Video Evidence Leads to Murder Charges, Three Arrested in Kolton Esparza Death

Officers answered a welfare call shortly before 11 a.m. and found 31-year-old Kolton Esparza inside a vacant house on Cypress Avenue in Klamath Falls, authorities say. Esparza was transported from Sky Lakes Medical Center to St. Charles Medical Center in Bend and died on Feb. 27; court records list the cause of death as "severe head trauma."

The scene description in court filings and police reports is stark: Esparza was found "naked and bound with rope," described elsewhere in filings as "nude and severely beaten" who "showed signs of torture." Investigators say the injuries were severe enough to require transfer to a higher level of care before his death the following day.

Three people have been taken into custody in the case. Reggie L. Townsend Jr., 34, of Klamath Falls, faces first-degree murder and first-degree kidnapping charges and is also accused of tampering with evidence and being a felon in possession of a firearm; some accounts add an unlawful use of a weapon charge. Jamie S. Harrington, 49, of Chiloquin, arrested Feb. 27, has been charged in some filings with first-degree kidnapping and murder charges and in other filings is accused of second-degree murder, first-degree kidnapping and tampering with evidence; separate accounts list her as held on kidnapping and criminal conspiracy to commit first-degree murder. Wesley J. Powless, 39, of Klamath Falls, was arrested during a traffic stop and is accused in various filings of second-degree murder, first-degree kidnapping and tampering with evidence, with one report also listing first-degree assault among his charges.

Local timelines of the arrests differ in some details: law-enforcement accounts show Harrington taken into custody Feb. 27, Townsend arrested the following day during what prosecutors described as a "high risk traffic stop," and Powless captured on the Monday after those arrests. One initial summary indicated arrests on March 2–3, a discrepancy present in the reporting that prosecutors and court clerks will need to clarify when charging documents are made public.

Probable cause affidavits prepared for the case add snippets of the lead-up to the fatal assault: Harrington reportedly drove Townsend, Esparza and another man to the Eulolona Trailhead, and Esparza asked to be dropped off elsewhere but was allegedly refused. Court records also allege that Powless and Townsend cleaned the scene afterward and removed evidence in a black trash bag.

Multiple pieces of the investigation remain to be released: the official medical examiner's report beyond the "severe head trauma" finding, the full charging documents that reconcile differing degree and count descriptions, and any law-enforcement statements about investigative leads referenced in headlines, including mentions of video evidence. Prosecutors have filed the charges listed in the court records; further details are expected as arraignments and formal filings proceed.