Original reporting
Homicide
Kenneth Eugene Lawhorn listed on robbery- and kidnapping-related capital murder charges in Russell County
The jail roster also lists vehicle arson, first-degree motor-vehicle theft and abuse of a corpse allegations from a November 2023 booking.
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Production note: This article was prepared with automated assistance and manually edited against the Russell County public inmate roster and the cited November 2023 CrimeOnline report. The roster is a booking record and does not report a disposition.
The Russell County Sheriff’s Office inmate roster retrieved Aug. 1, 2026, lists Kenneth Eugene Lawhorn as booked at 9:24 p.m. Nov. 7, 2023, at the Prentiss L. Griffith Detention Facility. The roster identifies the arresting agency as “JAIL” and lists five felony allegations.
The two most serious roster entries are “Homicide-Capital Murder-During Robbery 1st Degree,” under Alabama Code 13A-5-40(a)(2), and “Homicide-Capital Murder-During Kidnapping 1st Degree,” under 13A-5-40(a)(1). The other entries are vehicle arson under 13A-7-42, first-degree theft from a motor vehicle under 13A-8-3, and abuse of a corpse under 13A-11-13. Those descriptions and citations are reproduced from the roster; this article does not independently characterize their legal meaning.
A Nov. 10, 2023, CrimeOnline report, citing AL.com and Russell County Sheriff Heath Taylor, connected Lawhorn’s arrest to the disappearance of Michelle Whitaker Hough after she visited his Phenix City body shop. The report said investigators found Hough’s sport-utility vehicle burned and that the sheriff announced a capital murder warrant. CrimeOnline reported at that time that Hough remained missing and that her remains had not been found.
The inmate roster is a booking record and does not show a court disposition or docket number for these entries. Charges are allegations, and Lawhorn is presumed innocent unless and until proved guilty in court.
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