Brenda Humphrey

Case record: Brenda Humphrey

Background

Brenda Humphrey was convicted with Gregory Wilson for the kidnapping, rape, robbing and killing of Deborah Pooley. Humphrey was a 34-year-old white woman at the time of the offence. Gregory Wilson was 30 at the time of the offence. Deborah Pooley was 36.

Humphrey was described as a former prostitute with a long criminal record.

The offence

On 29 May 1987, Deborah Pooley was abducted at knifepoint outside the restaurant where she worked by Gregory Wilson, then 30, and Brenda Humphrey, a 34-year-old white woman.

Deborah Pooley was forced into her car, raped, killed, and her body was left in a wooded area in central Indiana, a state neighboring Kentucky.

During the abduction and attack, Humphrey drove Pooley’s car to the flood wall in Covington. Wilson took Pooley out of the car and led her up onto the flood wall, where he made her lie down with her eyes closed while Humphrey went to put gas in the car. After Humphrey returned from the gas station, Wilson forced Pooley into the back seat again. Wilson made the victim unbutton her blouse, finished undressing her, and raped her. Wilson tied her hands with a lamp cord while Pooley begged for her life. Wilson told Pooley she would have to die.

Humphrey told Pooley: "You have seen us. You know who we are, and you have to die."

Pooley kept begging: "Please don't kill me. I don't want to die."

Wilson robbed Pooley and strangled her to death before they crossed the state line into Indiana.

Wilson and Humphrey disposed of Pooley’s naked corpse in a wooded thicket in rural Hendrix County, Indiana.

Investigation

The cause of death could not be determined due to the absence of internal organs.

Authorities determined the identity of the corpse only by comparing its remaining teeth with the victim’s dental X-rays.

A forensic entomologist testified that, based on the extent of blowfly maggot development in and on the corpse, the estimated time of death had occurred 15 to 19 days prior to his June 16 examination of the corpse.

Wilson told cell mate Willis Maloney details of the crimes including that the initial intent had been to "snatch" the victim and rob her; that the victim was still alive when her money was taken from her; that the victim was killed before they crossed the state line into Indiana; that the corpse would be so badly decomposed that no sperm would show up; and that they had used the victim’s credit card to purchase, among other things, a watch Wilson was wearing at the time of his arrest which Humphrey later obtained by signing it out from one of the jailers. Wilson also told Maloney: "I bet they can't find what I used to strangle her with."

Maloney’s and Humphrey’s account of the rape was corroborated by the presence of semen on the back seat of the victim’s car. Head hairs similar to those belonging to Humphrey were found inside the victim’s car. Pubic and head hairs similar to those belonging to Wilson were also found inside the victim’s car.

A handwriting expert established that Humphrey had authored the forged credit card receipts.

A search of the hotel room where Wilson and Humphrey were arrested produced various items of clothing, all bearing K-Mart price tags.

Arrest and custody

After they crossed into Indiana and after disposal of the body, Wilson and Humphrey stopped at a Holiday Inn in Crawfordsville, Indiana. According to a registration card, Humphrey and a guest checked into the hotel at 4:19 a.m.

Wilson and Humphrey were later arrested, and Humphrey later obtained a watch by signing it out from one of the jailers.

Timeline

• 29 May 1987 — Deborah Pooley was abducted at knifepoint outside the restaurant where she worked; she was forced into her car, raped and killed, and her body was left in a wooded area in central Indiana.
• 29 May 1987 — Pooley’s car was taken to the flood wall in Covington and Wilson raped Pooley after forcing her into the back seat; Wilson tied her hands with a lamp cord and strangled her to death before crossing into Indiana.
• 30 May 1987 — Wilson and Humphrey stopped at a Holiday Inn in Crawfordsville, Indiana, and checked in at 4:19 a.m.
• 30 May 1987 — Pooley’s credit card was used to purchase two pairs of women’s shoes and hosiery at a Payless Shoe Store in Danville, Illinois.
• 30 May 1987 — Pooley’s credit card was used to make purchases totalling $227.46 at a K-Mart in Danville.
• 30 May 1987 — Purchases from Pooley’s credit card included a man’s Seiko watch and a woman’s Gruen watch for $68.00 each.
• 30 May 1987 — Pooley’s credit card was used to make a $24.50 purchase at an Amoco gas station in Urbana-Champagne, Illinois.
• 31 May 1987 — Wilson and Humphrey returned to the home of Humphrey’s best friend, Beverly Finkenstead.
• 7 June — Humphrey visited Finkenstead and told her details of the crimes in which she and Wilson had participated the previous weekend.
• 15 June — Finkenstead reported what Humphrey had told her to the police.
• 15 June — The Hendrix County, Indiana Sheriff’s Department was summoned to a wooded thicket where a corpse had been discovered.
• 16 June — The forensic entomologist examined the corpse.
• 1988 — Wilson and Humphrey were tried jointly in 1988.
• October 31, 1988 — Humphrey was sentenced to life in prison without parole for 25 years.
• 2010 — A judge halted lethal injections in Kentucky after ruling Kentucky’s method of carrying out the procedure was flawed; Wilson avoided a lethal injection execution at that time.
• September 16, 2010 — The Kentucky Supreme Court weighed whether to let the execution of the man convicted of Pooley’s killing go forward.
• April 19, 2012 — The Kentucky Parole Board rejected Humphrey’s move for immediate release.

Trial

Wilson and Brenda Humphrey were tried jointly in 1988, with the state seeking the death penalty for both.

Humphrey was sentenced to life imprisonment, while Gregory Wilson was sentenced to death.

Humphrey was the only defense witness during the guilt/innocence phase of the trial.

Wilson gave his own closing argument in which he told the jury he was not guilty. Wilson said he: "never met nor knew the victim"

and that Humphrey told her sister that she killed the victim.

The jury returned guilty verdicts against both defendants.

Sentencing

In 1988, Humphrey was sentenced to life imprisonment.

On October 31, 1988, Humphrey was sentenced to life in prison without parole for 25 years.

Appeals

The material described the Kentucky Supreme Court weighing whether to lift a stay of execution in Wilson’s case, and it said that a final ruling in Wilson’s lethal injection case was pending after a judge halted lethal injections in 2010 due to concerns about Kentucky’s method.

Outcome

Humphrey remained in prison after being sentenced to life without parole for 25 years.

The Kentucky Parole Board rejected Humphrey’s move for immediate release. The decision meant Humphrey would not be eligible for release until at least 2017.

Aftermath

At a parole hearing at the Kentucky Correctional Institution for Women in Pewee Valley, Humphrey apologized and spoke publicly for the first time about Pooley’s death and her role in it. Humphrey said she was a drug abuser at the time of the crime.

When asked what she would say to Pooley’s family given the chance, Humphrey said: "What could I say to the family? I hope they have found peace and closure," "If me staying here makes them feel better, then that's where I should be."

A petition circulated by Pooley’s family and friends drew about 250 signatures calling for Humphrey to remain in prison.

Family friend Kathy McBurney Salce said the petition brought Pooley’s friends back together and turned her from a "faceless victim" and made "Debbie come alive again." Salce also said: "Today is a good day"

During the parole hearing, parole panel member Ray Winburn read off details of Pooley’s kidnapping, rape and murder while Humphrey sat silently.

Investigators found Pooley nearly three weeks later in a field in Indiana.

Pooley’s sister, Bonnie Shinkle, and several friends spoke as the Kentucky Supreme Court weighed whether to let Wilson’s execution go forward. Salce said: "It's just opening old wounds for all of us"

and said: "If he's found God, he should be willing to meet his maker," "I don't think he should be seeing any sympathy."

Pooley was a native of Hamilton, Ohio, and moved in with her sister in South Florida in the early 1980s. She went to work as a bartender at Dalts in Kendall, a suburb of Miami. She joined a group of young employees, including Salce, and was described as part of a tight-knit circle of friends that shared holidays. Pooley earned the nickname "Mom" from co-workers.

Pooley doted on her two nieces who sat in a booth at Dalts eating homemade potato chips under her watchful eye. Shinkle said Pooley would read to the children and that: "She made the stories come alive," "I think she would have loved to have had a family."

Perez recalled Pooley buying large amounts of "Hello Kitty" paraphernalia for the girls, and said: "They were the world to her,"

Pooley moved back north to be near her parents, Walter and Anne, in the mid-’80s. Walter was a pressman at the Hamilton, Ohio, Journal-News and died in May. She worked at Barleycorn's Yacht Club in Newport across the Ohio River in Cincinnati.

Shinkle said her parents stopped putting up a Christmas tree and kept all of Pooley's things at their home, and Shinkle said: "They've still got her clothes in a drawer, like she still lives there," "You think she's going to come walking in the door someday."

More than 23 years after Pooley’s death, friends spoke of her in the present tense and remained angry at Wilson. Donna Lovell said: "We were all young and it hit everyone hard,"

The material described that Gregory Lee Wilson, 53, had been set to die by lethal injection at the Kentucky State Penitentiary in Eddyville. It also said the proceedings were halted due to concerns about the inmate's mental state and how Kentucky execution method.