Free A Warrant to Kill: A True Story of Obsession, Lies and a Killer Cop by Kathryn Casey

justified.”
    When Bill McGowen talks of a young, school-age Kent, that admiration is palpable: “If you could say perfect, I guess Kent was. He never gave us any trouble. He was studious, interested in hunting and fishing, average, no—above-average intelligence, very very intelligent. Kent was born an anointed baby.”
    Anointed as in chosen by God. The McGowens were born-again Christians, believing in the laying on of hands and speaking in tongues, in a literal interpretation of the Bible. “When Kent was a police officer, people would stop him in the street,” Bill McGowen contends. “They’d say, ‘I can see Jesus in you.’ Kent was an exceptional police officer, an exceptional young man.”
    Yet others describe a very different Kent McGowen: a troubled teenager with a fascination for guns; a controlling and manipulative young man who displayed nocompunction about twisting the truth to fit his own purposes; a man drawn to violence, especially toward women.
    “I met Kent while he was in high school, when he and Michelle began dating,” recalls Pam Jones, Michelle’s sister. “He seemed really nice at first; then everything went wild.”
    Kent met Michelle Morgan when she was sixteen years old, in drivers’ education classes at Robert E. Lee High School in Houston. At the time, the McGowens owned a fashionable town house in the Galleria area, a decidedly urban neighborhood of glittery stores and restaurants and expensive condos and homes.
    Michelle was a year ahead of Kent in school and six months older. The youngest of three sisters, she’s described by friends as a quiet, shy girl with long dark hair and a ready smile.
    Classmates describe Kent as a loner of sorts. He was small for his age, his dark hair often falling over his eyes. What his classmates recalled most was the way he flaunted his family’s wealth, like the day he drove his birthday present—a shiny, new, black Jeep—into the school parking lot after Easter break. Whenever the opportunity arose, Kent bragged of a trust fund he claimed his parents had set aside for him, boasting one day he’d be rich, never having to work. Over the years, his estimate of its value mushroomed from hundreds of thousands to millions of dollars. As time passed and the money didn’t come his way, the age at which he claimed he would gain control of that vast sum also increased, from twenty-one to twenty-five to thirty and beyond.
    “He was a big talker … he made it sound like he was living the glamorous life,” says Pam. “Michelle liked that, but at the same time, she would have been satisfiedwith the vine-covered cottage, kids, and a yard. The original Mommy-Daddy set.”
    Later, Bill McGowen would shake his head in denial that Kent could ever be a problem, blaming any teenage changes in his son on his relationship with Michelle. “We never had any trouble until they started dating,” he maintains.
    Perhaps the most telling explanation of Kent’s future relationships with women came from someone who grew to know him well over the years. “Kent idolized his father; he wanted to be like him, to make a lot of money,” she says. “I’ve always felt it had something to do with his parents’ divorce, but ever since I’ve known him, Kent has acted like he hated women.”
    Throughout high school, Kent’s relationship with Michelle took on a pattern of love and disdain. At times he was affectionate and thoughtful, leaving small notes professing his devotion to her. At other times he became violently angry.
    “I guess the first time Kent threatened suicide that I know of was at sixteen,” says Pam. “Michelle was going out with girlfriends and Kent showed up at our house. He had a knife in his hand and he threatened to use it on himself. My ex-husband took the knife away. It was so odd. He didn’t want Michelle, but he didn’t want anyone else to have her. Even going out with girlfriends made him jealous.”
    Kent blamed the Morgan family, especially