\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":6808,"href":"http:\/\/www.newsmolo.com\/EDC\/2019\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6807\/revisions\/6808"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.newsmolo.com\/EDC\/2019\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=6807"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.newsmolo.com\/EDC\/2019\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=6807"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.newsmolo.com\/EDC\/2019\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=6807"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}