PANAMA CITY BEACH (WMBB) — An amateur MMA fighter was arrested after he allegedly killed another man in the parking lot of a Panama City Beach bar.
Ross Allen Johnson, 23, of Cartersville, Ill., was charged with manslaughter by the Panama City Beach Police Department. The incident happened Sunday night in the parking lot of a bar in the 10500 block of Front Beach Road.
Police wrote that Johnson is an amateur mixed martial artist with a record of five wins and two losses and three years of “advanced fighter training.”
Johnson was running towards a fight involving a friend when he struck another man behind the ear, police added. Police noted that Johnson never attempted to get help for the man after he knocked him out.
Instead, Johnson left the man he struck laying in the parking lot and continued toward the fight where he engaged in a skirmish with another man, police wrote.
When that second fight was over, Johnson left the area and stayed in a hotel room while allegedly trying to avoid the investigators, officers wrote.
When he was finally taken into custody, investigators said Johnson gave them multiple different accounts of what happened including that he simply pushed the man. However, Johnson allegedly told a woman on Snapchat about the victim and wrote, “Dude is still not moving.”
They added that Johnson allegedly told a witness, “Man I hit that guy, I laid him out, and I think I killed him.”
An arrest report states the victim died from blunt force trauma to the head. An autopsy revealed a “softball” size bruise on the victim behind his left ear and a skull fracture.