On February 26, 2020, police in Las Vegas, Nevada responded to a domestic disturbance call involving 31-year-old Corey Trumbull and his girlfriend, 37-year-old Stormy Johnson. 

The couple was from Texas but had recently, along with Stormy’s 15-year-old daughter and three dogs, been living out of their truck in Las Vegas.

According to Corey’s arrest report, an extremely banged-up Stormy ran into a business on Glen Avenue in Las Vegas, “scared and hiding from a male in a white truck bearing [a] California license plate” and parked at the Walgreens across the street. The male in question, of course, was Corey Trumbull, and also in the truck with him was Stormy’s 15-year-old daughter, “L.C.” Police responded and made contact with the occupants of the truck, which was seen driving slowly through the parking lot of the business where Stormy was hiding. Corey denied any kind of physical altercation with his girlfriend, although she was taken to Sunrise Hospital, where the injuries she had suffered told a very different story, as did Stormy herself.

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Stormy told police that she had Corey had met in July of 2019 in Midland, Texas and had arrived in Las Vegas in early January of 2020.

She said Corey became more and more violent as time progressed, and she claimed that over the past few days, Corey had severely beaten her all over her body with a black and red stick or pipe, chained her by the neck to the truck’s headrest with a metal dog leash to prevent her from running away, strangled her repeatedly with the chain, and punched her with his fists.

Yikes.

The arrest report states, “Stormy’s injuries included a broken right shoulder, broken left elbow, broken nose, broken right middle finger, broken left pinky, broken right ankle, severe pain in her head, swollen and bruised eyes, and multiple swollen bumps on her face, swollen and bleeding upper and lower lips, swollen and severely bruised right thigh, swollen and bruised right elbow. At the time of interview, she was scheduled to have multiple orthopedic surgeries to repair the broken bones. The radiologist noted that Stormy also had several other fractures that had healed.”

Corey, who claimed that Stormy had been using illicit drugs, was arrested and charged with a misdemeanor charge of domestic battery (first offense) as well as four felony charges: first-degree kidnapping; domestic battery with a deadly weapon resulting in significant bodily harm; domestic battery by strangulation; and coercion constituting domestic violence using threat or physical force. 

As horrible as the incident was, the domestic disturbance call also resulted in something much, much worse.

While interviewing Stormy, Las Vegas Metropolitan Police received information that prompted them to place a call to police in Wichita Falls, Texas. That information led Wichita Falls Police Department investigators to the corner of Kenley Avenue and Borton Street in Wichita Falls, where police searched a room at the Red Roof Inn on Thursday, February 27 before taping off the area with crime scene tape.  

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A short distance away, inside a grey older model Ford sedan that had been abandoned for over a year, police discovered human remains… just like Stormy Johnson told them they would.

A witness at the scene told a reporter that the body could be related to the investigation of a missing child that took place in December at the nearby Red Roof Inn. Police believe the remains had been in the car since December.

The body was later identified as that of Stormy’s eleven-year-old son, Logan Nicholas Cline. 

I learned about Logan’s story through a Facebook group, where a fellow member posted a GoFundMe created by Logan’s grandmother, Christine Bero, to raise funds for Logan’s funeral. The GoFundMe was taken down soon afterward at the request of Logan’s father, Nicholas Cline, because the WFPD wanted to identify Logan’s remains through dental records and complete official notification of his next of kin before publicly releasing his name. 

According to the person who posted the GoFundMe in the group, who is a close friend of Nick Cline, an autopsy was completed, and Logan’s cause of death was determined to be blunt force trauma. Official autopsy results have yet to be released.

The Ford sedan has been impounded. 

Two warrants for tampering with evidence were issued for Stormy Loraine Johnson (born in 1983), who is Logan’s mother, and Corey Trumbull (born in 1988). An additional warrant, this one for capital murder, was issued for Corey, who was already in custody. The Las Vegas Metropolitan Police Department’s Criminal Team Fugitive Task Force took Stormy into custody on February 29. 

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(Author’s note: Some news sources state that it was Stormy Johnson who was charged with capital murder. I reached out to the Wichita Falls Police Department, who confirmed that the capital murder warrant was indeed issued for Corey Trumbull, as stated by WFPD Sergeant Harold McClure in the Times Record News video below.) 

Both suspects are being held in the Clark County Detention Center in Nevada pending extradition to Texas. Las Vegas authorities are assisting with the ongoing investigation.

On a Facebook post made by the WFPD during the initial search, users made comments about rumors of a body being found in a vehicle. One user asked, “Were they shot or something[?]” Another user, Kriste Cline, responded; Kriste is the current wife of Logan’s father, Nick. In her comments, Kriste revealed that her stepson was beaten by his mother’s boyfriend and left to die in the abandoned car in December of 2019. She said that the boy’s mother confessed what her boyfriend did and told the police where to find his body.

Logan’s father, Nick, is a First Sergeant in the United States military who has been serving in Afghanistan. According to his close friend, he will be returning stateside within the week, and he made the decision not to reopen the GoFundMe campaign created by his mother because the family has received enough to cover expenses and doesn’t want people to donate needlessly.

For clarity, I attempted to sort out the order, parentage, and custody situation of all of Logan’s siblings.

• 15-year-old L.C. is the daughter of Stormy Johnson and Nick Cline.
• Logan, who would have turned 12 in July, is the son of Stormy Johnson and Nick Cline.
• Stormy has an 8-year-old son and a 6-year-old daughter with unknown father(s). She does not appear to have custody of either child.
• Kriste (Hanners) Cline and Nick Cline, who married in December of 2019, have a 5-year-old son together.
• Nick Cline also has a 3-year-old son with Jamie Cline, who lives in Arkansas and appears to have primary custody of the little boy.

Both Stormy Johnson and Jamie Cline also served in the military.

Of course, where there’s domestic abuse and child murder, there’s inevitably family drama, as well. On November 25, 2019, Stormy Johnson made the following post on a Facebook classified ads group.

According to the Times Record News, Dorothy Savage Holland, who may be Stormy’s mother, made a Facebook post several weeks saying she was worried about her “grand babies” and that “New boyfriend is all of the problem. neither work.” She said that Stormy had reached out to her, “calling for money.” Dorothy continued, “Have called for a wellness check to no avail. I strongly suggest not to give her money. She keeps trying everyone.”

Stormy’s claim in her post that her son is “MHMR” seems to indicate that Logan had special needs to some degree, although whether there was a diagnosis is unclear. Logan’s former step-mom, Jamie Cline, said in a Facebook post about Logan, “God help me control my anger!! All this boy needed was a little love!!” 

I’ve made my stance on this clear in previous posts, but I will reiterate as the parent of a child with special needs that my favorite quote is one from Erma Bombeck: “A child needs your love more when he deserves it least.” A child’s behavior does not come from a vacuum; if a child is acting up, there is a reason, and it needs to be addressed, the earlier, the better. No child is born “bad” or irredeemable. Early intervention, consistency, and unconditional love and support is key to helping these kids weather their unique challenges. 

Reportedly, Corey Trumbull has also caused physical harm to Logan’s sister, L.C., who is currently in the care of her grandparents. I can only imagine the pain this situation has brought to that poor girl, who clearly adored her younger brother. I’m heartbroken for everyone in Logan’s family, but most of all for L.C., and I truly hope she can overcome the trauma she has experienced.

There’s not a lot of information out there about Logan as a person just yet, although from what I’ve seen online, he seemed like a typical silly, fun-loving eleven-year-old boy who enjoyed goofing around with his older sister and spending time with his family. 

Below are a couple of videos from Stormy’s Facebook page showing Logan as a baby. 

Logan’s funeral is scheduled for Saturday, March 21. 

Click here for my future/ongoing coverage of Logan’s story.

Sources: News Channel 6, Times Record News, Texoma’s Homepage, 8NewsNow, Facebook