Jan. 10 marked the one year anniversary of the shooting death of Platte County Citizen reporter Dennis Sharkey, with the suspect in the case still in custody without bond as the wheels of justice slowly move.
Ruslan Huseynov appeared at a hearing before Judge Quint Shafer on Tuesday, Jan. 6, but the case was continued. His next court appearance is scheduled for Tuesday, Jan. 20 for a tentative preliminary hearing. This tentative preliminary hearing has been continued several times since Huseynov was first arrested and charged in June 2025.
Huseynov is charged with second degree murder, unlawful use of a weapon, and two counts of armed criminal action.
Huseynov
In September, the Citizen reported Huseynov made about 350 phone calls during his first two months in jail, many of these were in Azerbaijani, forcing the state to locate a translator to analyze the content of these calls. More recent filings have made no mention of additional calls, but four continuances have been granted since September, all made at the defendant’s request
In recent weeks, Platte County Prosecutor Eric Zahnd has said the court process in Platte County takes too long. In Buchanan County, judges grant two continuances and then cases go to trial, speeding their court process.
“Quite frankly we have too many cases with too few judges,” Zahnd said during his report on cases filed made to the commission late last year. “We got another judge, but we need one more. This county remains very, very busy. We have trials set five deep into 2025.”
Zahnd said one thing the county doesn’t do well is move cases quickly, as defendants are easily able to get continuances in cases.
“We have developed a culture in Platte County that I do not support,” he said. “Justice delayed is justice denied in so many instances, particularly in homicide cases. Those families have lost a loved one and they deserve justice, and they deserve it quickly.”
Sharkey was a well-known journalist and sports photographer in Missouri. He graduated from Northwest Missouri State University in 2006 with a degree in journalism carrying a 3.5 grade point average and was the editor of the university’s newspaper, the Northwest Missourian.
Dennis has worked for many newspapers in the area, including the Oskaloosa, Kan., Independent, the Leavenworth, Kan., Times, the Platte County Landmark, the Mexico Ledger, the Mound City News, and most recently, the Platte County Citizen.
According to court documents, authorities received a 911 phone call on Jan. 10, 2025 shortly after 7 p.m. related to a shooting. That call came from a couple who had been traveling southbound on I-29 between Barry Road and NW 72nd Street. They saw a dark-colored car, later identified as the suspect vehicle, followed by a white car, later identified as a 2019 Chevrolet Spark, which was driven by the victim.
The couple said that the two cars came to a stop in the far right lane of the Interstate, requiring the vehicle in which the couple were traveling to also stop. As the couple pulled around the stopped cars, the driver of the dark colored car got out of his vehicle with a gun in his hand and pointed at the victim’s car. As the couple accelerated from the scene, they heard a gunshot.
The female witness described the suspect as a male of possible Italian or Middle Eastern descent.
The victim’s car crashed approximately ¼ mile south of NW 72nd Street, coming to rest against a fence that separates I-29 and NW Prairie View Road. Emergency workers found Sharkey in the vehicle unresponsive with what appeared to be a gunshot wound. Sharkey was taken to North Kansas City Hospital, where he was pronounced dead. An autopsy revealed the preliminary cause of death to be a single gunshot wound.
A canine belonging to the ATF discovered a recently expended single 9 mm shell casing on I-29, north of NW 72nd Street.
Sharkey’s cell phone was recovered from his vehicle. A search warrant related to data from the phone showed the phone communicating at 6:57:50 p.m. on the night of the shooting with the cell phone tower near 6600 NW Tower Drive at 6:57:50, which is located about 950 meters from where the shell casing was found.
A search warrant for other cellular signals traveling southbound at the same time revealed a cell phone allegedly belonging to Huseynov traveling southbound on I-29 and communicating with the cell phone tower on NW Tower Drive at 6:57:43 p.m. on the night of the shooting.
Court documents indicate that phone spent 62 seconds on I-29 in a space of 900 meters, leading investigators to Huseynov’s phone was in a vehicle that stopped on I-29 at the time of the shooting.
Investigators also reviewed surveillance footage documenting what the eyewitness couple reported.
On June 10, authorities interviewed Huseynov. According to court documents, he allegedly confirmed his cell phone number and denied owning a gun. When presented with an image from his own phone’s cloud showing him holding a 9 mm magazine, loaded, he admitted it was his hand in the photo, but claimed the gun belonged to a friend, whose name he could not recall, who attempted to sell him the gun.
A search warrant was executed at his residence, and authorities located a 9 mm Stoeger pistol in a safe in his bedroom. Court documents state that testing by the Kansas City Police Crime Laboratory confirmed that the shell casing located at the scene of the crime and the bullet removed from Sharkey’s body during the autopsy were identified and verified to test fires performed on the pistol recovered from Huseynov’s bedroom.
Huseynov, who worked for World Liquor in both Liberty and Platte City, also faces municipal charges in Pleasant Valley for failure to signal a turn. He faces additional criminal charges in Platte City, for allegedly stealing from the Platte City Price Chopper several times.
According to court documents, Huseynov has “several police interactions and a conviction for sexual battery out of Kansas.” In that case, police were concerned he would not show up to court as he planned to leave the country and return to Azerbaijan.