LAKELAND, Fla. — The Lakeland Police Department announced the arrest of Rex Honors III in the 2018 homicide of 14-year-old Rex "Stuffy" Honors IV, a case that detectives revisited using advanced technology and new interviews.
“Stuffy was only 14. He was a normal child. He loved school, he loved sports. He didn’t deserve it,” said Stuffy's mother Antoinette Tinsley.
Police said officers responded to a suspicious incident on July 3, 2018, at a home on West Crawford Street after Rex Honors III, then 21, reported he could not find his younger brother. Officers discovered Honors IV deceased in the backyard.
WATCH: Older brother arrested in 2018 cold case killing of Lakeland teen Rex Honors IV
“Detectives early on, they suspected that Rex Honors III, the brother was responsible for this but at the time they lacked enough evidence,” said Gary Gross, LPD Cold Case investigator.
Lakeland PD’s Violent Crimes Unit reopened the cold case on May 19, 2025.
“When you walk in the Cold Case office, we put a picture of Stuffy up on the wall. So that we could see that every day. Every day we know our purpose,” Gross said.
Gross, along with detective Virgil Cardin, reinterviewed witnesses in the case. A witness said the victim and Honors III were physically fighting when he left the residence around 3 a.m. LPD said the witness then heard a gunshot shortly after he left. He did not share the information originally with detectives out of fear of retaliation, LPD said.
Investigators reexamined phone records using new technology not available in 2018, and LPD said Honors' phone showed no outgoing calls to the victim as he claimed. Honors III was also seen on security footage outside talking on the phone to two witnesses, telling them his brother was deceased and he was found in the home.
“Just on the suspect's cell phone, there’s 26,378 pieces of digital evidence that we looked at, which is photos, videos and pictures. It is just a lot,” Gross said.
On Oct. 15, Honors III was reinterviewed by Investigator Gross and Detective Cardin at the Albany Police Department in Albany, Georgia. LPD said Honors III was confronted with the new witness statements and admitted to killing his brother in what he said was self-defense. He then told investigators he dragged the body out of the house and cleaned up the crime scene, LPD said.
“All I want to know is why you did this to my son? He didn’t even get to live his life,” Tinsley said.
Honors III is currently being held in jail in Albany, Georgia, on an unrelated charge. LPD said he will face second-degree murder, tampering with physical evidence and resisting an officer without violence related to the 2018 homicide.
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