A McKinney man will spend the rest of his life in prison for a 2017 Frisco murder that went unsolved for years before detectives reopened the cold case and uncovered new evidence, Collin County District Attorney Greg Willis said.

Kerrico Carr, 44, was sentenced on Dec. 15 to life without parole after a jury found him guilty in the fatal shooting of a man at a Frisco home, a case that initially stalled after a suspect was wrongly identified and later cleared. Carr had been in the Collin County Jail for nearly a year leading up to his sentencing.

The crime happened on June 30, 2017, when a man was found shot in the back in the yard of a Frisco home. Frisco police said they received multiple calls that day about a masked man who was seen armed in the neighborhood.

Witnesses told police they saw two men in a van wearing ski masks. According to Willis, the driver approached the victim's car parked outside his home, prompting the victim to run between houses.

The masked passenger fired a single shot, striking the victim in the back, Willis said. Both suspects then fled the scene in the van.

On the day of the murder, family members told investigators the victim owed money to Carr and had been receiving threatening text messages from him. 

The victim's girlfriend later identified a different man in a photo lineup, but investigators determined that that suspect was nowhere near the scene at the time of the shooting. He was released, and the case eventually went cold.

How Frisco police solved the 2017 cold case murder

In 2023, Frisco police detectives reopened the investigation and identified a new suspect who was at the scene on the day of the murder. That person confirmed he was with Carr during the shooting and told investigators it was Carr who fired the fatal shot.

Carr was arrested on Dec. 20, 2024, after being released from a federal prison in Arkansas, where he was serving time for conspiracy to commit identity theft, Willis said.

During the trial, prosecutors presented evidence that Carr admitted during a phone call that he was at the scene to collect money the victim owed him. Testimony also aligned with witness accounts and cellphone location data, according to the district attorney's office.

Collin County Jail records show Carr also had a separate warrant for cruelty to a non-livestock animal out of Dallas County.

Carr was sentenced to life in prison without the possibility of parole.