Murder suspect arrives in Boone Co., police still considering landfill search

A former Columbia resident who police say admitted to killing his wife in 2006 was booked into the Boone County Jail Tuesday.

Boone County prosecutors charged Keith Comfort with second-degree murder this month after he allegedly told police in Wisconsin that he killed his wife, who has been considered missing for more than a decade.

Comfort married Megan Shultz in May 2005. Court documents say Comfort admitted to strangling Shultz to death during an argument over a drug deal on Aug. 4, 2006. Comfort allegedly told this to police in his new home of Lake Geneva exactly 13 years after the crime.

According to the Boone County Jail website, Comfort will appear in Boone County court at 1:30 p.m. on Wednesday and is being held on a $1 million cash-only bond.

The criminal charge prompted a renewal of the Columbia Police Department’s search for Shultz, or evidence of her remains. Comfort allegedly said he put her body in a dumpster, which prompted police to consider searching the city landfill.

Steven Sapp, a city spokesperson, said Tuesday the city is still weighing if a such a search is feasible. “We will ensure the media and community is aware of any additional actions as soon as we can,” Sapp said.

A Columbia Utilities department spokesperson told ABC 17 in early August that searching the landfill for human remains disposed of 13 years ago would be difficult.

In 2009, according to a city document, Columbia began operating a portion of the debris collection area as an “anaerobic bioreactor landfill.” The process was meant to accelerate the degradation of debris.

“Decomposition and biological stabilization of the waste in a bioreactor landfill is designed to occur much faster than in a traditional ‘dry tomb’ landfill,” reads a section of the 2017 document titled City of Columbia Landfill Site Master Plan.

It’s not clear where Shultz’s remains could have been placed. She is still listed as missing on the city website.