Sufferer advocate Heather Aites is educated to consolation these in emotional agony, like Dan Krug, who dashed residence from work and realized his spouse, Kristil, had been discovered murdered of their storage in suburban Broomfield, Colorado, on Dec. 14, 2023.
Heather Aites: It’s a bizarre feeling standing there when anyone is being informed, I’m sorry, however the one you love has died.
An emotional Dan Krug is comforted by sufferer advocate Heather Aites as he learns his spouse Kristil Krug was discovered murdered of their storage on Dec. 14, 2023.
Broomfield Police Division
Heather Aites: This man has been going via a stalking case along with his spouse. … he’s being stalked as effectively. And now she is gone.
As investigators searched the crime scene for clues, Aites drove Dan to the police station. An officer’s physique digital camera recorded the journey.
Heather Aites: He was crouched over to the aspect of the passenger door. … And I’m comforting Dan by rubbing his again.
Dan and Kristil Krug had been married for 16 years. The couple, each 43, had three younger youngsters.
Peter Van Sant: What did he say within the automotive?
Heather Aites: Within the automotive … he was fairly targeted on the children. … he was very adamant about desirous to be the one to inform his youngsters.
Below the command of Broomfield Police chief Enea Hempelmann, investigators had been doing every little thing of their energy to search out the killer.
Chief Enea Hempelmann: We … instantly, uh, began doing interviews … speaking to neighbors, canvassing.
Kristil and Dan Krug
Lars Grimsrud
A number of hours had handed since Dan Krug’s emotional journey to the police station. He had settled down. And he informed detectives there was nothing out of the unusual that morning.
DAN KRUG (to detectives): Mornings are very routine in the home.
He mentioned they received the children to high school, and Kristil appeared effective when he left for his job on the Colorado Division of Public Well being and Setting.
DAN KRUG (to detectives): Whereas I used to be driving, uh, my — my cellphone dinged.
Dan mentioned Kristil texted him, asking if he may decide up one of many youngsters after college. However when he texted again and requested what time, he mentioned Kristil by no means responded.
DAN KRUG (to detectives): And that — that was bizarre.
So bizarre — so out of character for Kristil — Dan referred to as police and requested them to examine on her.
When there was no reply on the Krug’s entrance door, Officer John O’Hayre says he used his patrol automotive to look via the Krug’s storage window. “I immediately see Kristil … apparently lifeless, … had, uh, some type of wound to the head.”
Broomfield Police Division
OFFICER JOHN O’HAYRE (bodycam): I received a feminine down within the storage.
Lars Grimsrud: There should not phrases that may describe, what you’re feeling as a mother or father at that time.
Linda Grimsrud: It’s in all probability a dad and mom’ worst nightmare
Kristil’s dad and mom, Lars and Linda Grimsrud.
Lars Grimsrud: She was an engineer. … She had … unimaginable abilities in, uh, math, sciences, chemistry, physics. … she additionally had the — the abilities within the … arts.
Linda Grimsrud She cherished to only get out and dwell life.
All through her life, Kristil spent numerous hours working along with her dad on traditional muscle automobiles in his colourful storage.
Lars Grimsrud (in his storage): We’d work on the automobiles. … We’d race the automobiles. … Kristil at all times felt very snug coming over right here. … If we wanted to speak or no matter, that is the place we might sit and simply … take pleasure in one another’s firm.
Kristil Krug Tells Police She is Being Terrorized by a Stalker
However these enjoyable, informal conversations all of a sudden turned disturbing within the fall of 2023, when Kristil first informed her father that she was dwelling with intense worry.
Lars Grimsrud (in his storage): She sat right here and informed me that she was being stalked and that simply shocked me. … and I requested her, effectively, have you ever talked to the police?
Kristil had referred to as the police and met with Broomfield Detective Andrew Martinez.
Det. Andrew Martinez: She got here into the interview room and simply type of took over and simply informed me every little thing … with out hesitation.
Their dialog was recorded.
KRISTIL KRUG (to Det. Martinez): I preserve making an attempt to remind myself, that is meaning to be terrorizing. That is meaning to scare me.
Kristil Krug talks with Det. Andrew Martinez on Nov. 7, 2023, concerning the unsettling texts she was receiving.
Broomfield Police Division
Kristil informed Martinez that on Oct. 2, 2023, she acquired an unsettling textual content from somebody named Anthony, who mentioned he could be coming to the realm and requested if Kristil wished to “hook up.”
Peter Van Sant: And the way does she reply to that?
Det. Andrew Martinez: She didn’t reply.
The next day, Kristil informed Martinez she received extra texts from Anthony that included obscenities and mentioned, “you should kill urself. Dont waste my time.”
Peter Van Sant: Any person that wishes to hook up, now could be saying, go kill your self. How do you interpret that — that second textual content?
Det. Andrew Martinez: It’s a reasonably excessive response to not getting a response.
Kristil informed Martinez she knew an Anthony from her previous, Anthony Holland, a boyfriend she dated for a couple of yr after highschool and into faculty. The 2 broke up within the fall of 2000. Lars and Linda Grimsrud say again then Holland made an excellent impression.
Linda Grimsrud: Very pleasant very courteous. He at all times had good manners.
In 2002, out of the blue, Holland contacted Kristil. Based on Kristil, Holland by no means appeared to take no for a solution — contacting her once more in 2005, 2010 and 2016 through Fb.
KRISTIL KRUG (to Det. Martinez): He’s like we’re meant to be collectively … I mentioned, “this is really creepy for me. You need to stop.”
Kristil deleted Fb and thought she’d heard the final of Holland. However then got here the texts in 2023.
KRISTIL KRUG (to Det. Martinez): This was alarming. He’s by no means mentioned this sort of stuff to me earlier than, so —
Peter Van Sant: That means he may be surveilling them each, proper?
Det. Andrew Martinez: Appropriate.
KRISTIL KRUG (to Det. Martinez): This now could be escalating.
Det. Andrew Martinez: The harassment, uh, is simply fixed. … And she or he’s simply believing that each nook presents some kind of hazard for her.
Peter Van Sant: Getting that info takes time. … Generally these corporations are reluctant, or they gradual stroll getting that info to you, right?
Det. Andrew Martinez: Sure.
Kristil had been looking for Holland on her personal. She employed a personal investigator, and ultimately situated him dwelling in Utah, about 500 miles away. Kristil shared her discovery with Martinez, who selected to not contact Holland.
Det. Andrew Martinez: I defined to Kristil … that we wished to assemble as a lot proof as attainable and ideally get hold of an arrest warrant so when legislation enforcement does go to, uh, Anthony’s door, we are able to take him into custody and never need to stroll away.
However Lars Grimsrud says Kristil had been shedding endurance with the investigation.
Lars Grimsrud: She made the remark that she felt … they’d deserted her that — that they weren’t doing issues aggressively sufficient.
Kristil had taken steps to guard herself and her household – together with putting in safety cameras.
Lars Grimsrud (in his storage): She was scared. … I mentioned …effectively this sounds severe sufficient it is advisable to begin carrying. … you’ll use certainly one of my weapons for — for proper now.
Peter Van Sant: Is that this the very gun that she took along with her?
Lars Grimsrud: That’s the precise gun that she initially then carried.
Dan Krug was additionally interviewed. The threats had been taking a toll on him, as effectively.
DAN KRUG (to detectives): I went to the grocery retailer briefly on Tuesday and somebody behind me dropped a can and I f****** panicked. … So, what am I doing? I’m panicking. And I’m doing a s*** job of defending my spouse. … So, I’m not — I’m not doing good.
Dan Krug informed Martinez the stalker had a nickname.
DANIEL KRUG (to detectives): We name him Kickman.
Peter Van Sant: The place’d that identify come from?
Because the weeks glided by and Martinez’s investigation continued, Lars and Linda Grimsrud say the fixed threats had been ruining their daughter’s life.
Linda Grimsrud: It was simply heartbreaking. She was simply in tears … She was similar to, what am I gonna do? How am I gonna dwell?
Peter Van Sant: Did she really feel she was being hunted down by Anthony?
Linda Grimsrud: Sure.
Kristil additionally shared her fears along with her siblings Jenna Ericson and Josh Adamson.
Jenna Ericson: She was terrified.
Peter Van Sant: Did she ever categorical to both of you the worry that this man I feel goes to kill me?
Jenna Ericson: Sure.
Josh Adamson: Yep.
Jenna Ericson: She mentioned, it’s both going to be me or him that’s useless. And I’m going to do every little thing in my energy to ensure it’s not me.
Police Zero in on Kristil Krug’s Stalker
When Kristil Krug was discovered useless in her storage, Detective Martinez had just one suspect in thoughts.
Det. Andrew Martinez: My preliminary assumption was that … Anthony Holland had, uh, gone to her residence and murdered her.
Inside hours, native police descended on Holland’s residence in Eagle Mountain close to Salt Lake Metropolis.
Peter Van Sant: So that you’re alone in the home … what do you hear?
Anthony Holland: Pounding on the door.
Peter Van Sant (bangs hand on desk): Like bang, bang, bang, bang, bang.
Anthony Holland: Yeah.
Peter Van Sant: Huge time.
Anthony Holland: So I’m going to the door. … I see like eight cops. … I had no thought what was occurring.
OFFICER (bodycam): The place’s your ID at?
ANTHONY HOLLAND: It’s in my room.
OFFICER: Have you ever ever heard of the identify Kristil Krug?
Anthony Holland: They requested me if I knew Kristil Krug and I informed them I did know her.
ANTHONY HOLLAND (bodycam): She was my very first girlfriend ever.
OFFICER: And when was the final time you talked to Kristil? Has it been some time? A minute?
ANTHONY HOLLAND: Uh, it’s been a minute. Yeah.
Peter Van Sant: When was the final time you had reached out to Kristil?
Anthony Holland: It was round 2014, 2016.
Holland says he’d reached out to Kristil on Fb years earlier than.
Peter Van Sant: What are you considering? “Why would they come all — all the way here to ask me about Kristil?”
Anthony Holland: I assumed it was for that message … the place I mentioned I missed her. That’s the one factor I may consider as a result of I used to be like I haven’t contacted her since then.
Peter Van Sant: They didn’t inform you that Kristil Krug had been murdered?
Anthony Holland: No, they didn’t inform me.
Police had been there to assemble info from their suspect — not give it.
Anthony Holland: They requested me the place I used to be that day. … Can I show the place I used to be?
Holland had made a purchase order simply hours earlier at a Kohl’s retailer close to his residence.
Peter Van Sant: What’d you purchase?
Anthony Holland: A sweatshirt, this one proper right here.
And he nonetheless had the receipt. The acquisition was made at 12:16 p.m. Investigators say Kristil was attacked round 8 a.m.
Peter Van Sant: It seems that was probably the most essential purchases you’ve got ever made.
Anthony Holland: As a result of it was my alibi, as a result of there is no such thing as a manner I may have made it from Colorado again to Utah to purchase the sweatshirt. … It was an eight-hour drive.
Holland additionally confirmed police a few of his employment information. They proved he’d been in Utah all alongside — by no means touring to Colorado because the messages from Kristil’s stalker led cops to imagine.
Anthony Holland: I had a bunch of receipts from my work displaying the times that I labored. They usually took these, took my receipt from Kohl’s and … went to the squad automotive and made a cellphone name … got here again in and informed me I used to be free to go.
OFFICER (to Holland): You might have a greater day, OK?
Again in Colorado, Dan Krug was nonetheless head to head with investigators. He informed them his idea of the crime.
DAN KRUG (to detectives): So in my mind, the story that I’ve is somebody got here to the door, perhaps she went outdoors to get a package deal and so they will need to have are available in. And she or he’s — she’s a fighter. She’s — she is powerful. She would’ve fought.
Earlier within the interview, Dan requested he inform the kids what had occurred to their mom.
VICTIM ADVOCATE: Your youngsters have no idea but.
DAN KRUG: Are they right here?
VICTIM ADVOCATE: They’re right here. They’re proper within the corridor.
DAN KRUG (pats his chest): I’m — I ought to inform my youngsters.
VICTIM ADVOCATE: You wish to inform them?
DAN KRUG: I simply don’t understand how.
VICTIM ADVOCATE: That’s OK.
Det. Andrew Martinez: Watching their response is simply heartbreaking.
Investigators had been working each angle. They checked these safety cameras Kristil had put in on the home.
Det. Andrew Martinez: The doorbell digital camera, the aspect digital camera, and the aspect home digital camera, uh, had been all manually turned off.
Apart from that one Nest digital camera close to the storage. Police canvassed Dan and Kristil Krug’s neighbors in the hunt for something their residence safety cameras might need recorded.
Additionally they enlisted Randy Pihlak, a digital forensic examiner with the Broomfield Police Division, to take a more in-depth have a look at these disturbing messages to Kristil.
Randy Pihlak: I feel it was in all probability 4 hours, 5 hours after the homicide was reported to us.
Now that the stalking case had turn out to be a homicide investigation, Pihlak was capable of file new, expedited requests for info. He rapidly found that messages from two accounts used to harass Kristil had been despatched from the identical location.
Randy Pihlak: Each … got here again to the identical IP handle. That IP handle was the Colorado Division of Public Well being and Setting, which is the place Dan labored.
The messages to Kristil threatening her, threatening her husband, had been despatched utilizing the Wi-Fi system at Dan’s workplace. For the primary time, detectives believed Kristil’s stalker may very well be sitting proper in entrance of them. Might he be her killer as effectively?
Det. Andrew Martinez: All the air was simply type of evacuated out of our investigations room and we realized … we have to concentrate on Dan and the place he’s been and what he’s been doing.
Martinez, together with Detective Jennifer King Sullivan, confronted Dan.
DET. KING SULLIVAN: Who do you suppose killed her?
DAN KRUG: I feel it’s Kickman. I feel it’s Anthony.
DET. MARTINEZ: What if I informed you that we had already spoken with Anthony and there’s no manner that he was on the town in the present day?
DAN KRUG: Then I’ve nothing. And, then I’m f****** terrified to convey my youngsters residence.
DET. KING SULLIVAN: What are you petrified of?
DAN KRUG: If it wasn’t him, who was it?
However at the same time as Dan claimed ignorance, the detectives noticed that his physique language informed a distinct story.
Detective Martinez says Dan Krug’s physique language modified after being informed Anthony Holland was eradicated as a suspect in his spouse’s homicide.
Broomfield Police Division
Peter Van Sant: What had been you seeing with Dan?
Det. Andrew Martinez: He took a defensive posture. He sat again within the sofa just a little bit. He crossed his arms. … Kinda like I’ve nothing to elucidate.
Det. Jennifer King Sullivan: I feel his head is spinning, desirous about what else are they gonna discover?
Dan Krug Goes From Grieving Husband to Homicide Suspect
DET. KING SULLIVAN (questioning): The thriller continues and –
DAN KRUG: And it has be the husband.
DET. KING SULLIVAN: In case you had been watching these details unfold in entrance of you in a film, what would you say occurred?
DAN KRUG:There must be another person.
Moments after detectives informed Dan Krug they’d eradicated Anthony Holland as a suspect, Dan calmly insisted he was not the one who stalked and murdered his spouse Kristil.
DAN KRUG: I cherished her… there must be another person. However I don’t know who that’s.
Martinez and King Sullivan didn’t imagine a phrase of it, and had been struck by how stoic — how unmoved — Dan was.
Det. Jennifer King Sullivan: He had no response, um, and actually no clarification.
DET. KING SULLIVAN (questioning): Assist me make sense of it.
DAN KRUG: I don’t know. I’m not the one who does this. … I don’t have a story or a narrative that I can give you.
Inside minutes, Dan Krug had gone from sympathetic sufferer to homicide suspect.
DANIEL KRUG (to detectives): I get the narrative you’re placing collectively, however it alleges that I’d do that to my youngsters. … I like and adore my youngsters.
Det. Andrew Martinez: It’s a reasonably horrifying concept that … the most important menace that to you and your security is definitely dwelling in the identical home as you.
DET. MARTINEZ (to Dan Krug): We have to course of you for bodily proof, OK.
Det. Andrew Martinez: He is aware of that we’re on to him. … We simply didn’t have sufficient proof at that time to take him into custody.
DET. MARTINEZ (to Dan Krug): We’ll stroll you out to the foyer …
On his manner out, Dan saved insisting the true killer was nonetheless on the free and he made a determined plea.
DAN KRUG (to detectives): I simply need the f***** to pay … He took my youngsters’s mom earlier than Christmas. They’re by no means gonna recover from that. …I don’t care if you happen to seize him. I don’t care if you happen to kill him. … Discover him … Don’t simply as assume it’s me. Preserve wanting.
Peter Van Sant: When did you discover out that Dan was now an individual of — of curiosity on this case?
Linda Grimsrud: I feel at his interview. So that very same day after they held him and so they held him fairly late.
An post-mortem revealed what occurred to Kristil. She had been attacked from behind with a blunt object.
Det. Andrew Martinez: Bludgeoned to dying within the head and rolled over after which stabbed within the coronary heart.
With Dan now the prime suspect, the detectives wished to know extra about his relationship with Kristil. Based on Kristil’s dad and mom, it wasn’t good.
Linda Grimsrud: She mentioned, effectively, I’m sleeping on the sofa mother.
Peter Van Sant: However you knew there was hassle in paradise, proper?
Linda Grimsrud: Yeah. And particularly in that — these previous couple of months.
Kristil’s household says these troubles had been brought on by Dan’s fiery mood.
Peter Van Sant: What set him off?
Lars Grimsrud: It — it may very well be something, however it was normally if he was shedding management …
Kristil’s sister Jenna Ericson says she may at all times inform when Dan was indignant.
Jenna Ericson: His face would get actually crimson when he was getting annoyed … I vividly bear in mind seeing his face get crimson.
Linda Grimsrud: They’d a factor the place … they’d go, OK, stroll away. … You might want to stroll away. And so, you realize, they had been making an attempt to handle it.
Kristil Krug was an engineer who additionally had skills within the arts. “She loved to just get out and live life,” says her mom Linda Grimsrud.
Lars Grimsrud
However within the weeks earlier than her dying, in accordance with her dad and mom, Kristil was on the point of depart Dan.
Linda Grimsrud: She didn’t wanna have this marriage anymore.
Lars Grimsrud: She had determined that she wanted to break up.
Because the detectives methodically constructed their case, extra proof was uncovered on Dan and Kristil Krug’s cell telephones by digital forensic knowledgeable Randy Pihlak — together with texts from the morning of the homicide.
Randy Pihlak: So on Kristil’s cellphone, um, we see textual content messages to Lars, Detective Martinez, after which a textual content message to Dan.
The one Dan mentioned he acquired whereas driving to work about selecting up one of many youngsters in school. However Pihlak found these texts had been set on a timer. It was a brand new function on the cellphone Kristil had.
Peter Van Sant: Who do you imagine preprogrammed these messages?
Randy Pihlak: Uh, Dan Krug.
Peter Van Sant: And he did it to do what?
Randy Pihlak: To cover his actions.
Pihlak says the messages had been preprogrammed earlier than Dan left the home.
Randy Pihlak: And we imagine Kristil was deceased.
Peter Van Sant: That for him, then, would set up an alibi that effectively I had already left and my spouse is alive proper? She’s texting me.
Randy Pihlak: Appropriate.
All whereas Dan casually arrived at work.
Pihlak found extra damning proof from Dan’s cellphone: web searches like “What happens when you’re knocked unconscious?” “Do people really go unconscious when hit in the head?” and “How hard for head trauma to go unconscious?”
Randy Pihlak: All searches had been the day earlier than the homicide … it was slightly damning.
Simply two days after Kristil had been murdered, detectives Martinez and King Sullivan felt they’d sufficient proof to cost Dan Krug with stalking and murdering his spouse.
Det. Jennifer King Sullivan: We start following him.
Peter Van Sant: What number of automobiles we speaking about?
Jennifer King Sullivan: Most likely eight automobiles. … we’re like, “that’s him, he’s alone in the car.”
Det. Jennifer King Sullivan: We comply with him all the way in which to the grocery retailer.
Det. Jennifer King Sullivan: We anticipate him to park … we rapidly converge on his automotive.
Dan Krug, pictured left, along with his arms up as he’s taken into custody for the homicide of his spouse Kristil Krug in a grocery store car parking zone.
Broomfield Police Division
Det. Jennifer King Sullivan: We encompass him …
OFFICER (bodycam): You’re below arrest.
Det. Jennifer King Sullivan: … pull him out of his automotive and … inform him he’s being arrested for the homicide of his spouse.
Det. Andrew Martinez: I requested him only one query.
DET. MARTINEZ (to Dan Krug/bodycam): Do you wish to inform your youngsters that you simply killed their mom, or would you like anyone else to?
Peter Van Sant: That’s fairly a line. … That goes again to when … he mentioned he wished to inform his youngsters that their mom was useless.
Det. Andrew Martinez: After I requested that query, he simply mentioned that he wished to talk along with his lawyer after which regarded away from me.
Det. Andrew Martinez: And I shut the door and he went to the county jail.
Lars Grimsrud: I felt an enormous aid. … they received him. … It felt like a burden had been lifted, that he had been arrested.
And shortly, Kristil’s household would come head to head with the person detectives say murdered her.
Lars Grimsrud: He, uh, regarded proper at me and smiled at me.
They usually hear, for the primary time, Dan’s aspect of the story.
Kristil Krug’s Remaining Moments Revealed
When Deputy District Attorneys Kate Armstrong and Stephanie Fritz had been assigned to prosecute Daniel Krug, they are saying they had been struck by his downright stupidity in believing he may get away with murdering his spouse by impersonating her ex-boyfriend.
Kate Armstrong: The audacity with which he thought he may manipulate not solely his household, his family members, but in addition the police division.
Peter Van Sant: And a few of this … is subtle, is it not?
Stephanie Fritz: It’s subtle, however not too subtle as a result of we had been capable of determine it out.
The trial started in April 2025.
Lars Grimsrud: When he first got here in … he smiled at me like, he was saying, “hey, thanks for being here for me” … I imagine my facial features … made it very clear that I used to be not on his aspect.
The prosecution laid out Kristil’s remaining hours of life for the jury.
Kate Armstrong: On December 14th of 2023, Kristil Krug began her day like every other day. … She took her youthful two youngsters to high school.
And when she returned –
Kate Armstrong: Kristil … pulled again into her storage. She will get out of the automotive … when she is attacked from behind.
Peter Van Sant: And did she ever see him approaching, do you suppose? … Or was this an ambush?
Stephanie Fritz: It was an ambush. … She had two or three cranium fractures.
Kate Armstrong: As she’s laying on the ground bleeding, he … pushes her over, will get over her and stabs her … simply above her coronary heart.
Peter Van Sant: And why do you suppose — he had to try this vicious final stab?
Kate Armstrong: I feel it was rage. I feel it was management and energy that he wished to exert over Kristil.
Dan Krug had been shedding that management for a very long time, say prosecutors. Their idea of the crime is that Dan despatched Kristil these disturbing messages in an try and drive her nearer to him and never depart, hoping she’d see him as her heroic protector.
Kate Armstrong: It was not working … the stalking was not main her again to him … I feel it then turned to, ‘I’m nonetheless shedding her’ type of, uh, ‘if I can’t have you ever, no person can.’”
The prosecution says that within the final days of her life, Kristil had begun to suspect that her stalker was presumably her husband.
Stephanie Fritz: We all know from Dan’s personal interview that she confronted him and mentioned, “I can’t rule you out because the stalker.
DAN KRUG (to detectives): She mentioned that proper to my face, that she wished to know if it was me. And I informed her no.
Peter Van Sant: He felt the partitions closing in.
Stephanie Fritz: Closing in. He was going to lose Kristil anyway. … He was going to be uncovered because the stalker. … So he did that final, uh, deadly act and murdered her.
Prosecutors say Dan Krug tried to outsmart investigators — pre-programming these textual content messages on Kristil’s cellphone earlier than he left the home — assuming he wouldn’t be caught.
Kate Armstrong: Have been we not capable of uncover that that was a delayed ship textual content, it could have appeared as if Kristil was nonetheless alive when he left the home.
Peter Van Sant: Who took this image, do you imagine?
Randy Pihlak: Uh, Dan. Dan took this image.
Pihlak found that the cellphone which snapped that photograph was in selfie mode utilizing a timer — a undeniable fact that Kate Armstrong reminded the jury about in her closing argument. That’s when the choose allowed cameras into the courtroom.
KATE ARMSTRONG (in courtroom): The cellphone was propped on the again of this automobile subsequent to him. … The defendant took this {photograph} after which he despatched it to his spouse.
PHILLIP GEIGLE (in courtroom): We respectfully disagree with the prosecution on this case.
Protection lawyer Phillip Geigle argued the homicide investigation was poor. The blunt object used on Kristil’s head and the knife used to stab her had been by no means recovered by police. The protection additionally zeroed in on the truth that Kristil’s cellphone was not examined for fingerprints or DNA.
PHILLIP GEIGLE (in courtroom): Why not the cellphone? … The prosecution desires to imagine, “Well, you know, there may not be a lot to be found there.” Effectively, you gained’t know if you happen to gained’t attempt.
Geigle mentioned different forensic checks supported his declare that Dan Krug is harmless.
PHILLIP GEIGLE (in courtroom): They submitted the chest swabs. … And you realize whose DNA wasn’t there? The one who lived in the home, the one that ate within the kitchen with them, the one that shared the lounge, that fool proper there (factors to Dan Krug).
PHILLIP GEIGLE (in courtroom): There’s completely no bodily proof on Mr. Krug’s clothes. … There’s no blood discovered on that automotive inside or out. It’s searched thrice.
In week three of the trial, the jurors started deliberations. After a day-and-a-half, verdicts had been reached.
Choose Priscilla Loew learn the verdicts.
JUDGE LOEW: We, the jury, discover the defendant responsible of homicide within the first diploma. … We, the jury, discover the defendant, responsible of rely quantity two, stalking, excessive emotional misery.
Krug was additionally discovered responsible of stalking with credible menace and prison impersonation.
Lars Grimsrud: Responsible, responsible, responsible, responsible. And at that time I feel I began respiratory once more.
Krug was later sentenced to life in jail with out the potential of parole on the homicide cost, and an extra nine-and-a-half years for the stalking and impersonation counts. However proper after his conviction, in a video name from jail, Dan Krug informed his household that the jury received it mistaken, saying the true killer remained at massive and that his youngsters may very well be the following targets.
DAN KRUG (video name with household): I want them protected. I don’t know the place or who did this. The place he’s or who he’s. I want my youngsters out of Colorado.
Might Kristil Krug’s Homicide Have Been Prevented?
As Daniel Krug started serving his life sentence, he continued making video calls to his dad and mom and brother within the days instantly after his conviction. The person who viciously murdered his spouse, terrorized his personal youngsters and lied to everybody, was searching for sympathy from his aspect of the household.
DAN KRUG (video name with household): I’m in all probability sleeping like 16 hours a day due to the despair.
PATRICIA KRUG: Mm-hmm.
DAN KRUG: I sleep, I learn and I cry. That’s about it.
PATRICIA KRUG: OK.
Regardless of overwhelming digital proof in opposition to him, Krug fell again to his outdated methods — mendacity to his family members — now claiming he was wrongly convicted.
DAN KRUG (video name with household): They by no means produced a single piece of onerous proof.
His brother, Jeremy Krug, gave Dan Krug a much-needed actuality examine — that the muse of the household’s loyalty had began to crack.
JEREMY KRUG (video name with Dan Krug): Assist is dwindling. You already know, mother and pa wish to imagine you very a lot. I wish to imagine you very a lot. … There’s rather a lot that’s come out, um, and as imaginative as I could be with discovering explanations and methods to theorize how that, you realize this or that might have been, the, the truth, um, a few of it’s past even my creativity.
The case that ended with a homicide had begun with stalking and prison impersonation of Anthony Holland. Which begs the query: what if Detective Martinez had acted on the data Kristil and the non-public investigator had uncovered.
Anthony Holland: They need to have discovered me instantly. … They need to have discovered me, they need to have got here to my home. They need to approached me. They need to have talked to me.
However Detective Martinez selected to not name, telling “48 Hours” he didn’t have sufficient proof to take action, and was involved a cellphone name may exacerbate the state of affairs.
Peter Van Sant: Is that this one thing the place you’ve kicked your self about this?
Det. Andrew Martinez: Uh, this case has, uh, haunted me since, um, it occurred. … And the end result of this case has haunted me for the previous two years.
Peter Van Sant: And if you happen to may get in a time machine, maybe you’d make that decision in the present day?
Det. Andrew Martinez: Completely.
And Kristil’s dad and mom sympathize with Martinez and imagine their daughter was doomed it doesn’t matter what the end result of his investigation.
Lars Grimsrud: Inevitably, I feel he was gonna kill her. … When somebody units their thoughts to do one thing like that and that’s what the plan was … I don’t suppose that will’ve stopped the homicide from taking place.
Kristil’s dying has left a gap within the lives of those that skilled her love and pleasure for all times.
Anthony Holland: I’ve had a number of different girlfriends and I’ve by no means been in love with anyone else like her.
Peter Van Sant: She was the love of your life.
Anthony Holland: Yeah.
Jenna Ericson hopes her sister Kristil’s story will function a cautionary story.
Jenna Ericson: If it could possibly assist only one different individual, who’s in a harmful state of affairs, like she was in, that it provides them the energy to make a transfer as a result of it could possibly escalate and it could possibly escalate actually, actually quick.
Peter Van Sant: What was misplaced when she was taken from us?
Linda Grimsrud: Her mild, you realize, her mild.
Lars Grimsrud: That’s a — that’s a troublesome one to speak about as a result of there’s, uh, there’s a lot. I need her to leap outta that automotive and say, “hey Papa.”
All through her life, Kristil spent numerous hours working along with her dad on traditional muscle automobiles.
Lars Grimsrud
Lars nonetheless passes his time restoring components for classic automobiles. That father-daughter interest is now being handed right down to Kristil’s youngsters.
Lars Grimsrud: They’re in right here. They run that very same electrical screwdriver and so they can tear a carburetor aside.
Peter Van Sant: So, in that manner, you’re honoring her reminiscence. Aren’t you?
Lars Grimsrud: Effectively, that’s the entire thought. Yeah.
Peter Van Sant: You keep on that custom.
Lars Grimsrud: Yeah. That’s the entire thought. She, uh, she would get such a kick out of seeing the children doing the stuff that she was concerned in.
Linda Grimsrud: I have a look at my grandkids and … I discover a second of peace … as a result of I see her.
The household has began an internet fundraising marketing campaign to assist Kristil’s three youngsters.
Produced by Betsy Shuller and Susan Mallie. Elena DiFiore and Ryan N. Smith are the event producers. Michael Loftus is the affiliate producer. Marcus Balsam, Diana DeCilio, Phil Tangel and George Baluzy are the editors. Anthony Batson is the senior broadcast producer. Nancy Kramer is the manager story editor. Judy Tygard is the manager producer.
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