Murder in the Heartland on ID: Where is Johnus Luke Orr now?

The Murder In The Heartland episode titled A Killer Step looks into the conviction of Johnus Luke Orr. The 2014 murder of the eight-month-pregnant Sullivan resident, Tiffanie Adams, led to the conviction of her step-brother, Johnus Luke Orr. According to Terre Haute Tribune-Star, Tiffanie was last seen on November 5, 2014, following which she was reported as a missing person two days later.

However, the Indiana State Police found her decomposed remains in a cornfield on December 30, 2014. With circumstantial evidence including Tiffanie's cellphone records, and testimonies from close ones, Johnus Luke Orr was sentenced to 120 years in prison. He is presently incarcerated at the Miami Correctional Level 3 Facility.

The official synopsis of the documentary episode reads:

"Tiffanie Adams is expecting her first child but disappears from her home in Sullivan, Indiana. As police desperately search for answers, they stumble upon dark secrets surrounding the men in her life."

Episode 16 of season 6 airs on May 15, 2024, at 9 pm EST on Investigation Discovery.

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Why was Johnus Luke Orr arrested?

According to FindLaw, Tiffanie Adams was last seen in the morning of November 5, 2014, when she had stepped out of her father, Bruce Adams' home. She had reportedly walked over to her mother, Christina Orr's home a block away for some prescription pain pills. However, she was reported missing on November 7, 2014, by her close ones.

A turn of events led to Sean Drake, a farmer, discovering Tiffanie Adams' decomposed remains in a cornfield 55 days later. While the body was positively identified to belong to Adams through her dental records, the Indiana State Police found no DNA evidence from the crime scene.

However, the investigating officers had their doubts about the 32-year-old Johnus Luke Orr as he gave the officers an inconsistent account of the day Tiffanie went missing. According to court documents, Johnus had allegedly used James “Jim” Fish's Chevrolet Blazer to drop his wife, Katrina Fish, at her job in Linton.

Johnus returned the Blazer at a later time mentioning that the car had broken down on the way back from Linton. Around the same time, Johnus's then-wife, Amber Rogers, received text messages from an unknown number. The couple shared a cell phone.

According to Indianapolis media outlet Wish TV, Tiffanie Adams' cell phone was fished out of Lake Sullivan nine months later by the Indiana State Police divers. The phone records reportedly proved correspondence between Tiffanie and Johnus, as Amber later testified as well. The texts that were sent to Amber on Tiffanie's day of disappearance were from the same cellphone.

While the texts were found to be deleted, the Indiana State Police Cyber Crimes Unit recovered all of them as evidence. In his first interview, Johnus Luke Orr mentioned seeing Tiffanie Adams at the Dollar General store in September 2014 for the last time.

Furthermore, the detectives found that Tiffanie had reported Johnus for s*xual assault in 2013. Additionally, Brian Orr informed Johnus about the missing memory card on their deer hunting camera on November 6, 2014, which he then replaced. The autopsy reports stated that Tiffanie Adams had been strangulated to death.

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Where is Johnus Luke Orr now?

Johnus Orr was found guilty of two counts of the first-degree murder of Tiffanie Adams and her unborn child on July 1, 2016, per Terre Haute Tribune-Star. Orr was sentenced to an aggregate term of 120 years imprisonment 28 days later. While Johnus filed an appeal based on erroneous and insufficient evidence and jury instructions, his appeal was rejected in a 2018 hearing.

Johnus Orr is presently incarcerated at the Miami Correctional Level 3 Facility in Bunker Hill, Indiana, according to the Indiana Department of Corrections. Johnus's earliest possible release date is January 2104.

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Watch all the details of Tiffanie Adams' murder on Murder In The Heartland on Investigation Discovery on May 15, 2024.