Jury Finds Nancy Crampton Brophy Guilty Of Murdering Her Husband

PORTLAND, OR — Nancy Crampton Brophy murdered her husband Daniel almost four years ago, a jury in Multnomah County Circuit Court found Wednesday. The jury had deliberated for approximately eight hours over two days before finding her guilty on the single charge of second-degree murder.

Brophy didn't appear to show any emotion as the foreman of the 5 men and 7 women jury read the verdict. The same was not true of members of her family, who appeared shaken. Meanwhile members of her husband's family hugged and seemed relieved.

A lawyer for Crampton Brophy said that they plan to appeal but didn't specify on what grounds.

Crampton Brophy, a self-published romance novelist who once penned an essay, "How to Murder Your Husband," was arrested in Sept. 2018, almost three months after Daniel Brophy was killed.

He was found shot twice at the Oregon Culinary Institute where he was a popular chef and instructor.

The 27-day trial painted two very different pictures of the life that the Brophys shared in their home in Beaverton.

Crampton Brophy's lawyers maintained that their client, who had pleaded not guilty, was very much in love with her husband. They said that while the couple had had financial troubles, things were back on the right path.

Prosecutors took the opposite approach, telling jurors that Crampton killed her husband for reasons that included her belief that she would benefit more from him financially if he was dead than alive.

Before the jury got the case on Tuesday, Deputy District Attorney Shawn Overstreet had one last chance to make his argument to the jury.

"The last time Nancy saw Dan was when she stood over him, looked into his eyes and pulled that trigger one last time," Overstreet said.

Overstreet was responding to an assertion by defense lawyer Kristen Winemiller that the last time Crampton Murphy saw her husband was the morning of his death, when he left their home in Beaverton for his job at the Oregon Culinary Institute where he was a chef and instructor.

Overstreet accused the defense of trying to distract the jury from the facts of the case and of raising issues that were not relevant.

The prosecutor argued that Crampton Brophy had the motive, the means and the time to kill Daniel Brophy.

He disputed the defense assertion that Crampton Brophy would have been better off financially with her husband alive, arguing that a witness detailed how she would have received more money from insurance policies than she would have had if her husband had continued working.

"Nancy is guilty of murdering her husband, and it's now up to you to deliver the justice for chef Dan Brophy and the rest of the Brophy family," Overstreet told jurors.

She was arrested on Sept. 5, 2018, and has been held in Multnomah County Detention Center without bail since then.

A sentencing date has not been set. Crampton Brophy faces life in prison with a minimum of 25 years.