Warning: Some of the details featured in this story are graphic.
After months of speculation, testimony in the case of a missing Colorado woman finally offers the last piece of the puzzle: how Kelsey Berreth died and what happened to her still undiscovered body.
Berreth, a 29-year-old flight instructor and mother to a one-year-old girl, was ruled missing presumed dead by police last December after disappearing from her home on Thanksgiving.
Her fiance, Patrick Frazee, 32, was charged with murder and several counts of solicitation of murder, the charge for hiring an accomplice to help commit the crime.
Earlier this month, a woman claiming to be Frazee's accomplice admitted to helping him cover up Berreth's murder. Krystal Lee Kenney, a 31-year-old nurse from Idaho, said she was the one to dispose of Berreth's cell phone over 700 miles from her home, causing it to "ping" or signal an Idaho cell tower.
Kenney later pleaded guilty to tampering with evidence in a murder case, but would not be sentenced before Frazee as she agreed to testify in his trial.
Now, a Colorado Bureau of Investigation agent has shared Kenney's side of the story at a court hearing, offering the first explanation on the record for how Berreth died and what happened to her body.
Agent Gregg Slater told the court that Frazee, who was having an affair with Kenney, allegedly pressured the nurse several times to murder his fiance, including once in September when Kenney says Frazee suggested poisoning Berreth's coffee.
Kenney admitted to giving Berreth the coffee, while pretending to be her new neighbor, but insists it was not poisoned.
In October, she claims Frazee tried to persuade her two more times, suggesting she could beat Berreth to death with a metal pipe or baseball bat and offering places where she could dispose of the body.
Kenney said she actually drove to Berreth's home, and considered carrying out the plots, but thought better of it.
"I guess if you can't do it, I'll have to do it," Frazee reportedly told her after the third failed attempt.
Kenney claims Frazee called her on Thanksgiving, saying he "had a mess to clean up."
When Kenney arrived at Berreth's home, with a key provided by Frazee, she described finding a bloody crime scene that took her four hours to clean up.
Frazee allegedly described the murder to his mistress, telling her that he had tied a sweater over Berreth's face and beaten her with a baseball bat. Shockingly, Kenney says Frazee also told her his infant daughter was in the room with him during the murder.
After cleaning the crime scene, Slater said that Kenney and Frazee retrieved Berreth's body from a barn where he had hidden it, before burning the remains at his ranch.
This is when Kenney said she drove Berreth's cell phone to Idaho and disposed of it.
Kenney also revealed Frazee told her that Berreth was abusing their daughter, but police say there's no evidence of that.
Police also revealed new, previously unreleased evidence from the crime scene, including how they found Berreth's blood found under the floorboards and on several pieces of furniture in her home that the killer failed to clean up.
After hearing the testimony, a Teller County District Court judge ruled there was enough evidence to take Frazee to trial for murder.
Frazee is currently charged with two counts of murder, three counts of solicitation to commit murder, one count of tampering with a dead body, and two counts of committing a crime of violence.
He'll be back in court on April 8 to enter a plea.
Frazee and Berreth's daughter is currently in the custody of Berreth's parents.
Chery-Lee and Darrell Barreth have filed a wrongful death lawsuit against Frazee, and claim he was motivated to kill their daughter by a custody dispute over their daughter.
[H/T: Denver Post, CNN]
