Author Who Wrote 'How To Murder Your Husband' Has Been Found Guilty Of Killing Husband

A romance novelist who wrote a blog post titled How to Murder Your Husband has been found guilty of doing exactly that. 

A jury in Portland convicted Nancy Crampton Brophy of second-degree murder after fatally shooting her husband Daniel Brophy almost four years ago. 

In June 2018, Daniel Brophy was found dead by his students at Oregon Culinary Institute and authorities revealed he had been shot twice.

Nancy Brophy had a series of romantic titles from the likes of The Wrong Lover, Hell of the Heart, and even The Wrong Husband.

She had written a blog post in 2011 titled How to Murder Your Husband where she pondered the perfect method of killing one’s spouse. 

She claimed a wife who kills her partner must be ‘ruthless’ and ‘very clever’ while ironically stating that guns were too messy. 

Much of the case against Nancy came from the fact she had acquired a handgun and gun pieces in the lead up to her husband’s death. She even picked up a piece that could obscure what gun a bullet was fired from.

Although the gun was never found, Shawn Overstreet, a deputy District Attorney believes it could have been no one else.

According to The New York Times, in his closing statement, he said: “She had the plan in place. She had the opportunity to carry out this murder. She was the only one who had the motive.

“Nancy is the only person who could have committed this crime.”

However, Nancy’s team argued that the gun pieces were actually bought for research as part of a story she was considering about a woman who slowly builds a weapon and turns the tables on an abusive partner. 

The author’s team claimed that Nancy and Daniel were happily married and that the case was only based on ‘conjecture’.

But defence lawyers believed Nancy was looking to collect her husband’s significant life insurance which amounted to $1.4 million. 

Nancy Brophy says retrograde amnesia erased her memories of driving to the scene of her husband's murder at the same time he was shot

On trial, she took the stand:

"I see Dan every day. I talk to him every day... It seems to me that if I had shot him I would know every detail" pic.twitter.com/oVz7ibe8az

— Zane Sparling (@PDXzane) May 19, 2022

It was neighbourhood surveillance that tipped the jury against Nancy, as footage showed the author driving to the Oregon Culinary Institute 30 minutes before her husband’s death, and driving away 20 minutes later. 

While the prosecutors were prohibited from discussing her blog post, they did echo much of what Nancy had discussed.

They concluded with a statement that was based on her post, asking: “If there is one thing that you know about murder, is it that anyone is capable of doing it?”

Within her post, Nancy cited financial issues as a big reason for a wife to be drawn to murder her husband.