The Unsolved Murder of Armani Dante Morgan

Hey, it's Jen. Before we get into today's episode, I want to share something close to my heart, something many of you have asked about you already know. My work goes far beyond investigating cases. I sit with families, I listen to their stories. I walk alongside them when they're exhausted, grieving, or still fighting for answers. And through that work I realize something powerful. People don't just need awareness, They need support, They need community, they need hope. That's why I founded the Rignited Project, an official nonprofit built to do exactly that, to take advocacy beyond storytelling, to turn compassion into action, to help ensure that families, survivors, and truth seekers don't walk this journey alone. Because advocacy isn't just posting a story, it's showing up. And that's why we didn't just build an organization. We built a movement. Because support doesn't always look like a headline. Sometimes it looks like packing toiletry kits by hand for a domestic violent shelter. Sometimes it looks like volunteers showing up for a missing person's awareness event, not because the cameras are there, but because compassion is there. Sometimes it looks like helping a mother craft the words to tell her son's story one more time, hoping this time someone will finally listen. That's what makes us different. We created four branches, each one meeting a different need, but all rooted in the belief that hope becomes real when people show up. We have the Hive, the heart of our community. This is where compassion becomes action. We show up in real, tangible ways through outreach events, awareness campaigns, donation drives, and supporting families and survivors in ways that can truly be felt. We have the Compass, which is our trauma informed educational branch, offering workshops, programs, tools and guidance for families, advocates, and professionals navigating grief, trauma, justice, or the systems that follow. The Ember Collective is our alliance network where we collaborate with media, ethical storytellers, advocates, and nonprofit organizations to responsibly amplify stories raising awareness without sensationalism or exploitation. And then we have Shores of Strength, which many of you are already familiar with. It's now an official branch of the Regnited Project, and we continue the mission of providing families of the missing and murdered with digital tools and resources to help spread awareness of their case, share their loved one story, and keep their search for answers alive. And here's what truly makes the Reignited Project different. We don't just focus on one piece of the puzzle. We bring them all together, advocacy, awareness, education, support, collaboration and community. We don't just tell stories. We stand with families, We equip survivors, We partner with organizations who are doing meaningful work, and together we create change that lasts. If you're a nonprofit or advocacy group looking to collaborate, join our aligance network or partner to expand the services we can offer, we want to hear from you. And if you're someone who believes in this mission and wants to help, whether through volunteering, donating, or simply showing up alongside us, you have a place here. Visit the Reignited Project dot com to partner, support, or get involved. Now let's get into today's episode. Hi everyone, and welcome back to Case Uncovered, where we uncover the most compelling and lesser known cases while lifting up the voices of the missing, the murdered, and the family still fighting for answers. I'm Johen Rivera, and today I'm bringing you a case from Oakliffe, an area right outside of Dallas, Texas. This is a case that began with fear, escalated through violence, and ended with silence. A case where a young man disappeared only days after multiple documented assaults, and yet no one was ever charged. His name is Armani Dante Morgan. I had the privilege of speaking in depth with Armani's aunt, Robin Johnson, who was devoted the last eight years to fighting for answers. Throughout this episode, I'll be sharing clips of our conversation. What happened to our Moani didn't start on the day he disappeared. It started long before, with a series of threats, assaults, and warnings that no one listened to. And by the time anyone looked deeper, he was gone. Eight years later, his case is still unsolved. This is the story of Ourmani Dante Morgan and the question that still haunts his family. How did so many cries for help lead to silence. Before we talk about the investigation, and before we examine what went wrong, we need to begin with our money, Because our money is more than a case file. He's loved, he's known, and he matters. When I sat down with his aunt, Miss Johnson, the person who's been fighting for him every single day since twenty seventeen, I asked her to tell me who our Money really was. I am Robin Johnson, our Money, Morgan's aunt, next up Keen and his advocate. Our Money was twenty seven years old at the time of his sudden disappearance, and Our Money was a loving person. I always wanted everybody around him to be happy. OURMANI was the first grandson born into a large, close knit family. He was tiny at birth, Robin said, everyone wanted to hold him, protect him, and take care of him. He grew up surrounded by women, his mother, grandmother, aunts, and cousins, but the one consistent male figure in his life was his grandfather, who helped to raise him. My father was the only father figure in our Money's life, and by our Money being the first grandchild, grandson, a male in the family, everybody gravitated to him because he was the first male. Cause it was a house full of women, you know, even though my mom had two boys and four girls, still the house was dominated by women. And when our Money was born, you know, everybody wanted to take care of Hi because he was such a tiny little. Thing, you know, when he was born, but you know, my. Dad helped to raise him, and everybody in the house wanted to protect him because. He was so tiny. His biological father had chosen not to be a part of his life, and when Our Money came out as gay, that separation became even more permanent. The fact that he was an only child. Our Money loved love, you know, and not only that, he also longed to have everybody around him love him because his biological father was not present in his life at all. You know, throughout his entire life. He was ashamed of Our Money once Our Money came out and identified as being gay. And you know, it didn't affect anybody in our immediate family, but you know that our Money really took that heart. When his biological father didn't have a personal relationship with. Our Money, that rejection hurt deeply. Robin told me, our Money loved love. He wanted to make people laugh, he wanted people to feel safe, he wanted to be accepted, and he wanted to belong to somebody. He had a big personality, charming, expressive, creative, but also a deep emotional awareness. He could read a room and if he suns sadness, even from a stranger, he'd make it his mission to make them smile. Never wanted to see anybody with a sad face, you know, anytime he entered the room or into this space, you know, and he detected someone wasn't happy. His main objective was to end up with a smile on everybody's face in the space you know, which he occupied. And our money inherited that from his grandmother. My mother. Our mother was a loving, understanding, caring person, and she taught us to have compassion for everybody you know around us, you know, and for our siblings and immediate family. So that's where our money adopted that from. But our money wasn't fragile. He was tall, quick witted, and strong minded. People assumed they could bully or intimidate him, but they quickly learned otherwise. Once he started to grow and get taller. He was so tall even in elementary school that growth spurt, you know, he just began to grow so fast. But one thing about our money, people couldn't take advantage of him. Even though he was a tall, thin in person, people underestimated him a lot, you know, and wanted to try to bully him, and he just wasn't having it. You know. They soon learned that they couldn't push him around. And that's one thing I loved about him is the fact that, like they say, you never judge a book by his cover. You know, when people saw that he was, you know, kind of withdrawn, you know, it was tiering. Then they thought that they could just run over him and bully him. But he soon let him know that that's not how it's gonna be. And that's what I loved about him. Armani was also a latchkey kid, gaining independence early. He let himself in and out of the house, cook his own meals, and manage his routines. He loved music, he loved fashion, and he loved being around people. Growing up with. Him being around a house full of women in him being a latchkey, you know, because when our Money and his mom moved away from our childhood at home and moved into their own place to live, she worked and still worked in the home health field, and our Money would have to leave home, lock the door, go to school, come back home, unlocked the door, and let himself back in the house, So he was a latch kin kid. And by him being around the house the little women, he learned how to cook, you know, from just watching us. He soon learned how to cook, and he was good at it, you know. And one thing he did love. He loved music, he loved fashion, and he just loved being around family and people that really cared about him. But as our Money got older, and as he explored relationships, friendships and identity, he started seeking love and loyalty and places that weren't always safe, and that made him vulnerable, not because he was weak, but because he believed in people. He trusted people, even when they had proven they weren't trustworthy. Robin shared that after har Money died, people who knew him, even those who had been with him shortly before he disappeared, when silent. Now it's said that he called some individuals his friend, but once his we realized that, you know, he was deceased, those people that he called his friends, we never heard from them. They never went to law enforcement to give any information. And I was like, okay, well these are the people that he considered his friends. Okay, so your friends show up for you, you know, and that's what that was. The disappointing part of it is because he considered. Them his friends. You know why he was still living. That silence, even years later, remains one of the biggest sources of pain for this family. And it was around this time, just weeks before Our Money disappeared, that things began to escalate. By the spring of twenty seventeen, Armiani had started to pull away from certain people in his life, people he cansidered friends, people he trusted, people he believed loved him, but he was beginning to realize not everyone in his circle mean him well, and some may have wanted to hurt him. The first known violent assault took place in the week of May twenty second, twenty seventeen, at a strip mall not far from Ourmani's home in Dallas. A woman, someone ourmany knew, someone he had once considered a friend, tracked him down in a parking area along with her two teenage sons. This female perpetrator, she and Our Money used drugs together and what she would do was she would solict at Our Money's help, and this went on for three years or more. She would a solicted Our Money's help because he knew a lot of people. You know, he was just a social butterfly. You know, he knew a lot of people. So she would sob list that our money's help with selling a portion of our monthly food stem Now she has three children, I know, well maybe four, and so she's taking food out of their mouths, selling a portion of her monthly food stamps in exchange for cash to buy drugs. So whatever went wrong with that regular deal. When the drug deal. Went bad is when she when she started tracking our money like an animal to violently assault him wherever she will find him, wherever she would locate him. In the first instance was the week of May the twenty second. I know a lot of people I always want to say, referred to it as May the twenty second. It wasn't actually on May twenty second. It was of May twenty second that her and her two teenage sons tracked their money not far from his home. It was at a strip model and I'm assuming they were all going to this tobacco shop, because that's it was the tobacco shop, a place where this man sold food, food and cold drinks, you know, out of this place in the strip mall, and she and her two teenage sons cornered our money at that strip mall and they all three violently assaulted it. That was the first instance. This wasn't a random attack. It was personal, and it wouldn't be the last. Just over a week later, May thirtieth and thirty first, the harassment escalated. She began calling our Money's home repeatedly. Robin said, it was all day, from sun up to sundown, trying to lure him outside. The second instance was May thirty, May the thirtieth, she started making harassing phone calls to our Money's home. And this was all day that day, when I say twenty to four or seven. She called that home from sun up to sundown on May the thirtieth. She couldn't lure him outside with those harassing phone calls, so the next day she proceeded with the harassing phone calls, which was made of thirty first. So since she saw that that wasn't working for her to lure him outside with these harassment phone calls, all of a sudden, a bullet Piers threw Our Money in his mom's living room window. And so at that point our Money and his mom ventured outside to ask the bystanders, you know, did they see who it was that actually fired the shot into the to the apartment window. A gun shot through the window of his mother's apartment where a money had been sitting. This was no longer harassment. This was attempted murder. Our Moni and his mother ran outside trying to see who fired the shot, but the shooter was already gone. Security cameras captured the suv fleeing the scene, but the license plate was fake. So once the gun bullet piers threw the living room window, Our Money's mom went to the to the lease in office to ask the leasing manager to review the surveillance cameras to see if they could actually see who the shooter was. Unfortunately, the camera that. Was mounted outside the unit where Our Money and his mom lived was inoperable. It wasn't working. But the camera at the front interest were cars come in and come coming in and go out, you know, entering the complex, that camera actually captured the losing plate on the vehicle. Once she violent the assaulted our money because the gun bullet pierced into the living room window, Our money his mom go outside. His mom travels to the lease in office on foot to speak with the leasing manager, our money was violently assaulted right outside to our front door by the non female perpetrator and her young young daughter. And this is by evidence of a brief cell phone video. So once one of the residents went to the lease in office to notify our money's mom, our money is being violent the assault. He's attacked, you know, right outside your front door. So as she and the leasing manager are Money's mom and the Lisa manager go back to where he was being assaulted, the non female perpetrator in her young daughter jumped into the suv and sped away, leaving the complex. Once the leasing manager did go back to view the cameras of the vehicle speed in a way, the license plate number that was a fix to the SUV did not belong to the ISSUV. It was an inval A license plate number. So that day was her second violent assault against our money, made it thirty first. Dallas police took the projectile from inside the apartment wall, but from that day until twenty nineteen, almost two years, they did nothing with it. When Dallas Police collected the I want to refer to it correctly the fire projectile. Now it's a bullet when it comes out of the chamber of a gun. But once it leaves the chamber of that gun, it's considered a fire projectile at that point because until unless that bullet is whole, a whole bullet, then it's a bullet. But then once it leaves the chamber and it's no longer a whole bullet, it's a fire projectile. So that was police collected the fire projectile from our mom and him and his mom's home made the thirty first. I continue to ask about that bullet gin for two years. For two years, from twenty seventeen to twenty nineteen, I continue to ask this lead detective. Okay, well, what is the status of the gun bullet? At first he. Told me when I asked him, which was three months two and a half, almost three months into him being the lead detective in charge of our money's case, I said it, but text message, I started documenting things to where I could leave me a trail because me calling and topping him over the telephone just wasn't cutting. So I had previously asked him about the status of the bullet, and he told me that there was no gun bully recovered. And I knew better because by this time I had already obtained copies of the crime scene photos inside our money in his mom's residence. So when he told me out. Of his own, out of his mouth that day, that there was no bully recovered, no gun bully recovered, well, if you want to get technical about it, it was the there was no bully recovery, but the projectile was recovered. That just put it that way. That's why I said, I want to I want to say it correctly. When when you when we talked about the projectile and as opposed to the bullet, and he said there was no there was. No bully recover. I already knew at that point that he wasn't telling me true because I already had crime scene photos in my position that I had obtained through Dallas Police's open records. So I continue to ask him, and as I continued to ask him, I would always text him or send him an email. I stopped asking him over the telephone anything. It was all everything from that point going forward. It was either vial email or text message. And that was on purpose. Despite repeated requests from Robin, the family, and even members of the community, the bullet was never sent to a crime lab for testing. In fact, it wasn't even acknowledged in the case records for a long time. Why well, we'll come back to that. After the shooting, Armani stayed inside for several days. He was terrified, he was bruised, he was not safe. But by June third, twenty seventeen, Armani finally stepped outside again, that same female offender found him again. There were now three known perpetrators, two males, one female, All of them knew our money, all of them had personal ties to him. Our money was violently assaulted by three non perpetrators. His same sex partner was one of the three, the non female perpetrator who violently assaulted our money on three separate occasions, even on June third, the day he suddenly disappeared, and three days prior to the day he suddenly disappeared, and then several weeks prior to the shooting at our Money's home, this known female perpetrator was involved in violently assaulting our money. There were three different perpetrators, two males and this one female, but they all knew each other very well, and they all lived in the same community at one point, in the exact same community. The female perpetrator that violently assaulted our money and it was a personal vendetta. They all had personal vendettas. I have had several people to ask me, well, what was the reason why they were violently assaulting him. They all had their own personal reasons and vendettas as to the reason why they were violently assaulting him. Leading up to his disappearance. The same sex partner violently assault at our money when our money informed him that he no longer wanted to be in the intimate, same sex relationship with him anymore. And so he started to get violent with our money. And because our money was detaching himself from and he's a he's a non violent repeat offender, you know who has been in and out, you. Know of the the jail system. And so he and our money had been in a relationship almost three years at that point, and her money just didn't. Want to be no longer wanted to be involved with him. For one thing, he had a live in girlfriend, and the living girlfriend was unaware that her living bar friend and the father of her unborn child liked men. She had no idea, so when she. Discovered the same sex relationship between her living boyfriend and my nephew or money. She started harassing money, our money bell telephone, you know, and I might tell her to say, well, you need to talk to your boyfriend, you know. And the sad part about that, jin is that although we provided the detective with this information, they have yet to interview that girlfriend. And you know, besides the same sex partner being violent with our money and assaulting him in the days and the weeks in the month, you know, leading to him suddenly disappearing. And so three days later she tracked him now because our money. Whenever he would get into these altercations with these with these non perpetrators, he would always stay indoors for days before he would even get back out to go anywhere. And so when he did venture back. Out on June the thirties, when she tracked them down again and violently assaulted him. And everybody wants to say he went missing from his home. No, he did not go missing from his home. He went missing from the area where he was violently assaulted, which was not where he lived. It was it was less than a minute from where he lived. So he didn't go missing from his home, which is what a lot of people like to say you know, and that's just their go to statement he went missing from his home. No, he did not go missing from his home. He had been rendered aid and had left the area where he lived and went back toward the area where he was violently assaulted, and he was never seen alive again. Wow mm hm. And so the second male perpetrator, non male perpetrator, aided the non female perpetrator and violently assaulted our money on June third, So that's where he came he became involved. But again, you. Know, all three of these perpetrators knew our money and knew him very well in our money knew them. He was not violently assaulted and attacked by people that did not know him. This is where Armani was attacked for the last time. He did not go missing from his home like so many articles and reports have incorrectly stated. He was last seen alive in the area where he was violently assaulted less than a minute from his apartment, and after that he was never seen again. These were not isolated incidents. They were not misunderstandings. They were a pattern, a pattern that should have been recognized, investigated, and stopped. A stranger didn't take our money. These were people he knew, people he trusted, people he had led into his life, and in the days after he vanished, those same people stayed silent. For most families, when a loved one goes missing, there's that moment, that instant when they just know something isn't right. For Ourmani, that moment happened on June third, twenty seventeen, the very same day he was last seen alive. Robin told me, it wasn't the police, it wasn't the news, It wasn't even social media. It was something much more personal. It was silence. My youngest daughter and our money are year apart. She's a year older than our money, and they had more of a brother's sister bond as opposed to first cousin Bond, and she knew everything that went on with him. And the fact that she did not hear from him June third, you know, is would set off a red flag for her because if no one else in the family would hear from our Money, she would hear from him every day. If she didn't hear from him, she knew something was wrong. Armani spoke to his cousin every single day, not most days, not when he had time every day, and on June third, twenty seventeen, she didn't hear from him. She sent messages, no reply, She called, no answer, she waited, still nothing. She told Robin, something's wrong. This isn't normal. At first, the family hoped maybe his phone died, maybe he stayed with a friend, maybe he just needed some space. But by the morning of June fourth, twenty seventeen, there was still nothing. No messages, no calls, no activity on social media, and that silence was their first red flag. One of the most common misconceptions about Armani's case is that he went missing from his home. Well, we know he didn't. After being assaulted on June third, Armani was seen walking back toward the area of the assault, near the Strip Mall, which is less than a minute from his apartment complex. It was broad daylight, he had visible injuries, and after that he was never seen alive again. Seventeen days went by. The family filed reports, made calls, looked themselves, but the first real clue about Urmiani's fate didn't come from police. It came from a young woman whose number was found inside Armani's purse, which had been recovered at the scene where his remains were found. When Dallas Police or Dallas homicide detective when they were at the scene, they collected our moni's purse which had a phone number in it, and that phone number, uh, that was homicide contacted that phone number. So the young lady's phone number that was inside our money's purse, she was the one who notified us it wasn't It wasn't Dallas Police. She notified us that a homicide detective had just left her door asking her questions about our money, and he was he was in the accusatory mind frame, accusing her because her phone number was was found in our money's purse. But her and her sister actually rendered aid to our money the day that he was missing. So she. Once she finished that abusive conversation with that homicide detective, she immediately contacted her sister and her sister went to our money's mom's door, and my daughter was there, my daughter that reported our money missing, she was there. Uh, when this young lady knocked on the door to inform. Her, she called her outside and she said, well, the detective just finished talking to my sister and they were asking her questions, and the questions they were asking her, let us know that they found our money, but she said that they wouldn't give them any detailed information, but the questions they were asking, you know, let them know, you know, because he had been missing for seven weeks. So the fact that that, you know, detectives went knocking on her door seven weeks later, you know that that was a. Truth sign or key signed. You know that they had found and so you know, that's how we learned about our money. You know, discovery of his reminders was through this person. Think about that. Not a detective, not a victim specialist, not Dallas Police, a stranger. She told Armani's family that detectives had been questioning her sister, asking what she knew. That's how they learned our money was found, and still it would take seven weeks to confirm it. On July twenty fourth, twenty seventeen, skeletal remains were discovered in a vacant residential lot just a short distance from Harmoney's home. It would take until October sixteenth, twenty seventeen, for those remains to be legally identified through Armani's mother's DNA. When Our Money's skeletal remains were legally and positively identified through his mother's DNA. Dallas Police still did not do the respectful thing and do a death notification. They still didn't go to our money's mom to say, well, we're sorry for your loss. We will be investigating you. That's not how it happened. I had to contact Dallas Police because I continued to reach out to the Medical Examiner's office, call him constantly, Okay, well you still don't have the results back yet. You still don't have the results back yet. So this one day when I called, which was October to sixteenth, two six seventeen, I'll never forget it, and asked the death investigator, have you guys received our money's mother's DNA buckle swab information back test results back? And she said yes, Miss Johnson. She said, we can legally and positivitatively confirm that the remains that were recovered July the twenty fourth, twenty seventeen, indeed do belong to our money. And I just fell apart. I dropped the phone. That was information that we had been anticipated, but to actually hear it, you know, so I had to actually, you know, gather myself and compose myself because I didn't want to call his mom, you know, in that emotional state, to so tell her, yes, you. Know, it's been confirmed. But once you know, I got off the phone with the medical Examiner's office. That day, I called Dallas ProPolice headquarters to find out who the homicide detective was or was going to be that was going to be assigned to our Moni's case. And the detective that I. Did speak with, he said, well, the medical examiners hadn't reached out to us to confirm, you know, that the remains did actually belong. To your nephew. And I said, well, I just got off the phone with a mean said, well, she has to confirm it with me first, so but he still never called me back. I still ended up calling him back. Even after Ourmiani's remains had been confirmed, even after his mother's DNA had been matched, even after the family had already learned the truth, Dallas police still never made an official death notification. No knock on the door, no call, no visit, no acknowledgment. And that would be one of the first, but not the last, signs of just how differently this case was handled. When Ourmiani's remains were confirmed in October twenty seventeen. His family expected answers. They expected to meet a detective. They expected to hear about leads, suspects, or at the very least, autopsy finding. Instead, Robin sat across the conference room table just seventeen days into the investigation and heard something that made no sense. Seventeen days of him being assigned as the lead homicide detective in our Money's case, he sat across the confert room table with our Money's mom and I at Dallas Police Headquarters and said to us, looked us in the face and said to us that our money od in the vacant residential lot. Where his remains were found. And his mother came unglued, And we had just left our money's graveside ceremony that day in the pouring rain. I mean it rained like it had never rained before. And our money was cremated. So the grave side ceremony was where his at his ashes cremated. Ashes were placed into a niche. It's a wall at the cemetery where families that have cremated their loved ones. It's a brick wall. At each section has a glass door, has a small glass door just tall enough for the urn with the ashes in it to fit in, you turn it with the key and. They can never open it again. So we had just left his graveside ceremony, which was November the eighth, twenty seventeen. And. Just so happened we had arranged I had arranged for. That was the first meeting with this initial lead homicide detective. And I'm like I said, he was in charge of the case seventeen days. How do you look at skeleton remains which were very few, only six, and his score was one of the six skeleton remains that will recover. And how do you look at skeleton remains and say to his grieving mother and me that he odeed? Now, what person, regardless as to their state of mind, were crawling to some bushes in a vacant residential lot, up against a tree to die? If our money wanted to od or kill himself, or however they want to refer to it, he could have done it at home because he was always home by himself, because his mother works so much. If he wanted to kill himself, he would have done it at home. If what person, not gonna say again, in their right mind, would would crawl into some bushes shot at three days before he went missing. But you say he odeed in a in a residential in a vacant residential. Lot, no toxicology, no medical confirmation, no autopsy ruling, just an assumption. And it didn't come from a medical examiner. It came from the lead detective. Robin later confirmed that no overdose was ever documented in the official records. It wasn't in police files, investigative notes, or the autopsy report. It wasn't written anywhere, but it was said directly to Armani's mother. That moment set the tone for how Armani's case would continue to be handled. A theory based not on evidence, but on assumptions, would overshadow the facts completely. Now Here's what's surprising is when the autopsy was actually completed, the cause and manner of death was undetermined. Undetermined doesn't mean accidental, it doesn't mean overdose, it doesn't mean suicide. It means suspicious, unexplained, and unresolved. But despite this, the investigation never treated Armani's death as suspicious. No homicide ruling, no forensic testing of key evidence, no search warrants, no interviews with the last people seen with him. Alive. Not one of the three known perpetrators has ever been formally interviewed about his death. And remember the bullet, the one that was fired into Armani's mother's living room window on May thirty first. Now, as I mentioned earlier, Dallas Police collected it, multiple officers handled it, It was bagged, tagged, and placed in evidence, but according to Robin, for two years it was never submitted to the lab for testing. When Robin pressed harder, she was eventually told the projectile would be tested, but by the time that happened, the statute of limitations on the shooting had expired. The evidence was submitted two years too late. Within this two years, the statue of limitation on the daily conduct where the perpetrator, female perpetrator, uh what we call her the suspected shooter because until we can actually prove that she did it put the gun in her hand, we have to keep saying suspected shooter to actually hold her accountable. I want that statue of limitation on that daily shooting shouldn't have never expired. DPD personally, that was police purposely allowed that two year statue of limitation to expire on that criminal offense. Then to conduct with a firearm shooting into an occupied residence, knowingly shooting into an occupied residence, so that two year statue of limitation passed. While I continue to ask this lead detective about the status of the fire projectile. Now two years later June twenty nineteen, the assistant police chief at that time was the so that I obtained that meeting with. During that meeting, although it had been two years and the statue statue of limitation had expired on that then to conduct shooting in our money in his mom home, this assistant police chief still authorized and approved for that fire projectile to be sent to the Forensic Glad for testing. And my question kept being, well, why would a person the system police chief authorise and approved for the fire projectile to be sent to Forensic Glad for testing after the statue of limitation had expired on the criminal offense involving this bullet. Now think about that they collected a fired projectile from his home just days before he disappeared, but didn't test it until after it was too late to charge anyone with the shooting. This wasn't just a missed opportunity, it was evidence mishandled Robin tried to get answers. She called, she emailed, she documented everything. When the lead detective stopped answering, she reached out to Dallas Police Headquarters asking to meet with the chief. They told her she needed to follow the chain of command. That meant meeting one by one with twenty six different police officials before she was allowed in that room. When I reached out to the police chief's executive assistant, requesting an in person meeting with the police chief so let her know my immediate concerns about how our money's case wasn't going, the executive assistant told me that I needed to follow the chain of command before I could actually have an in person meeting with the police chief. So that meant that I was being passed around from high ranking police officer to high rank, and police officer to high rank. I met with twenty six different police officers within the time frame before I was actually granted an in person meeting with the police chief, and that in person meeting with her lasted all of two minutes. Two years later, that meeting, when it finally happened, lasted two minutes, not two hours, not even twenty minutes. Two minutes in attempts to group Armani's death with other tragedies. Dallas Police publicly referred to him as transgender, placing his case alongside a series of unsolved transgender murders in Dallas from twenty nineteen. But Armani was killed in twenty seventeen, and Armani never identified as transgender. At one point, it was a several transgender females that were violently assaulted in Dallas and one was killed, and it made national news. Malaysia Booker. Malaysia books he was violently assaulted in the complex where our Money lived with his mom, but that was in twenty and nineteen. Our Money was murdered in twenty seventeen, So DPD Dallas Police always tried to lump our Money's murder in with the transgender murders that happened two years after the fact, and Dallas Police was the one who referring to our Money as transgender. Our money never identified as transgender. Our money identified as a gay male who sometimes would dress in female clothing. And you know, like I tell everybody, our Money wasn't shamed of who he was. He wasn't ashamed of dress in female clothing. We were not ashamed of who he was. We were not ashamed because he dressed in female clothing because our money would still dress in mail clothing. So he was dressed the way he wanted to dress. You know, he was dressed as a male sometimes and he would dress as a female sometimes, but closer to his disappearance, you know, he was he was dressing more often as a female. But it wasn't just him constantly dressing as a female twenty four seven, three sixty five. You know, he hadn't gotten to that point. And if he did, then we still accept him for who he was. But Dalla was police was the one that started referring to money as transgender. So that's where that misclassification, you know started, And DPD wanted to Dallas Police wanted to laump our money's h depp in with those transgender death so they wouldn't have to investigate. They tried to lump it in so they could say, oh, well, we solved another wee, No, you didn't solve anything, because I'm still fighting for them to do a proper investigation into his into his murder. I'm still fighting with them constantly about. It because he was misclassified because his case was grouped into a larger narrative, and because those cases were already politically and socially charged, Armani's case got even less attention, fewer resources, less urgency, and more assumptions. So here's what we know. A young man was violently attacked multiple times. Days before he disappeared, a bullet was fired into his home. He vanished less than sixty seconds from where he'd been assaulted. His remains were found in a vacant residential lot just blocks from home. His death was never ruled an accident. Police never formally notified the family. Key evidence sat untouched until it was too late to act on it, and eight years later, no suspects have ever been interviewed. This was not lack of evidence. This was lack of investigation. Robin began to realize that she wasn't just grieving a family member. She was investigating his murder, not because she wanted to, but because no one else was. She kept meticulous notes. She saved every message, every case file, every name, she logged, every call, every date. She collected her own evidence. She even obtained the crime scene photos through Dallas Police open records. Robin isn't a detective. But she did what the detectives weren't doing. She tracked timelines, mapped locations, followed up with officers, demanded reports, documented inconsistencies, and still she never stopped. When I asked Robin why she believes the case wasn't investigated properly, she didn't hesitate to respond. It was due to lack of investigation. Bottom line, did not care. Did not care because our money was black Gay, built any impoverished neighborhood and had a prior risk history. She paused and then said something that I think explains more about this case than any police report ever has. It was biased in pre It was biased and personal predetermined theory about our money, which negatively impacted his On sophomore. In twenty twenty one, a new law took effect, the Victim's Family Rights Act, which gave families of unsolved homicide victims the ability to request that police revisit neglected cases. Robin used it immediately. They do very little. They do the bare minimum. Because once the Victim's Family Rights Act was signed into law, I want to say was two thousand and twenty one. Any cold case that has been cold for a specific amount of time when the family requests that the that the law enforcement that has jurisdiction over their loved one case they have to go back in to do something to say, okay, well we've we've gone back in to to perform or pursue investigation because the family asked us, because that's part of the Victim Rights Family Act law that that they have to do it. Like I said, he did very little. Uh. I told him about different people he needed to investigate. He would investigate one or two if if that And and I wish you could see his investigative notes, Jen, have you ever seen a doctor's handwriting. A lot of people always talk about how bad a doctor's handwriting is. His investigative notes were handwritten, and it looked like chicken scratch. Dallas police reopened Armani's case, but instead of reinvestigating, they just reviewed the old notes and most of those notes were handwritten incomplete, and, as Robin said, looked like chicken scratch. When I asked Robin what she believes was really standing in the way of progress evidence resources time, she said no, it was something more troubling. He was always looking for love in all the wrong places. And like I said, these people, they never met him any good. And it's sad that the people that he knew, and he knew them very well, were the very ones that took his life. People who claimed they loved him post a tributes online rest in peace, we miss you, we love you, but none of them walked into a police station to give a statement. They would all post on social media, rest in peace or money. And I was like, okay, well, if you really want to help, go to law enforcement. What you think may not be of the inputs may be something that's the key that will help move his case forward. And you know that that was so disappointing to me, and it still is because I don't have access to social media at all. I'm not on any of the social media platforms, but family members around me will tell me that they see various postings still, you know, about people saying that they miss him and love it. Okay, well, if you miss him and you love him, go to law enforcement and tell what you know. And that silence still today is the single biggest obstacle to solving our Money's case. Now, I've heard this said before that cases go colds when people stop caring. Although we know that's not true. These families don't stop caring about their loved ones. Nobody has ever stopped caring about our Money. Not his family, not his community, not the people who remember him laughing in the kitchen while cooking, adjusting his outfit one last time before heading out the door, Not the people who still feel his absence, Not the aunt who has carried his story farther than the investigation ever did. After Our Moani's remains were confirmed in October of twenty seventeen, there were no arrests, no persons of interest identified publicly, no statements taken from the last known people who were with him, not a single subpoena, not a single search warrant. Years passed, but silence doesn't mean people don't know. Someone knows something, and Robin she knows this case can still be solved. There were several things that the initial homicide detective assured me he was gonna do involving Our Money's investigation. He never did. Then, when they will get frustrated with me because of the amount of pressure that I put on him and constantly coming back to him about Our Money's case is when they get frustrated with me and say no further leans, so then that puts a delay, a pause, and then them thinking that okay, well, they think I'm gonna go away and never come back. It is where they're saying and mistaken because I tell them each time, oh, this is not the last you're gonna say of me. And I remind them that of that, every time you look to see me Indian, because I'm not going away. Doo'll be my exact words to them every time. Despite his struggles in life, that still didn't give anybody the right to take his life. Robin isn't just looking for closure, She's looking for truth. She's looking for accountability. She's looking for someone, anyone who will say I was there, I know something, I'm ready to talk. Armani didn't just disappear, He didn't just walk away, and he didn't take his own life. He was erased by violence done by silence. But that silence is not permanent because cases do not expire, and justice, especially in cases like Ourmani's, is always possible. If you have any information about the death of Armani Dante Morgan, no matter how small it may seem, please contact Dallas Crime Stoppers at two one, four three seven three, eight, four, seven seven. You can remain anonymous. Your tip could be the one that finally brings justice to Ourmani and brings answers to his family. I'll also leave all of the information in the show notes below. I want to personally thank Ourmani's aunt, Robin Johnson for partnering with me to bring you this episode. Thank you so much for joining me today for this episode of Case Uncovered, and for listening to Ourmani's story. Make sure to connect with me on Instagram and Facebook at Gen Rivera Investigates. Until next time, stay curious, stay vigilant, and stay safe out there. Fire Eyes Media