Deundray Cottrell vanished during a Birmingham family visit, leaving relatives searching for answers until a former partner was arrested two years later.
BIRMINGHAM, Ala. — Deundray Cottrell came to Birmingham from Atlanta for a Fourth of July visit with family in 2024, joining relatives and friends for a holiday celebration. By the end of the night, the 31-year-old was missing. His family searched nearby yards, police opened a missing-person investigation, and two days later officers found him dead in a shed about a block from the gathering. The unanswered disappearance would become a homicide case that remained open for more than two years.
The case entered a new phase in September 2026 when U.S. Marshals arrested Cottrell’s former romantic partner, Julian Taylor Morris, in Miami on an Alabama fugitive warrant. Morris, now 33, is charged with murder. Authorities said he was at a cruise terminal when he was taken into custody. He was later extradited to Birmingham, booked into the Jefferson County Jail and denied bond after a judge found him to be a flight risk. Morris’ lawyer says he is innocent and disputes the police theory of the case. The charge has brought Cottrell’s family closer to a courtroom proceeding but has not yet answered how prosecutors say the killing occurred.
The first hours of the investigation unfolded as a search for a missing relative rather than a homicide inquiry. Birmingham police said officers responded on the evening of July 4, 2024, to a residence in the 7900 block of Fourth Avenue South after relatives reported that Cottrell could not be found. He had been spending time with friends and family and was last seen in the area on foot. Family members said he had gone to check on his dogs around the time fireworks were going off. When he failed to return, relatives began looking through the neighborhood and contacted police.
On July 5, East Precinct officers searched the area where Cottrell was last seen. Police said they recovered some of his clothing and obtained surveillance video from a neighborhood resident showing him walking nearby. Family members also said they found his phone and one of his shoes in the backyard. Other surveillance footage later described by relatives and local media appeared to show Cottrell moving quickly through yards and crossing a fence. Those fragments gave searchers a general area to concentrate on, but they did not publicly explain why he had left the gathering or what happened to him afterward.
The search ended the next day in the 7800 block of Fifth Avenue South. Officers found Cottrell dead in a detached shed behind an abandoned residence, according to police and the Jefferson County coroner. The medical examiner subsequently classified his death as a homicide. Court records later cited by local television stations said Cottrell had been strangled. Law&Crime reported that an electrical cord was around his neck when his body was found. Police have not publicly released a full forensic account of the death, and no motive has been announced in the material reviewed for this story.
Within a day of the homicide ruling, Birmingham police publicly named Morris as a person of interest. At that time, police described him as Cottrell’s romantic partner and said investigators wanted to locate him because he might have been one of the last people to see or hear from Cottrell. For Cottrell’s family, the designation deepened questions that had already emerged during the search. Relatives told news organizations they were troubled by Morris’ behavior after Cottrell vanished and believed some of the accounts he gave them about the disappearance were inconsistent. Morris was not charged then, and those family suspicions were not findings of guilt.
As detectives worked, Cottrell’s relatives also tried to make sure his identity was not reduced to the mystery of his final hours. At a vigil less than two weeks after his death, family members described him as energetic, loving and known for his sense of style. His sister said his personality and presence were difficult to capture in a single description. Local reports identified Cottrell as a dancer and Atlanta-based influencer, and another report said he was pursuing a doctorate in marketing. His family’s public comments shifted between remembering his life and pressing for answers in a case that had produced no immediate arrest.
The investigation appeared to move largely out of public view after the summer of 2024. Police continued to classify Cottrell’s death as a homicide, while Morris’ attorney, Victor Revill, disputed suggestions that his client was responsible. Revill said Morris had been with members of Cottrell’s family and maintained that surveillance footage showed Cottrell alone away from the house. The attorney argued that the timeline made the accusation against Morris impossible and said investigators should consider other explanations. Birmingham police did not publicly disclose what evidence later caused detectives to seek a murder warrant against Morris.
That changed Sept. 14, 2026, when U.S. Marshals took Morris into custody in Miami. Birmingham police announced that he had been charged with murder in Cottrell’s death. Police Chief Michael Pickett said the arrest reflected the department’s commitment to pursuing violent-crime investigations even when years had passed. Cottrell’s family described the arrest as an emotional turning point after enduring a prolonged wait. His sister said relatives had reached moments when they doubted whether an arrest would come, but she said the family intended to follow the case through the court system.
The arrest also produced a sharper public dispute between the family’s view of the investigation and the defense. Revill said the fact that Morris had been charged should not be mistaken for proof that he was guilty. He maintained that Morris could not have been both with the family and at the location where Cottrell was seen on surveillance. Revill also questioned whether investigators had adequately examined another person who had previously been connected to Morris and Cottrell. Police have not accused that person of wrongdoing. Prosecutors will ultimately have to prove their case against Morris in court rather than through public statements from either side.
Morris was returned to Alabama near the end of September and made an initial appearance by video after being booked into the Jefferson County Jail. In October, a judge considered his pretrial detention under Alabama’s Aniah’s Law. The judge denied bond, saying testimony established that Morris should be considered a flight risk. The decision keeps him jailed while the prosecution proceeds, but it is not a verdict on the murder charge. Morris remains presumed innocent, and his defense has said it expects to challenge the evidence linking him to Cottrell’s death.
More than two years after a family holiday gathering turned into a search, Cottrell’s death is now the subject of an active criminal case rather than an unresolved homicide investigation. As of Nov. 6, Morris remains jailed without bond in Jefferson County. No trial date has been publicly announced in the reports reviewed for this story, leaving the next answers about the disputed timeline, the surveillance evidence and the state’s theory of the killing to come through the court process.
Author note: Last updated Nov. 6, 2026.