There’s breaking news out of Columbus, Ohio. Charges have been filed in the murders of Spencer and Monnique Tep, on the eve of their funerals.
Monnique Tep’s ex‑husband is now in custody for the killings.
The murders of Spencer and Monnique Tep shattered their families and community.
The couple, parents of two young children ages one and four, were shot to death in their home in a downtown Columbus neighborhood in the middle of the night as their children slept.
Police say it happened in the early morning hours of December 30th, sometime between 2:00 a.m. and 5:00 a.m.
The story sent shockwaves across Ohio and the country: a dentist and his stay‑at‑home wife, likely murdered in their sleep and found shot to death in their bedroom.
Now, more than a week after the murders, Monnique’s ex‑husband is in custody.
Dr. Michael McKee is a vascular surgeon.
He was married to Monnique for a short time in 2015, and they divorced using a private judge.
It’s my understanding that even though the marriage was brief, McKee didn’t want to let go.
The affidavit in support of the murder charges states:
> “On December 30th, 2023, at 9:57 a.m., Columbus patrol officers were dispatched on a check on the well‑being of Dr. Spencer Tep, who had not shown up to work. Officers arrived and found Dr. Tep and his wife, Monnique Tep, deceased inside, suffering from gunshot wounds. Two minor children were found inside the home unharmed. Columbus Fire Medic 7 responded and pronounced both victims deceased at 10:11 a.m. Columbus Police Homicide Unit Team 2 was advised, responded, and initiated an investigation.”
The affidavit continues:
> “During the subsequent investigation, detectives were able to identify a suspect through neighborhood video surveillance. The suspect was tracked to a vehicle which arrived just prior to the homicides and left shortly after the homicides. Detectives were able to identify this vehicle further and link it to Michael McKee. Detectives located the vehicle in Rockford, Illinois, and found evidence of McKee in possession of the vehicle prior to and after the homicides.”
Take a look at this surveillance video.
Columbus Police released it earlier this week, asking anyone who recognized the person in the footage to contact them.
It appears that investigators believe the man walking down the alleyway near the Tep home in the early hours of December 30th is Michael McKee.
Right now, McKee is in custody at the Winnebago County Jail in Rockford, Illinois.
He’ll have to be extradited to Ohio to face the murder charges.
This is an absolutely heartbreaking case.
Friends of the couple went to the house that morning to check on Spencer and Monnique after Spencer failed to show up for work.
They arrived at the home, concerned about this young, vibrant couple, and made the gruesome discovery that they had been murdered.
The Teps’ two small children were inside, unharmed but crying, when their parents’ bodies were found.
Spencer and Monnique will be laid to rest on Sunday.
Law&Crime will continue to follow this case and bring you new developments as they emerge.
Now let’s get to the latest on this case we’ve been following closely.
When it comes to how much information police release during an investigation—especially one as public and widely covered as this—you can only speculate about their communications strategy.
Why are they sharing certain details while refusing to answer other questions from journalists?
The biggest question, of course, is: how close are they to catching the killer—or in this case, building their case against the accused?
At this point, only those on the inside truly know the answer.
This is newly released body‑cam video from the City of Columbus, sent to us here at Law&Crime.
It shows the officer dispatched to perform a welfare check at Spencer Tep’s home after he didn’t show up at his dental office.
The officer walks the property, knocks on the door, sees nothing obviously wrong, and leaves.
The problem, according to the chief of police, is that he went to the wrong address.
This was around 9:30 a.m., roughly 20–30 minutes after Spencer’s boss first called for a welfare check.
It would be another half hour before a 911 caller discovered what appeared to be Spencer’s body inside the couple’s home.
More than a week into the investigation, much of what happened that night remains a mystery.
The Columbus police chief has made limited public comments.
From what we heard, she did not directly say whether the public is still at risk.
That raises questions about where police are in their investigation and whether they believe the crime was targeted.
We’re going to talk about that and about what the chief reportedly said regarding this earlier 911 call:
> “Hello.”
> “Hi, this is 911. We just got a hang‑up call. Is everything okay?”
> “Yeah, I’m sorry. I’m okay.”
> “Are you sure?”
> “Yeah. Yeah, I’m okay. Sorry.”
> “Okay. Well, it sounds like you’re crying. Do you need police, paramedics, or anything?”
> “No, no, no. I’m okay. I promise. I’m just… I’m just emotional.”
That 911 call was first obtained by Fox News Digital.
They reported that the call was made in April, at 2:45 a.m. on a Tuesday, from the general area of the Tep home.
The woman on the line said she had a disagreement with “her man.”
> “Okay, I didn’t mean nothing.”
> “Can I ask, what made you call 911 in the first place? Were you having an argument with somebody?”
> “Me and my man got into it, but I’m okay. I promise.”
> “Did anything ever get physical?”
> “No.”
> “You guys were just arguing? Nobody hit each other?”
> “Yeah.”
> “Okay. All right, ma’am. I have the information here. I can tell the officers to cancel heading over to your address. If anything changes, call us back.”
> “Okay.”
The police chief has since confirmed to local media what Spencer’s brother‑in‑law told us here at Law&Crime: the voice on that call is not Monnique’s.
She also provided more context about where the call may have originated and whether it’s important to the homicide investigation.
The most significant piece of public evidence we’ve seen so far is the surveillance clip of a person of interest walking down the alley behind the TEP home in the early morning of December 30th.
Police are asking the public for any additional video captured between 2:00 and 5:00 a.m. that night.
This time frame is believed to be when Spencer and Monnique were killed.
Even though the footage is grainy, there are some notable details.
The person appears to be male, wearing gray pants, black shoes, a black coat, and walking down a back alley in freezing temperatures on the Tuesday before New Year’s Eve.
The person never looks directly at the camera and keeps their head down.
It’s unclear whether they knew about the cameras behind these homes or on the garages.
The video comes from a Nest camera—privately owned security, not a police system.
This alley provides access to detached garages behind newer townhomes, like the one where Spencer and Monnique lived.
We also have drone footage from the Tep wedding video, shot by Spencer’s brother‑in‑law, that shows this back alley and the row of townhomes.
The person of interest’s gait and posture might be recognizable to someone. Some viewers have suggested the person may be slightly pigeon‑toed.
Police emphasize that this is a “person of interest,” not necessarily the killer—simply someone who was in the area during the critical time.
This could be someone walking home from a bar or visiting friends during a holiday week.
Still, the circumstances are suspicious.
If this were just an innocent person out late at night, you might expect them to come forward after seeing the video “everywhere” online, to clear things up.
So far, no one has publicly identified themselves as the person in that video, and police are still actively seeking information about them.
From the chief’s recent interviews, we also learned a few key new details.
Let’s quickly recap where the investigation stands publicly.
Up until the day they were killed, Spencer and Monnique appeared to be living the kind of life many people dream of.
They were a young couple with two small children, in a newer townhome, surrounded by family and friends who adored them.
Loved ones say they were the kind of people who loved entertaining, bringing people together in their home.
Their wedding video, shot in 2021, shows them on what appears to be the steps of the very home where they were later found dead.
The children, ages four and one, were inside the house when their parents were killed but were not physically harmed.
The family dog, a goldendoodle, was also unharmed. The children and the dog are now with Tep family members as the investigation continues.
Spencer had a career he clearly loved.
He was a dentist working at an office in Athens, Ohio, roughly 75 miles from Columbus—a significant commute.
His office bio notes that he graduated from Ohio State in 2017 with a Doctor of Dental Surgery degree.
Outside of work, Spencer loved Ohio State Buckeye football, the Cincinnati Bengals, golf, travel, and spending time with his family.
Monnique grew up in Worthington, a suburb north of Columbus.
She played soccer and ran track growing up.
Like Spencer, she was an Ohio State graduate, earning a master’s degree in early childhood education.
While in school, she worked at a daycare.
More recently, she was a stay‑at‑home mom, known for her bright smile, infectious laugh, caring heart, and bubbly personality.
Their joint obituary describes Spencer and Monnique as “the life of the party.”
They met online and married in December 2020.
It’s hard to comprehend how something like this could happen to a couple so loved and seemingly stable.
Their generosity, their growing young family, and the way they drew others in are recurring themes in how loved ones describe them.
That love is evident in the number of 911 calls made out of concern when Spencer didn’t show up for work.
> “Columbus Police, Tech 107.”
> “Yes, I would like to ask for a wellness check on an individual at their home.”
Those calls started just after 9:00 a.m. on December 30th.
Spencer’s boss, on vacation in Florida, phoned in after employees told him Spencer had failed to show up at the office.
“Have you received any other calls about him—like a car accident or anything?” the dispatcher asked.
“No,” the caller replied. “Sometimes people just don’t show up to work. Maybe he’s sick. I don’t know.”
Despite that, Spencer’s boss was adamant that this was out of character.
“I just know he is always on time, and he would contact us if there was any issue whatsoever,” he said. “We’re very, very concerned. We can’t get in touch with his wife, which is probably even more concerning.”
About 20 minutes after that first call, at 9:22 a.m., an officer arrived on scene—but at the wrong house.
No one answered the door, so the officer left after a brief check.
Concerned friends then went to the actual Tep home.
Around 10:00 a.m., they arrived and said they could hear the children inside.
One caller told 911:
> “We had a call out there. They knocked on the front door and back door multiple times and there was no answer.”
> “Yeah, no answer. I can hear kids inside, and I swear I think I heard one yell, but we can’t get in. At this point I don’t know if I need to break the door in or just get in the house or what.”
The dispatcher asked whether he had been there when the officer was there earlier.
He had not.
The dispatcher assured him they would send police back out.
Soon after, another call came—again from someone connected to Spencer’s work—reiterating that he hadn’t shown up and that they were now on site and could hear someone inside.
About five minutes later came the most chilling call:
> “There’s a body. There’s a body inside.”
The dispatcher transferred him to medics as the caller stayed on the line.
In the background, you can hear what sound like small children.
The caller explains:
> “Our friend wasn’t answering his phone. We just did a wellness check. We just came here and he appears dead. There’s blood. He’s laying next to his bed, off of his bed in there. I can’t get closer to see more than that. I can’t look.”
Medics and officers responded.
According to local reporting, Spencer had been shot multiple times, and Monnique had at least one gunshot wound to the chest.
Police have said they do not believe this was a murder‑suicide.
They reportedly recovered several 9mm shell casings at the scene—critical evidence that may eventually help identify the weapon and the shooter.
It’s also worth noting: if the killer understood how crime scene investigations work, leaving shell casings behind would be a significant oversight—or a sign of haste.
The police chief, Elaine Bryant, has now addressed the initial welfare‑check response.
She confirmed to local outlets that the first officer went to the wrong address on a nearby street, which runs parallel to the TEP home.
We obtained the body‑cam footage from that response.
In it, you see the officer whistling as he walks up, knocking on the door, looking around, and then leaving when no one answers.
The house he checked is on Summit Street, which runs parallel to the street where Spencer and Monnique lived.
Roughly 30 minutes after that mistaken check, the friend called in to report seeing Spencer’s body inside the correct home.
According to the chief, that friend actually went inside the house to look for them.
The TEPs’ bodies were reportedly found in a second‑floor bedroom.
The chief has not publicly disclosed a motive.
She said detectives are still canvassing for surveillance video—both from private security systems and from city cameras.
She acknowledged that there is a police‑owned camera positioned near the couple’s home but would not say whether it captured anything useful.
As for that April 911 call with the crying woman, the chief told the Columbus Dispatch that the caller’s voice was not Monnique’s.
She also explained that in dense urban areas, cell‑phone 911 calls can be routed to an approximate location within about 30 meters, meaning a call could appear to come from near the Tep home even if it did not originate inside it.
She added that there was no history of previous police calls related to the TEPs’ address.
The chief continues to urge patience.
She says the department is being as transparent as possible while protecting the integrity of a still‑active homicide investigation.
Former Chicago Police Detective Commander Will Varr has helped us analyze this case as it unfolds.
He points out that inside the detective bureau in Columbus, the focus right now is running every lead, reviewing every video frame, and sorting credible tips from background noise.
Supervisors buffer detectives from outside pressure so they can work the case as thoroughly as possible.
Varr believes the chief did the right thing by giving targeted interviews to local media to address growing public speculation.
We also discussed the new details the chief confirmed.
First, that both victims were found in an upstairs bedroom, suggesting they may have been asleep or in bed at the time of the attack.
Second, that the 911 caller who reported seeing a body actually entered the home and saw Spencer on the floor, which implies close familiarity with the couple and access to the property.
The question of “no forced entry” has led to speculation that the killer may have been someone they knew—someone with a key, a code, or at least enough familiarity to enter quietly in the middle of the night.
Varr notes that the layout of the home, the lack of obvious forced entry, and the upstairs location of the bodies all point to someone with prior knowledge of the residence.
The lingering question for many is whether the community is at risk.
Police have not labeled this a random attack, but they also haven’t publicly said it was definitively targeted.
That puts officials in a tough position: if they believe a random killer is at large, they must warn the public; if they are confident the incident was isolated and connected to a specific relationship or grievance, they may choose their words more carefully.
Varr suggests that the way police are talking—or not talking—about risk to the public implies they have “very definite leads” and may already be focusing on a known person of interest.
Still, until prosecutors present their full case in court, many questions will remain unanswered.
As for the surveillance video, if additional footage of the person of interest exists, police may be holding it back strategically.
Releasing everything could tip off a suspect and compromise investigative advantages.
Varr emphasizes that investigators must “fill in the puzzle” carefully, running out every tip—including seemingly unrelated 911 calls, unusual activity in the neighborhood, and prior connections to the victims.
The mistaken welfare‑check response, while troubling on a human level, likely didn’t change the outcome.
Spencer and Monnique were believed to have been killed several hours earlier. The main impact, as Varr notes, is that their children remained inside the home with their parents’ bodies for longer than they might have otherwise.
The 9mm shell casings found at the scene are another key clue.
In most shootings, casings are left behind because events unfold quickly and shooters flee.
If casings had been removed, that would suggest planning and a higher level of forensic awareness.
In this case, the fact that casings were recovered suggests a fast, possibly emotionally driven attack rather than a perfectly staged crime.
The person in the alley video remains a central focus.
If that individual is innocent, they might hesitate to come forward out of fear of being drawn into a major homicide investigation—but police still need to identify and interview them.
For now, much of the public picture is built on partial information: 911 calls, limited video, and carefully worded statements from police.
Behind the scenes, detectives are working through witness lists, digital data, forensic reports, and background histories.
As charges progress against Michael McKee and more court documents become public, we’ll gain a clearer view of what investigators believe happened and why.
Law&Crime will continue to follow this tragic case, track developments in the prosecution, and bring you updates as new information becomes available.
For now, our thoughts remain with the families of Spencer and Monnique Tep, and with the two children left behind.
