A trial begins in Washington tomorrow for a man charged with first-degree murder in the death of a Burlington teenager.
The Des Moines County trial was moved to Washington County by District Court Judge Mary Ann Brown for defendant 25-year-old Jaron Narelle Purham. He is charged in the March 2016 death of 16-year-old Kedarie Johnson, a gender-fluid Burlington High School student, whose body was found with two bullet holes in the chest in a Burlington alley. Another man charged in the death, 24-year-old Jorge Sanders-Galvez was sentenced to life in prison in December 2017 after a jury trial found him guilty. Purham’s trial begins at 9 a.m. Tuesday at the Washington County Courthouse.