Rural Pleasanton man receives four years for moving body

A rural Pleasanton man was sentenced to four years in prison, less time served, after pleading guilty in Bates County, Mo., circuit court for moving the body of a 13-year-old boy that his dogs killed last December. (Photo by Jason Wix / Bates County website)

Journal staff report

BUTLER, Mo. – Rural Pleasanton resident Damon Leonard, 47, has been sentenced to four years in prison after pleading guilty to abandonment of a corpse, a felony.

Leonard pleaded guilty to the charge on May 22. A Bates County circuit court judge handed down the sentence on Friday, May 29.

Leonard was taken into custody on Dec. 22, 2025, after a 13-year-old neighbor, Airen Andula, went missing from the Holiday Lakes area after going to a neighbor’s home to feed a dog while she was on vacation.

While traveling to that home, the boy was attacked by one or more dogs owned by Leonard and died as a result of his wounds. The man attempted to conceal the death by taking the boy’s body across the Missouri state line and placing it in a ravine.

He later contacted the Bates County Sheriff’s Office and took law enforcement officers to where he had abandoned the body.

At the sentencing, Leonard was given credit against his sentence for the more than five months he has served in the county jail.

Leonard has also been charged with interference with law enforcement, criminal desecration, and having a vicious dog at large by the Linn County Attorney’s office. Several dogs were removed from his property at Holiday Lakes.