John Diedrich

Milwaukee Journal Sentinel

Kris Zocco was charged Monday with homicide in the death of Kelly Dwyer, more than three years after the 27-year-old woman disappeared.

Zocco, 42, has long been a suspect in Dwyer's death — he had been dating Dwyer, she was last seen entering his east side Milwaukee apartment, and he gave inconsistent statements to detectives under questioning, according to the criminal complaint. Yet police were unable to find evidence directly linking Zocco to the murder.

Police still apparently do not have physical evidence linking the former computer systems expert to the death. Rather, the 16-page criminal complaint lays out a detailed circumstantial case, concluding, "No one other than defendant Kris Zocco could have committed these crimes."

Dwyer's body was recovered in a remote area of Jefferson County in May 2015. She disappeared in October 2013.

Zocco was convicted on child pornography counts and is currently serving an 18-year prison sentence.

The "overwhelming weight" of all evidence, rather than a single piece, led to charges being filed, Milwaukee Police Chief Edward Flynn said.

"This is a bit of a jigsaw puzzle," he said. "There were a lot of pieces that were always available to us, it was just ultimately learning how each piece fit with the others."

Zocco is charged with first-degree reckless homicide, hiding a corpse, and strangulation. The case was investigated by the Milwaukee Police Department's Cold Case unit and is being prosecuted by Assistant District Attorney Sara Hill, who also prosecuted Zocco in the child pornography case. No court date on the homicide counts has been set.

According to the criminal complaint:

Zocco's history of violent and sometimes non-consensual sex goes back to when he was a teenager in Connecticut. Several women Zocco dated said he enjoyed violent sexual encounters and when the relationships ended, he sometimes stalked them.

One woman Zocco once dated later told her husband, "if anything ever happened (to her) that police should look at Kris Zocco first."

Zocco moved to Milwaukee in 2009 and began working at TRC Global, where his mother, Joyce Frye, was the executive vice president and chief operating officer.

Zocco and Dwyer began dating in late 2012 or early 2013. Zocco apparently was dating other people.Friends reported seeing bruising on Dwyer's neck around this time.

Police later found photos and a video on Zocco's phone from September 2013 showing a dangerous sexual encounter between Zocco and Dwyer, who appeared to be unconscious. That video is the basis for the strangulation count.

The last time Dwyer was seen was at 2:37 a.m. Oct. 11 entering Zocco's apartment, according to video from the apartment. When she failed to appear for work, friends and family began searching and calling Zocco and soon dialing the police.

Police later learned that Zocco removed the SIM card from his cellphone, making it impossible to track his whereabouts for 17 hours, from 7:43 p.m. Oct. 11 — the day Dwyer went missing — to 2:41 p.m. Oct. 12. Zocco would later tell friends he was running errands and Christmas shopping.

During an interview with police, Zocco gave incorrect statements about what Dwyer was wearing that night and contradictory details about when she left his apartment. He also made a point of saying he took "summer sports equipment" to his mother's house in Delafield. A witness later noted that a large travel golf bag was missing from Zocco's apartment.

In a search of Zocco's apartment, police found that the shower curtain rings were bent, which detectives theorize was because Zocco pulled down the curtain to wrap the body. A police dog picked up the smell of a corpse in Zocco's bed, bathroom, trash chute and his car. Technicians also found Zocco's DNA on the trash chute. A witness who cleaned Zocco's apartment said it was unusually clean when she came to do the job.

While Zocco's phone was disabled, police have evidence he was about 12 miles from where Dwyer's remains were found. Shortly after noon on Oct. 12, he bought shoes at a Sports Authority in Delafield, according to bank records.

The complaint concludes by saying Zocco killed Dwyer either accidentally or intentionally "during a highly reckless act of strangulation."

Given his sexual history, Zocco, would have known such actions could endanger someone's life and amounts to "playing with life and death," the complaint says.

Ashley Luthern of the Journal Sentinel staff contributed to this report.

John Diedrich can be reached at john.diedrich@jrn.com and @john_diedrich.