VIRGINIA — A defense attorney sought Friday to cast suspicion on another man for the 1986 Chisholm killing of Nancy Daugherty.
Brian Evenson, in his second day of extensive testimony, faced a barrage of questions about his prior sexual relationship with Daugherty and his frequent expressions of fondness and jealousy in the years leading up to her death.
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“From December 1982 until she died, you wanted to be more than friends?” defense attorney J.D. Schmid asked?
“Yes,” Evenson acknowledged. “I wanted to be with her, but I didn’t know what would happen.”
“You dreamt of being in a committed relationship with her?”
“Yes.”
“She was the love of your life?”
“Yes.”
Schmid represents Michael Allan Carbo Jr., 56, of Chisholm, who is accused of first-degree murder for allegedly raping and strangling Daugherty in her own bed. He was charged in the cold case in 2020 after DNA testing identified him as the man whose DNA was found in semen and fingernail scrapings at the crime scene.
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While Carbo was convicted of the crime by a jury in 2022, the defense has long pointed to Evenson as the true perpetrator. The Minnesota Supreme Court last year granted him a new trial, ruling he was improperly barred from presenting that argument at the first proceeding.
Evenson, who was long considered a person of interest by police, was otherwise the last known person to see Daugherty alive and was the first to discover her body the next day.
While Evenson firmly denied that he was responsible for her death, Schmid attempted to paint him as a scorned and obsessed ex-lover whose frustration boiled over into violence.
Evenson acknowledged they engaged in a sexual relationship between 1982-84, but said they broke it off due to feelings of guilt as Daugherty was married.
Schmid presented various letters Evenson wrote over the years, sometimes reminding her of the anniversary of the first time they had sex and making statements such as: “I still love you lots even though I think I’m not supposed to.”
In the weeks before Daugherty was killed, Schmid noted Evenson suggested the victim and her kids could move in with him.
“I would’ve welcomed her,” Evenson explained. “But that wasn’t the driving force in my actions. I wasn’t planning on her moving in with me or anything. I let her know she was welcome.”
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Still, whenever he saw Daugherty, he acknowledged the “thought was always there” that they might have sex, and he had a desire to be in a committed relationship with her. He broke up with his own girlfriend shortly after Daugherty informed him she was getting a divorce, but Evenson denied those events were connected.
Schmid pressed the witness on his 1998 statement to then-Chisholm Police Chief Scott Erickson in which Evenson said: “I've often wondered, `Jeez, did I wake up in the middle of the night, drive over here and kill her, go back to bed and not know it?'"
Evenson described that comment as a “casual conversation between two friends.” But the defense attorney noted it came amid a formal interview in which the chief was pressing him on serious matters, including his possible involvement in the crime.
“Have you had other casual conversations where you admitted to often wondering whether you’re guilty of murder?” Schmid asked.
“No,” the witness responded.
Schmid has also noted to jurors that the only item apparently missing from Daugherty’s residence the night of her death was a single earring. The set had been a Christmas gift from Evenson, and she was wearing the jewelry the evening before she was found dead. He denied taking the missing earring.
In concluding his questioning, the defense attorney pressed Evenson on his decision to speak with a reporter last year and unsolicited strategy advice he gave to prosecutors hoping to “blindside” Carbo’s defense team.
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“I didn’t like the way my good name was being smeared by the defense in this case,” Evenson said.
In response, St. Louis County prosecutor Chris Florey asked the witness to elaborate on his efforts to cooperate with law enforcement over the years and share his emotions.
“Did you want Nancy Daugherty to die?” Florey asked.
“No,” Evenson replied. “Her dying has been the worst event of my life.”
“Has her life made your life better or worse?”
“Worse.”
“Do you miss Ms. Daugherty?”
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Evenson at that point broke down his tears on the witness stand. After several moments, the prosecutor thanked him for his time, never receiving a verbal answer.
Carbo was 18 at the time of Daugherty’s death and lived nearby but was not known to her or her family. The defense concedes that he had sex with her that night, but claims he was blackout drunk and simply does not remember.
Prosecutors, however, say the evidence shows that the sexual assault and killing were closely intertwined and not separate events. They asked jurors to rely on “common sense and science” that will prove Carbo guilty.
The trial is expected to continue for at least another week.
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