The investigation began with a family trying to reach James O’Neill and ended with a guilty plea from James Agnew.
LAKEWOOD, Colo. — A welfare check requested by James O’Neill’s brother led police to a Lakewood condominium where officers later found O’Neill’s body and uncovered the use of his Social Security money, investigators said.
The request came June 19, 2025, after years of distance between O’Neill and his family. His relatives had not seen him since 2019 and had not spoken to him since 2021, but his brother needed to reach him about an inheritance. The first police visit did not end with a body, an arrest or a confirmed sighting of O’Neill. Instead, officers met a man at the South Ammons Street home who identified himself as “James,” acknowledged the family’s efforts and said he did not want to speak with them. That answer briefly suggested O’Neill was alive and refusing contact. It later became a key detail in the case against James David Agnew.
Police body-camera video from that first encounter moved the case forward. When O’Neill’s brother watched the footage, he told officers the man was not his brother. Investigators then had to account for two men named James who were tied to the same home: O’Neill, the missing relative, and Agnew, a Lakewood resident who lived there with his wife, Suzanne Ruth Agnew. Detectives returned to the address and asked more questions. Suzanne Agnew said O’Neill had moved out several years earlier after meeting a foreign woman online, according to court documents. Investigators later said that explanation did not match the banking records, the brother’s contacts with Suzanne Agnew or the evidence found inside the condo.
The inheritance also became part of the timeline. O’Neill’s brother contacted Suzanne Agnew directly and told her O’Neill had money that needed to be deposited. She said O’Neill was sitting next to her but did not want to talk, court documents said. She then provided a checking account number and O’Neill’s Social Security number. The conversation changed when the brother said O’Neill would have to appear in person at a bank to sign paperwork. After that, investigators said, Suzanne Agnew stopped communicating with him. The detail mattered because it placed the family’s concern, the claimed presence of O’Neill and the use of his banking information into one chain of events before police found the body.
Detectives then traced O’Neill’s account activity. Monthly Social Security deposits were still being made, and the money was being spent. Court documents said surveillance video showed James Agnew using O’Neill’s debit card at a 7-Eleven. Investigators said $17,406 was spent from the account after O’Neill is believed to have died. James Agnew later told police he had long known the card’s personal identification number and had access to the account. When asked why O’Neill’s death was not reported, he said the continuing income was a consideration, according to investigators. That financial evidence helped support charges that moved the case beyond the question of an unreported death and into identity theft and financial misuse.
On July 3, 2025, detectives arrived with a search warrant. According to the affidavit, Suzanne Agnew immediately told them they would find O’Neill’s body in the home and said he was dead. Officers found human remains on the floor of a bedroom beneath or near a deflated air mattress. Suzanne Agnew told investigators that she, James Agnew and O’Neill had lived together for years and had been in a three-way intimate relationship. She said O’Neill died in December 2023. James Agnew also told police they woke one morning and found O’Neill dead, and he said there had “probably” been drug use the night before. The couple suggested the death was tied to health problems or drug use, but no final public finding has identified the cause or manner of death.
The condition and placement of the body became one of the most disturbing parts of the affidavit. Suzanne Agnew told investigators that she did not want to report O’Neill’s death at first because she was not ready to “give up” Jim. She also acknowledged that failing to report the death was wrong, according to police. Investigators said she described covering the body with a deflated air mattress after about a week because the couple’s Chihuahuas had begun chewing on him. Police and local reporting have described the home as a condominium in the 3400 block of South Ammons Street. The remains were found about 18 months after the Agnews said O’Neill died, leaving a long period in which the body stayed inside the residence.
James Agnew’s part of the criminal case ended in April 2026 with a guilty plea and prison sentence. He pleaded guilty to tampering with a deceased body and identity theft. The court sentenced him to five years in prison on each count, with the terms running together. The judge gave him credit for 276 days in pretrial custody. Prosecutors dismissed five other felony counts as part of the agreement, including abuse of a corpse, theft, attempted theft, another identity theft count and unauthorized use of a financial device. The plea did not include an admission that Agnew caused O’Neill’s death. It resolved charges tied to the concealment of the remains and the use of O’Neill’s identity after death.
Suzanne Agnew’s case followed a different path. She pleaded not guilty, and her charges remained pending after James Agnew was sentenced. Her case is important because some of the most detailed statements in the affidavit came from her interviews with police. Investigators said she described the relationship, the death, the failure to report it and the air mattress placed over O’Neill’s body. Prosecutors charged her with crimes including tampering with a deceased body, abuse of a corpse and theft. A pretrial conference was set for May 26, 2026. Unless her case is resolved by plea or dismissal, prosecutors would need to prove the charges against her in court.
For O’Neill’s family, the case shows how a request for contact about inherited money became the step that exposed a death inside a home. Police first treated the matter as a welfare check, then as a missing-person concern, then as a criminal investigation tied to a hidden body and benefit payments. The public record now confirms James Agnew’s prison sentence but leaves other matters unresolved. Authorities have not announced homicide charges, and the coroner’s final public findings on O’Neill’s death have not been reported. The unresolved case against Suzanne Agnew keeps the matter in Jefferson County court months after the body was found.
What began as a family welfare check now remains partly unresolved in Jefferson County court, with Suzanne Agnew due back for a pretrial conference on May 26, 2026.
Author note: Last updated Sunday, May 17, 2026.