Woman who fetched hammer, restraints used to beat and bind Wichita murder victim is sentenced

A 22-year-old Wichita woman will spend more than 15 years in prison for taking part in the killing of a 47-year-old man who reportedly begged for his life as he was beaten and left to die in a car trunk.

Ariana Cook pleaded no contest on Nov. 21 to counts of conspiracy to commit first-degree murder and conspiracy to commit aggravated kidnapping in the July 2020 death of Roy Hayden of Wichita, court records show. In the amended charges, prosecutors said Cook “retrieved (a) hammer to use to strike” Hayden, “directed conduct” of a least one attacker, “ordered restraint of (the) victim and retrieved multiple items to assist.”

Wichita police have said Hayden was beaten in the head with a hammer and crowbar, punched, shot in the knee and choked on July 1 or 2, 2020, during an hours-long assault at 840 S. San Pablo, an apartment near Lincoln and Woodlawn where Cook reportedly lived with her boyfriend. The attack was tied to drugs and may have lasted eight hours, according to police, after Hayden refused to submit to a sex act and follow other orders, apparently to prove he wasn’t a cop.

After the beating, Hayden’s attackers shoved him in the trunk of a Volvo that was later abandoned in the 1500 block of North Broadway, police have said. When authorities found the car four days later, they discovered his bound body inside, with plastic trash bags covering his head, according to an affidavit released by the court.

An autopsy determined Hayden died from asphyxiation.