EMMETSBURG — An Emmetsburg man has been charged with first-degree murder in connection with the July 2020 death of another Emmetsburg man.

Brice Patrick Colling, 22, was arrested without incident Monday night by the Palo Alto County Sheriff’s Office and agents with the Iowa Division of Criminal Investigation.

On July 22, 2020, the body of Rollin RJ Bontrager was found floating in Virgin Lake in the 3700 block of 353rd Avenue in Palo Alto County. Upon autopsy at the Office of the State Medical Examiner in Ankeny, State Medical Examiner Dennis Klein “found that Bontrager had sustained multiple lacerations to his head consistent with being beaten with a bolt cutter tool,” according to the criminal complaint.

The subsequent investigation found that Bontrager had last been seen alive on July 19, 2020.

According to the complaint, “multiple cooperating witnesses” told investigators that Colling was at the Virgin Lake location on the evening of July 19, 2020, and that Colling later made admissions to the witnesses about “beating somebody.”

Colling is being held at the Palo Alto County Jail.

Another man, Allan Michael Dean Schwidder, formerly of Emmetsburg, pleaded guilty to second-degree murder on March 12, 2021, for his role in Bontrager’s death. The criminal complaint said that Schwidder also told investigators that Colling was present and “engaged in beating Bontrager and placing him in Virgin Lake.”

Colling had his initial appearance in Palo Alto County Magistrate Court on Monday, and his preliminary hearing is scheduled for March 11.