A man serving time for domestic violence in Idaho now stands accused in a cold-case murder from more than a decade ago in Alaska.
A Palmer grand jury has indicted 36-year-old Keenon Leland Keyes on first-degree and second-degree murder charges in the 2011 death of Loy Suthammavong, the Alaska Department of Law announced in a statement Wednesday.
Keyes is charged with shooting and killing the 30-year-old Suthammavong on Dec. 3, 2011, the statement said.
“Both Keyes and the victim knew each other and were both at the victim’s house in Houston when the murder occurred,” Department of Law spokeswoman Patty Sullivan said in an email.
A neighbor reported Suthammavong missing Dec. 6, Sullivan said. It was the same day his vehicle was found burning in Anchorage, the Anchorage Daily News reported at the time.
“Efforts to locate the victim were unsuccessful even though there were obvious signs of severe injury found at the victim’s residence,” Sullivan said.
It wasn’t until the following March that snowshoers near Eklutna Lake Road found Suthammavong’s body, she said.
Sullivan said subsequent investigation found that Keyes had driven south with Suthammavong’s body in the victim’s vehicle, then dumped the body in the Eklutna Lake area.
According to the Department of Law statement, Keyes is currently serving a 15-year sentence in Idaho for felony aggravated assault, felony injury to a child and possession of a firearm by a felon. The Spokane Spokesman-Review reported that a jury convicted Keyes of those crimes in January, after he fired a gun at his wife and 3-year-old child in Coeur d’Alene in August of 2022.
Wednesday’s statement said the troopers’ cold case unit reopened an investigation into Suthammavong’s death in September of 2022. Sullivan said investigators connected the crime to Keyes after conducting more interviews and reviewing digital and physical evidence.
Keyes’ cold case is the fifth to receive an indictment from Alaska’s Office of Special Prosecutions this year, according to the Department of Law. He faces a maximum sentence of 99 years if convicted.
Alaska Public Media’s Casey Grove contributed to this report.
Chris Klint is a web producer and breaking news reporter at Alaska Public Media. Reach him at cklint@alaskapublic.org. Read more about Chris here.
