King of the Hill voice actor Jonathan Joss has died aged 59 after a shooting in Texas, police have confirmed.

Joss was the voice of John Redcorn for seasons two through 13 of the popular animated series. He had reportedly recorded bits for the show’s reboot, which recently began production for Hulu and is slated to premiere in August.

The actor was reportedly shot multiple times over the weekend after a disagreement with a neighbor, according to TMZ. San Antonio police responded to a home after reports of shots fired and found Joss near the road with gunshot wounds, according to Variety.

He was pronounced dead at the scene.

  • PaulBunyan@lemm.ee
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    1 month ago

    Statement from Tristan Kern de Gonzales
    Husband of Jonathan Joss

    My husband Jonathan Joss and I were involved in a shooting while checking the mail at the site of our former home. That home was burned down after over two years of threats from people in the area who repeatedly told us they would set it on fire. We reported these threats to law enforcement multiple times and nothing was done.

    Throughout that time we were harassed regularly by individuals who made it clear they did not accept our relationship. Much of the harassment was openly homophobic.

    When we returned to the site to check our mail we discovered the skull of one of our dogs and its harness placed in clear view. This caused both of us severe emotional distress. We began yelling and crying in response to the pain of what we saw.

    While we were doing this a man approached us. He started yelling violent homophobic slurs at us. He then raised a gun from his lap and fired.
    Jonathan and I had no weapons. We were not threatening anyone. We were grieving. We were standing side by side. When the man fired Jonathan pushed me out of the way. He saved my life.

    Jonathan is my husband. He gave me more love in our time together than most people ever get. We were newlyweds. We picked Valentines Day. We were in the process of looking for a trailer and planning our future.

    He was murdered by someone who could not stand the sight of two men loving each other.
    I was with him when he passed. I told him how much he was loved.

    To everyone who supported him, his fans, his friends, know that he valued you deeply. He saw you as family.

    My focus now is on protecting Jonathan’s legacy and honoring the life we built together.

    If your concern is how someone coped with trauma or how loudly they speak when recounting injustice and being ignored by authorities then you never truly cared about my husband.

    Jonathan saved my life. I will carry that forward. I will protect what he built.

    • Tristan Kern de Gonzales

    From Jonathan Joss’s Facebook post

      • andros_rex@lemmy.world
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        That’s what they do. Our media absolutely covers for hate crimes right now.

        I sent an email to their complaint department about the headline. Not likely to do anything, but I’ll still be annoying.

        • hypnotoad@lemmy.ml
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          1 month ago

          Posted this. Thanks for the idea!

          Shame on your organization.

          You ran an article titled “King of the Hill actor Jonathan Joss fatally shot in Texas after argument with neighbor” and just conveniently left out the fact that there was no argument, just an active hate crime. You failed to mention the years of police reports, the context of the situation, or the open letter penned by his husband who was there, witnessed the murder, and heard the man yelling homophobic slurs as he shot at two completely unarmed non threatening men on their own property.

          Organizations like yours protect the shit police forces, the bigots, the lowlives of our society. Decisions like this show where you stand. You’re cowards; cowards protect other cowards.

          Disgusting.

          Pathetic.

          Shameful.

          I hope you actually ponder this one for a second. I know you won’t, but got dang, find a moral or two. Y’all suck. This man deserved better; we deserve better. Even you deserve better.

    • Resonosity@lemmy.dbzer0.com
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      1 month ago

      What a tragic story. Hope that fucking loser gets jailed for murder. There have to be consequences for behavior like this

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      1 month ago

      His name is written like 10 times across the article, how could you still misspell it…

      • PaulBunyan@lemm.ee
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        1 month ago

        Thanks, homie. Fixed it for you. I think I let autocorrect get the best of me.

    • Tja@programming.dev
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      His name is written like 10 times across the article, how could you still misspell it…

    • Tja@programming.dev
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      His name is written like 10 times across the article, how could you still misspell it…

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    Title is a lie. He was shot for crying over his dead dogs skull being placed near the mailbox of the recently burned down home they moved out of and shot by one of the homophobes who threatned to burn down said house who was also screaming slurs at him, while pushing his husband out of the path of the gun, saving his life. This was ALL preventable but the police force there allowed it to happen despite multiple years of reports.

      • arin@lemmy.world
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        1 month ago

        I feel bad for any progressives living in conservative neighborhoods (street city or state)

        • KneeTitts@lemmy.world
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          I feel bad for any progressives living in conservative neighborhoods (street city or state)

          The entire country is either right wing or insane far right wing… where else are people supposed to go to live in peace from these insane fascist freaks?

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      If I lived in America and was LGBTQ I’d be buying a gun right now, and this comes from someone who has always been anti-gun

      • Sal@lemmy.world
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        That’s what I’m telling all my LGBTQ friends in the US who are not at risk of suicide. You can’t afford to be neutral in an arms race, especially when the enforcers of possible gun bans are all buddies with the people that shouldn’t have guns.

    • KneeTitts@lemmy.world
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      He was shot for crying over his dead dogs skull being placed near the mailbox of the recently burned down home they moved out of and shot by one of the homophobes

      Seriously… fuck the US, fuck that country, fuck it.

      • ipkpjersi@lemmy.ml
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        I hate that I’m going to be visiting the US for an MRI soon (I didn’t want to wait up to 9+ months, sadly). It’s only 20 minutes away from the border but it’s still too far into USA. Damn it all.

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    Read the story and be pissed by how any news outlet phrases it in any way other than “this man was murdered in a pre-meditated manner after prolonged harassment from psychotic neighbors who previously murdered their dog”

    Rorschach was right about one thing, people like this shouldn’t get to go to jail. Rabid Animals get put down.

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      Like, I get you want to make sure information is true, but if a direct witness to the event said, “This was hate crime as fuck,” you’d at least throw in an “allegedly” statement in there…

    • WhoIsTheDrizzle@lemmy.world
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      I thought that as well, but then found that there were 60+ calls made to their home since 2023. Most of them were Joss acting erratically, usually confused and carrying weapons through the street, shooting guns on the property, yelling hysterically. There’s definitely more to this and most folks in this thread are jumping the gun.

      "The shooting was the 47th call SAPD had responded to at the property to since Jan. 1, 2024, according to SAPD’s PIO. Prior police reports included accusations of Joss being an aggressor against his alleged shooter. But apart from a detainment, neither man faced serious legal consequences in the months leading to the shooting.

      Joss was detained June 8, 2024, due to an active warrant for criminal mischief brought upon by complaints from Ceja. Earlier that day, Ceja called SAPD to report Joss was walking outside with a crossbow while name calling and yelling racial slurs at him. Ceja also detailed that there were repeated instances of Joss standing outside his property calling him names and telling him that “he is coming for him.”

      Joss had a history with weapons, according to police reports. An SAPD information report collected at the property on July 9, 2024, stated that Joss had been reported for causing disturbances with a gun in the past and had his guns confiscated by officers. While entering Joss’ vacant home on the information report with an administrative warrant, SAPD found a crossbow with an arrow chambered, which could not be disengaged due to a malfunctioning safety. SAPD took the crossbow and placed it in a patrol car."

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    Too bad there had to be an argument or disagreement…

    …about whether the victim(s) crying over their dead dog in front of their burned down house deserved to live?

    I wonder what the chances are that the fire, the dog skull, and the murder were all the same shithead.

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      I wonder what the chances are that the fire, the dog skull, and the murder were all the same shithead.

      Very high. And he’s probably buddies with the homophobic cops who dismissed years of reports of the threats to do those three things. And the same cops who have already “determined” that there was no hate crime.

      Although I don’t think those cops have realized yet that he was on other popular shows like Parks and Rec as well. And famous people are speaking out. Meaning there will be a lot more scrutiny and they can’t just shrug and sweep it under the rug this time.

    • Trainguyrom@reddthat.com
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      I’m now seeing firsthand why folks across the pond keep making snarky comments about The Independent being a Tory tag…

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    A homophobia-fueled pre-meditated murder is not simply a “disagreement.”

    For those that are wondering, he voiced John Redcorn.

    • KneeTitts@lemmy.world
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      A homophobia-fueled pre-meditated murder is not simply a “disagreement.”

      All amerikkkan media is owned by the fascists/bigots/rascists/kkk/oligarchs

  • MyNameIsAtticus@lemmy.world
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    I really despise the usage of ‘Argument’ here in the title. It does not do the situation justice. As far as i’m aware this wasn’t an Argument. it was entirely one sided. The perpetrator just walked up and started being homophobic before shooting him. It was a murder and to call it anything less is just being dishonest.

    • SippyCup@feddit.nl
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      This was after someone set his house on fire, which killed his 3 dogs. And then someone took one of the skulls and a leash and set it up where they’d be seen. So when Joss and his husband came back and were mourning, THEN his neighbor came out and started shouting slurs at them while waiving a fun around.

      But no this was an argument between two equally at fault rational people. Definitely not a homophobic hate crime on the first day of pride month.

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        From what I can tell, this region is notorious for gangstalking, especially against gay men. Many of these reports could likely be falsified to justify the idea of killing him.

        I don’t see any inconsistency about the fire if the article itself says that the cause is under investigation. Joss believed it’s possible he made a mistake, but it seems more likely to be caused by the same people that threatened arson, and possibly the same people that murdered him.

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        Thank you for this write up. I had been trying to put this into words for the past couple of days myself.

        Additionally, Jonathan had shown up at a king of the hill panel he wasn’t part of and tried to speak, then was setting up a shoe shine booth outside of the venue? While in Austin he also did a podcast in which he was clearly inebriated and then was asking for rides home on Facebook.

        While none of this excuses someone murdering him in any way, all of these things together definitely give me pause and lead me to not necessarily taking the husbands post at face value. I have addicts in my family and it just seems too familiar.

  • L0rdMathias@sh.itjust.works
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    An argument.

    The actor was reportedly shot multiple times over the weekend after a disagreement with a neighbor,

    “Ahh gee hahaha just a small little kerfuffle happened, then someone involved in lost their temper and shot the other big sad wow carpe diem or something. No further looking into the situation required, just personal dispute Texas amiright lol.”

  • veni_vedi_veni@lemmy.world
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    The wiki article on his death says that the San Antonio PD is saying that there was no evidence of hate crime up to that point, but if this was ongoing for literal years over 300+ incidents, i find that hard to believe. They need an outside-led investigation into that county PD.

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      Is it sad that my first suspicion is that it simply doesn’t meet the local legal definition of a hate crime because the laws are probably written to protect white people only?

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          You still need a PD willing to gather, keep secure and submit evidence that portrays it as a hate crime. The detectives and LEO’s involved may be hiding statements, motives, physical evidence, etc, by simply not recording it as such.

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    His death was so brutal. I hope people in San Antonio schedule a pride march in the voice actors neighborhood.

    Also, I really think there should be a neighborhood watch or civilian guard force where lgtbq populace can ask for help or support when they’re being harassed. Like a civilian neighborhood watch app.

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        There was no argument, he was crying at the display of his dogs skull the murderer made before he pulled up and shot him in cold blood.

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          Not to mention instigated for years and gangstalked from the sound of it until he mentally broke down. Something beyond jail deserves to happen to the people responsible.

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    Reading the story and I’m fucking mortified. Fuck America and their love for hate. The rise of American Christianity and white nationalism has justified being scum of the earth. These people deserve the fucking worst treatment imaginable. Fuck off.