In March, a 62-year-old man went by bus from South Carolina to western Jefferson County, Alabama, to confess to the 21-year-old murder of his lover.
When Brian Edward Jones arrived in Birmingham, he phoned Bessemer police and informed them that in February 2001, he killed his fiancée and packed her corpse in a suitcase, which he then discarded in a wooded area nearby. Jones said he accidently murdered his girlfriend, Janet Jones Luxford, following an argument with her in a nearby motel.
According to the reports, Luxford was last seen alive in 2001 and has been recorded on numerous missing persons databases since then. In 2002, her daughter reported mom missing from her Jacksonville, Florida home to the Napa Police Department.
“We were in disbelief that somebody had come to us confess to a murder much less than one that is 21 years old,’’ Lt. Christian Clemons said.
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“On top of that,’’ he said, “it was a murder we didn’t even know happened in Bessemer.”https://t.co/fRmajJzCBS
According to his arrest record, Jones was charged with murder and mistreatment of a body after his confession. In late March, he was arrested and brought into the Jefferson County Jail.
Bessemer police, according to Lt. Christian Clemons, had no knowledge the murder had occurred.
He told detectives that he would have come out sooner if he hadn’t wanted to let his parents down.
Investigators suppressed information of Luxford’s arrest until his family could be notified. Jones led detectives to bone remains in the approximate location where he discarded her corpse in 2001, according to the report. Her body has not been formally recognized.
