Kingston pleads guilty in 20 year old Fulton County murder case
By Tammy Curtis, Managing Editor
Less than a month after being found fit to proceed to trial, the fate of 66-year-old Dennis Kingston of Salem was sealed just short of a year after his Feb. 23, 2024 arrest for Murder in the First Degree in a 20-year-old cold case. Kingston accepted a negotiated guilty plea agreement in place of a jury trial and will serve 30 years in the Arkansas Department of Corrections for his role in the 2004 death of David Stone near Wheeling.
The sniper-style shooting of Stone was finally solved last year by long-time investigator Dale Weaver, who works on cold cases for the Fulton County Sheriff’s Department.
The motive for the killing, which was a case of mistaken identity, began as a property dispute between brothers Darrell and David Burch and the intended victim, Leon King, Jr. The dispute started with a physical fight where King allegedly pulled a gun and hit David with a vehicle. Five months later, in May of 2004, David Burch’s daughter, Leah, went to King’s house, and David went looking for her. Later, JR beat David to the point that he was taken to the hospital for treatment. When the report was taken by former Fulton County deputies Brad Schaufler and David Estes, David’s brother, Darrell, told the officers that he would take care it himself.
This led to the filing of assault and battery charges that were adjudicated in Fulton County Circuit court the same day as the 2004 murder. The court found King not guilty and ordered him to pay $200 toward Burch’s medical bill. This led to a series of threats to King’s life after court that day between the Burch brothers and their good friend, Dennis Kingston, who was arrested for the murder on Feb. 23, 2024.
Weaver took over the cold case in the Fall of 2022. After finally receiving the Arkansas State Police case file, he began a tedious process of reinterviewing suspects and witnesses in the case, including Kiingston and his wife, Kathy. Kingston’s story changed several times during interviews.
Finally, after multiple interviews by Weaver on Feb. 16, Kingston told Weaver in a Post Miranda statement that David Burch was with him at the pond the night of the homicide. Still trying to claim his innocence, he said David stayed a few minutes after dark and left Kingston at the pond, returning home. Kingston then claimed he stayed 30-45 minutes longer and began walking, crossing the road to King’s and on the mile and a quarter to David’s house, through the woods with no lights.
Finally, on Feb. 23, Kingston returned to the Fulton County Sheriff’s Department and, during a post-Miranda interview, the whole story of the crime was told.
He said David Burch took him to Mulberry Road, also shown on a map drawn by Kingston, to the west side of the King property. He then walked the road to a fence row to Kings residence and took up a position to shoot in some trees near a swinging barrel. After about 30 minutes, he took rest off on a nearby tree and fired at a shadow inside the King home. He then began walking back to David Burch’s house through the road and woods. He then hid the rifle he had obtained a few days earlier in an old car near David Burch’s shop. The H and R bull barrel .223 belonged to Darrell Burch. Kingston said he had shot it a few times before the murder and had obtained the rifle a few days earlier and hid it by the road until the night of the murder. Kingston told Weaver he returned it to Darrell the following day after work.
He also told Weaver he did not intend to kill Stone, but King “out of anger for what J.R. had done to David Burch.”
Kingston was taken into custody the same day. Circuit Judge Tim Weaver saw fit to hold him on the crime with no bond. Sixteenth Judicial Prosecuting Attorney Dwayne Plumlee also filed the criminal charges in Fulton County Circuit Court the same day.
This group of professionals set a fine example of the swift manner in which an arrest, bond hearing and formal filing of charges can occur seamlessly when working together to keep the wheels of justice turning rapidly and effectively.
