Do you think it could be connected to Jessica Hamby? She was a friend of his and went missing. She left alabama after telling police where his body was and the went missing as soon as she returned.
If he had been killed the day he went „missing“ his body would be in the dry stage of decomposition. Just bones and crust maybe, but the smell of his body allowed officers to find him. Decomp can be affected by temp, hot and humid allowing the body to rot faster, so he would have to be at the most a day old. He was most likely kidnapped and then killed a day before he was found