Rasheed Turner was convicted of first-degree murder after Layla Freeman was fatally shot on her 21st birthday in Kansas City.
KANSAS CITY, Mo. — A Missouri man has been sentenced to life in prison without parole for killing his former girlfriend after arranging to meet her on her 21st birthday by telling her he had a present for her, according to court records and prosecutors.
Jackson County Circuit Judge Adam Caine sentenced 26-year-old Rasheed Turner on Wednesday to life without the possibility of parole for first-degree murder in the May 13, 2025, death of 21-year-old Layla Freeman. Turner also received a consecutive 15-year sentence for armed criminal action. A Jackson County jury found him guilty of both charges in August.
Kansas City police found Freeman near a parked Chevrolet Malibu at West 37th Street and Pennsylvania Avenue after officers were called to the area at about 9:45 p.m. She had been shot multiple times and died at the scene. Witnesses told investigators they heard repeated gunfire and a woman screaming before seeing a man leave the area and run toward a blue Ford Mustang.
Court records show Freeman had been in contact with Turner in the hours before she was killed. Her cousin told investigators she spoke with Freeman on FaceTime at about 6:30 p.m. while they discussed plans for Freeman’s birthday. Freeman said Turner, her former boyfriend, wanted to meet because he had a birthday present for her.
The cousin called Freeman again about an hour and a half later after she had not heard back from her, according to court documents. Freeman answered while she was with Turner and appeared to be crying, the cousin told investigators. Freeman said they were still talking and that she would call back. That call never came, and later messages from relatives went unanswered.
Investigators used city surveillance cameras, license plate readers, phone information, text messages and social media records to link Turner to the shooting. Police said cameras captured a blue Ford Mustang near the crime scene. Detectives later found photographs of a similar Mustang on a social media profile connected to Turner, according to court records.
Messages reviewed by investigators also showed Turner communicating with Freeman before the shooting. Court documents said Turner told Freeman he wanted to wish her a happy birthday face to face and give her a present. Authorities arrested Turner on May 28, 2025, about two weeks after Freeman was killed.
Turner was initially charged with second-degree murder and armed criminal action. Prosecutors later obtained a superseding indictment charging him with first-degree murder. A jury convicted him in August 2026. Some subsequent reporting incorrectly described the August outcome as a guilty plea, but contemporaneous trial coverage and court reporting state that a Jackson County jury returned the guilty verdicts.
Freeman had a temporary order of protection against Turner at the time of her death, according to court records cited by local news organizations. Records from the initial case also said Turner had previously been investigated in connection with two domestic violence assaults in Grandview, though authorities did not publicly detail the circumstances of those investigations in the reporting reviewed.
Jackson County Prosecutor Melesa Johnson described Freeman’s killing as a domestic violence-related homicide after the sentencing. Prosecutors said Turner will spend the rest of his life in prison because the murder sentence carries no possibility of parole, with the additional 15-year armed criminal action sentence ordered to run consecutively.
Turner’s sentencing completes the criminal case at the trial-court level following his first-degree murder conviction. No information reviewed Friday indicated that the sentence had been overturned or modified, and any future appeal would proceed separately through Missouri’s court system.