Parents of Jenae Gagnier, known to her millions of followers as Miss Mercedes Morr, share heartbreaking details of her murder, allegedly by a crazed stalker.
Thursday, September 2, 2021
The father of Jenae Gagnier, famously known as Mercedes Morr to her vast online following, revealed the chilling conversations he regularly had with his daughter about the potential dangers of her fame. “My monthly conversation is, Jenae you have all these followers. Some probably because they love you, some because they like your look, some more crazy, and some obsessed,” he recounted. Tragically, their worst fears materialized when a man believed to be an obsessed follower murdered her and then took his own life, leaving behind disturbing confessions scrawled on her apartment walls.
HOUSTON, Texas – Jeaneta Grover and Mark Gagnier, the grieving parents of Jenae Gagnier, the beloved Instagram sensation Miss Mercedes Morr, are grappling with the devastating loss of their daughter. To millions online, she was Mercedes Morr, but to them, she was simply their cherished child.
“She’s a person. That was our baby,” Jeaneta Grover, her mother, shared, her voice filled with sorrow.
In their first emotional interview since Jenae’s shocking murder, they spoke with KTRK-TV, an ABC7 sister station, painting a picture of their daughter beyond her online persona. They described Jenae as a dependable and loving older sister, a daddy’s girl, and her mother’s closest confidante.
“She was so famous in her world, and so loved in ours,” Grover poignantly stated.
Mercedes Morr, or Jenae as she was known to her family, had become a prominent figure in Houston’s entertainment scene. Her captivating and bold photographs on Instagram garnered hundreds of thousands of likes, propelling her to social media stardom.
“It scared the hell out of me,” confessed her father, Mark Gagnier, reflecting on his daughter’s burgeoning fame. “My daughter was beautiful. That scared the hell out of me. And she kept trying to get more and more beautiful, she worked on it hard. That scared the hell out of me.”
Despite his underlying fears, Gagnier could never have imagined the horrific scene that awaited him when he arrived at his 33-year-old daughter’s apartment on that fateful Sunday evening. Concerned by the lack of communication from Jenae throughout the weekend, he rushed to her residence.
“I know my daughter, and when I got to my daughter’s house and it was locked up and she’s not answering my phone call, which is not like her, I knew something was up. So I didn’t hesitate to kick the door down,” Gagnier recounted, his voice heavy with emotion. “What I saw, I wouldn’t want any parent to go through.”
He discovered his daughter lifeless at the bottom of the stairs.
Initially, a heartbroken Gagnier considered the possibility of an accident. However, upon reaching the upstairs of the apartment with his girlfriend, they encountered Jenae’s killer, Kevin Accorto, 34, with a self-inflicted knife wound to his neck. Investigators later confirmed that Accorto had stabbed himself.
“He was twitching, he was gurgling,” Gagnier described the gruesome scene. “I could look in the room and there’s writings all over the wall.”
Written in lipstick and pen, the walls were covered in rambling notes filled with confessions, apologies, and declarations of love for Jenae – a woman investigators believe Accorto did not personally know. The chilling discovery pointed to a tragic case of obsession and stalking targeting Mercedes Morr.
“My monthly conversation is, Jenae you have all these followers. Some probably because they love you, some because they like your look, some more crazy, and some obsessed,” Gagnier reiterated, highlighting the persistent concern he had for his daughter’s safety in the face of online fame.
Her family believes Accorto was the embodiment of those fears – a crazed follower who stalked Mercedes Morr and tragically managed to find her.
“I don’t know how he found her and I don’t know how all this happened,” her devastated father admitted.
As news of the Instagram star’s death, Mercedes Morr, spread rapidly across social media platforms on Sunday, so did a wave of unfounded rumors and speculation.
“It went from false accusations of HIV or COVID, to other things,” Gagnier lamented, expressing the added pain caused by the online misinformation.
Her parents emphasized how these baseless rumors circulating online compounded their grief, making it even more challenging to mourn the loss of their beloved daughter, Mercedes Morr.
The medical examiner officially ruled Jenae’s death a homicide, confirming that she died from strangulation and suffered a traumatic concussion, according to the Fort Bend County Medical Examiner’s office.
Investigators are currently working diligently to determine the precise means by which Accorto located Jenae and gained entry into her apartment, seeking to piece together the events leading up to this horrific tragedy involving Mercedes Morr.
