Nearly a year after man made 911 call to save woman’s life now charged with reckless homicide in her death

Published 5:54 am Saturday, August 14, 2021

It was almost a year ago when dispatchers received a phone call reporting a woman who was unresponsive and in need of medical attention.

On Sept. 24, 2020 at about 4:25 p.m., Catisha Patterson Ascencio, 33, was taken from a residence on Ky. Hwy. 698 and transported to Ephraim McDowell Fort Logan Hospital in Stanford where she was pronounced dead.

Fast forward a year later and the man who made that 911 call has been charged with reckless homicide in regards to Ascencio’s death, according to Lincoln County Sheriff’s Detective Rob Oney.

Michael Austin Crowe, 24, of Stanford, was arrested at a residence in McKinney on a reckless homicide warrant out of Lincoln County during the early morning hours on Aug. 13.

Foul play was not originally suspected, Oney said. The investigation has been ongoing for a year now and countless interviews have been conducted.

“Through witness statements, I did find out there was a domestic situation that occurred,” Oney said. “I have interviewed a boat load of people. I have interviewed the head of neurology at the University of Kentucky…”

Ascencio’s toxicology was clean and the Kentucky Medical Examiner’s Office ruled that her death was caused by a subarachnoid hemorrhage, which is bleeding in the space between the brain and the membrane surrounding the brain.

“Through investigation we found out about the domestic. That’s when I interviewed neighbors, family…and the day before yesterday I went ahead and issued a reckless homicide warrant on Michael Douglas Austin Crowe,” Oney said.

Crowe was the man who called 911 on Sept. 24 to report that Ascencio was unresponsive, Oney said.

“Units picked him up last night at about 2 a.m. at I believe his grandmother’s residence in McKinney at Smith Trailer Park,” he said. “They brought him in. I was called to come in and we interviewed him.”

Crowe was then transported to Pulaski County Jail.

His court date is scheduled for Monday, Aug. 16 in Lincoln District Court. No bond had been set as of Friday afternoon.