PORTLAND, Ore. (KOIN) — On day seven of the murder trial of Nancy Crampton Brophy, the court heard a phone call that took place just four days after the murder — during which, Nancy asked a detective to write a letter stating she was no longer a suspect in her husband’s death for her to give her insurance company.
Nancy Crampton Brophy is charged with murder in the killing of her husband, Daniel Brophy, whose body was discovered at the Oregon Culinary Institute in Portland on June 2, 2018. Her trial began on April 4.
The trial picked up with the continued cross-examination of the city’s Analyst Kelsey Guay, who was tasked with helping police analyze evidence in the crime back in 2018.
The subject matter was the prosecution’s animation of van surveillance video captured by the TriMet Goose Hollow platform’s west-bound camera, which appeared to show a gray minivan, like the Toyota Sienna Brophy drives, traveling down Jefferson street shortly after 7:20 a.m.
While the defense argued “fuzzy quality” and editing of the video showed it had possibly been altered, the judge allowed the surveillance to be admitted as evidence, as the footage was screen-grabbed and not enhanced.
The video is crucial as it is appeared to put the van near OCI, where Mr. Brophy was murdered.
“After looking at [the van] through the other video footage… it did appear to be the same subject vehicle,” Guay stated.
After the defense attorney Lisa Maxfield questioned the Analyst on her review of Mr. Brophy’s phone records on the day of his death, Detective Darren Posey of the Portland Police Bureau took the stand.
Now a part of the Enhanced Community Safety Team, which investigates gun violence crimes, Posey was in the homicide detail and a lead detective on the Brophy murder case back in 2018.
According to Posey’s testimony, he arrived the morning of the homicide to work with Detective Merrill, went through a briefing and walkthrough of the crime scene, and participated in the death notification with Crampton Brophy before following up with other leads.
Day 7 of the Brophy trial, April 13, 2022 (KOIN)
Following the homicide, Posey said he interviewed Oscar Taylor, a homeless man who had been involved in a hostile situation at a nearby “potluck in the park,” on the day of Daniel’s death. The defense had previously brought up Taylor’s presence near OCI in a series of security videos shown during the cross-examination of Detective Merrill Tuesday.
Posey also said he identified a van consistent with Crampton Brophy’s minivan on the Bellagio’s surveillance camera video, saying the van in the footage had a scratch that matched pictures of her vehicle.
Detective Posey later identified a firearm that was delivered to him on the day of the homicide as a Glock 17 gen. 4, 9 mm pistol, and confirmed a purchase receipt from a gun show had been recovered for the weapon.
He noted that the slide lock of the firearm was not in its natural resting position when it was first presented to him. And while Posey confirmed the slide and barrel from the gun were not used in the homicide, he told the court an investigation revealed Crampton Brophy had later purchased a Glock 17 slide and barrel from eBay.
identified as a Glock 17 Gen. 4, 9mm pistol. April 13, 2022
Posey explained that he asked the company that sold the gun to Campton Brophy to give a demonstration of how to replace the slide and barrel of one gun with another gun.
The prosecution then played an audio recording of a phone call between Crampton Brophy and Detective Posey, which was made four days after Brophy’s murder.
During the detective’s return call on June 6, Crampton Brophy talks about the hoops she had to jump through to claim life insurance and asks if the detectives are closer to getting the case solved.
In the recording, Crampton Brophy said she had a “‘stupid question,” for Posey.
She went on to ask him if police could provide her a letter declaring that she was no longer considered a suspect in her husband’s murder.
“My insurance company said, ‘just have the detective write a letter that you’re no longer a suspect,’” Brophy said in the audio recording — to which Posey responded by asking her why she would need that.
“Because they don’t want to pay if it turns out that I secretly went down to the school and shot my husband because I thought ‘hey, going into old age without Dan after 25 years is really what I’m looking for,’” she told him.
During the phone call, Posey told Crampton Brophy they “would never do something like that,” and that it’s never been done. When he was asked on the stand whether he had ever heard of something like that before, he told the court he had not up until that point.
Although Crampton Brophy referred to the insurance policy as “little” during the call with Posey and told him it was “only $40,000,” he confirmed that police later found Mrs. Brophy had filed several insurance policies valued in the “hundreds of thousands” — some of which she filed on the same day as her phone call with the detective.
The trial is set to resume on Thursday morning. KOIN 6 News will continue with ongoing coverage.