A Garfield County jury found 55-year-old Charles Jordan guilty of first-degree murder Friday in the death of 27-year-old Colby Sheppard, recommending a sentence of life in prison without parole. The verdict came more than two years after Sheppard vanished from Enid and nearly two years after his body turned up tied with rope and wrapped in a tarp inside a storm cellar.
The trial concluded in Garfield County District Court over two years after Sheppard's body was discovered, according to KOCO. As reported by KFOR, four people are accused of luring Sheppard to his death in an effort to obtain information about a missing woman, according to investigators.
Body Found Behind a Vacant Home
Enid Police Department detectives discovered Sheppard's body on August 27, 2024, tied with rope and wrapped in a tarp inside a storm cellar behind a vacant property in the 1100 block of North 12th Street, according to reporting cited alongside coverage from Law & Crime. Sheppard had been missing for nearly eight months before investigators located him there.
Detectives cracked the case after an inmate came forward and reported that Jordan had admitted to hiding the body in the cellar and had offered money for help moving it, per the The Charley Project. That tip gave investigators the lead they needed to finally locate the cellar after months without answers.
Co-Defendants Take Plea Deals
Court records indicate Heaven Jordan, Charles Jordan's daughter, allegedly lured Sheppard to her father's home to be confronted while co-defendant Devin Harris stood guard outside, according to EnidLIVE!. Both Heaven Jordan and Harris later pleaded guilty to manslaughter, resolving charges against two of the four original murder co-defendants.
A fourth co-defendant, Victor Battelo, still faces a first-degree murder charge and has a trial scheduled for late October in Garfield County District Court, the same outlet's report notes. Battelo is the uncle of Kendra Nicole Battelo, a 24-year-old Muscogee (Creek) woman whose disappearance sits at the center of the motive investigators have described.
A Retaliation Motive Tied to an Unsolved Disappearance
Enid Police have stated that evidence suggested Sheppard was killed in retaliation for rumors connecting him to the July 2022 disappearance of his girlfriend, Kendra Nicole Battelo, though detectives emphasized they found no evidence corroborating any involvement by Sheppard in her vanishing, according to Law & Crime. Local rumors about that connection had circulated for over a year before Sheppard was killed.
Kendra Battelo went missing from Enid in July 2022 and was last heard from around midnight on July 7 of that year, according to the Charley Project. Her case remains an active, unsolved missing persons investigation.
At the time Battelo vanished, Sheppard was facing pending domestic assault charges involving her in Garfield County, but prosecutors dismissed the case after she disappeared and became unavailable to testify, per the same source. That dismissal fueled local speculation despite a lack of physical evidence linking Sheppard to her disappearance.
Sheppard's Final Known Days
Sheppard was last seen alive by family members in Enid in late December 2023, including a confirmed sighting at an Enid Pizza Hut on December 27, 2023, and he was officially reported missing on January 4, 2024, according to True Case Files. His family reported him missing eight months before his body was located in the storm cellar.
What Comes Next
Under Oklahoma law, first-degree murder is a Class Y felony punishable by death, life imprisonment without parole, or life imprisonment with parole eligibility, according to Justia Law. The jury's recommendation of life without parole for Jordan now moves to formal sentencing, while Battelo's trial next month will determine the outcome for the last remaining murder defendant in the case.
Hoodline previously covered the discovery of Sheppard's body and the initial murder charges filed against all four defendants in 2024. Kendra Battelo's disappearance remains unresolved, and no one has been charged in connection with her case.
