Many leads but no charges in Kay Mortensen murder probe

PAYSON — Six months after retired BYU professor Kay Mortensen's throat was slashed in his Payson Canyon home, investigators are still pursuing several leads, including four people who were arrested in the days following the killing.

Three of the four have prior federal convictions involving drugs and guns, leading authorities to suspect that the slaying may have been related to the sale or trade of weapons from the large cache that Mortensen, 70, kept at his home. In March, officials released a list of 32 missing firearms.

That is only one avenue investigators are exploring, according to Utah County Sheriff's Lt. Mike Brower.

"We're still aggressively investigating this case for resolution," Brower said. "It's not a cold case."

The only persons of interest authorities have named are Mortensen's son and daughter-in-law, Roger and Pamela Mortensen of Payson. The couple reported finding Kay Mortensen in an upstairs bathtub after masked men had tied them up, but investigators said their story contained inconsistencies.

Meanwhile, authorities interviewed a witness who placed at least three other people in the home on the night of the killing, according to people with knowledge of the investigation. However, the witness reportedly was so intoxicated on some kind of drug that he or she could not be sure about what happened that night.

Acting on the witness' tip and other information, members of the Joint Criminal Apprehension Team sought at least four people and questioned them about Mortensen's death.

 On Nov. 19, three days after the slaying, members of JCAT boxed in a Payson couple and another woman in a vehicle near 700 West and 7000 South in West Jordan, officials said.

The Payson man, 27, and his 26-year-old girlfriend were booked into Utah County Jail and interviewed. He was held for violating his probation from a 2004 federal conviction for being a felon in possession of a firearm.

In a statement made when he pleaded guilty in that case, the man said he exchanged two guns, believed to be stolen, for methamphetamine. He is serving 10 months in federal prison in Colorado for probation violations, including failing to submit to drug testing, and is set to be released in July.

His girlfriend was released the day after the arrest and is facing unrelated forgery and theft charges out of Spanish Fork for allegedly stealing checks from her mother.