Investigators say surveillance footage connected Andrew Acton to a trash bin later found with a woman’s body inside.
COLUMBIA, Mo. — A surveillance image of a red Chevrolet S-10 carrying a city trash bin has become a central piece of the murder case against Andrew B. Acton, a Columbia man indicted in Boone County.
Acton, 53, faces charges of second-degree murder, abandonment of a corpse and tampering with physical evidence. Prosecutors say he killed a 47-year-old woman, placed her body inside a City of Columbia roll cart and dumped the container in Perche Creek near Eagle Bluffs Conservation Area. The woman’s name has not been released by the Boone County Sheriff’s Office, which has said it is deferring to her family and friends. Acton has been held without bond while the case moves through circuit court.
The image described in court records shows a red Chevrolet S-10 pickup traveling on Burr Oak Road near Star School Road on May 11. Investigators said the truck was headed toward the Eagle Bluffs Conservation Area, and a City of Columbia trash bin was lying in the bed. Days later, on May 17, a boater found a similar roll cart floating in Perche Creek near the Providence boat access on Old Plank Road. Deputies opened the container after it was moved to the bank. Inside was the body of an adult woman. The match between the vehicle, the container and the location turned a report from a boater into a wider criminal investigation.
Law enforcement found Acton on May 18, around 8:30 p.m., while he was driving the pickup described in the probable cause statement. He was arrested after a traffic stop. During questioning, Acton said he could not remember what happened on May 11 except that he had driven around all day, according to court documents. Investigators wrote that he did not deny dumping the container even after they gave him several chances to do so. The affidavit said the recovered bin and the bin seen in the truck bed had similar unique features. Prosecutors later said the container was dumped in hopes the woman’s body would not be found.
The first charges filed against Acton did not include murder. Prosecutors initially accused him of abandonment of a corpse and tampering with physical evidence in a felony prosecution. The probable cause statement described the investigation as active, and local reporting at the time noted that more developments were expected. Those developments came June 2, when Boone County prosecutors added second-degree murder. The amended charge alleged Acton caused the woman’s death by strangling or smothering her sometime between Oct. 1, 2025, and May 10, 2026. The wide date range left unanswered how investigators believe the death was timed and what evidence places the killing within that span.
A Boone County grand jury returned an indictment June 26 on the same three charges. The indictment identified the victim by the initials C.A.C. and described the cause of death as a neck impression. The woman had been in a relationship with Acton and had lived with him before her death, according to court documents and local reports. Officials have not publicly released a motive. They also have not said whether the woman died in Columbia, at Acton’s listed residence, somewhere else in Boone County, or at another location. The public record ties Acton to the alleged disposal of the body through the truck image and the recovered container.
The physical setting matters in the case because the alleged disposal site sits away from central Columbia. Eagle Bluffs Conservation Area lies near McBaine and the Missouri River, with roads, boat access points and wetlands that can be quiet depending on the day and season. Perche Creek runs through that landscape before reaching the river. Prosecutors say the roll cart was placed in that area around May 11. The bin was found six days later, after the boater reported the odor. Court filings have not said whether the container drifted from one point to another, how long it was in the water, or whether investigators recovered additional evidence from the creek bank.
The case has also carried a privacy issue. Sheriff’s officials confirmed the body was that of a woman and later confirmed she was a 47-year-old Columbia woman, but they have not released her full name. They said next of kin had been notified. That decision left the public record focused on the charges, the accused man and the evidence trail rather than on the victim’s full identity. Local reports later used only her initials from the indictment. The records do not describe whether she had been reported missing, when she was last seen alive, or who first raised concern about her absence before the discovery in the creek.
Acton’s court path has moved quickly since the body was found. He made early appearances on the abandonment and tampering charges, then faced the added murder count in June. A judge denied bond again June 23 after a hearing where public safety concerns were cited. The grand jury indictment followed three days later. Local court coverage said Acton was arraigned June 29 before Judge Stephanie Morrell and pleaded not guilty. Public defender Spencer Smith was listed in reporting as representing him. The indictment keeps the case alive as a murder prosecution rather than only a case about hiding a body after a death.
Outside the criminal allegations, public records have added limited background about Acton. Missouri business records linked him to 63 Diner North Columbia LLC, connected to a diner that once operated in Columbia and later closed. Local property records cited by news outlets listed an address for him in southwest Columbia and showed that home had been foreclosed on earlier in 2026. Officials have not tied those details to the alleged killing. The evidence described by authorities remains narrower: a truck, a city roll cart, a body in Perche Creek, an alleged relationship and a medical finding that prosecutors say points to homicide.
Acton remained in the Boone County Jail without bond. The next public milestone in the case was listed as a July 9 hearing, where the prosecution is expected to continue under the grand jury indictment.
Author note: Last updated July 7, 2026.