How to Murder Your Husband writer guilty... of murdering husband

A ROMANCE novelist who wrote an essay titled How To Murder Your Husband has been convicted of killing her spouse.

A jury took just eight hours to return a guilty verdict against 71-year-old Nancy Crampton Brophy for shooting dead Daniel Brophy.

Prosecutors said the writer, whose Wrong Never Felt So Right series of novels include The Wrong Husband and The Wrong Lover, had been struggling financially before she fatally shot her husband, 63, twice through the heart in June 2018 at a culinary institute where he worked.

Crampton Brophy had denied the charge insisting security camera footage that put her at the scene of the crime merely showed her scouting for writerly inspiration. Her being parked in a nearby car park was merely coincidence, she said.

The author also claimed a missing gun police believe was the murder weapon had been bought as part of research for a novel, and denied the hundreds of thousands of dollars in life insurance she stood to gain were a motive for murder.

Prosecutors alleged Crampton Brophy swapped the barrel of the gun used in the shooting and then discarded the evidence.

Crampton Brophy was arrested in September 2018 and has been in custody ever since. Prosecutor Shawn Overstreet laid out reams of evidence showing how Crampton Brophy had plotted to kill her husband. He said: ‘It’s not just about the money. It’s about the lifestyle Nancy desired that Dan could not give her.’

Crampton Brophy, who faces life in prison, will be sentenced next month.

She showed no reaction inside the crowded Multnomah County courtroom in Portland, Oregon, when the jury of seven women and five men delivered its verdict.

Her lawyers said they would appeal against the seconddegree murder conviction. Her blog post How to Murder Your Husband, which is still available online, discusses methods and motivations for dispatching an unwanted spouse.

These include financial gain and the use of a firearm, although it notes guns are ‘loud, messy, require some skill’. It states: ‘But the thing I know about murder is that every one of us have it in him/ her when pushed far enough.’

Circuit Judge Christopher Ramras ultimately excluded the essay from the trial, noting it was published in 2011.