Heidi Joy Tretheway was shocked when she learned that a romance novel author had been arrested for allegedly murdering her spouse — and she knew exactly who he was.
“I was shocked,” Tretheway told Fox News Digital. “The first time I knew this was happening was when I saw the arrest photo of Nancy Crampton Brophy on the news.”
An Oregon author plotted for months to kill her husband, and has turned her nefarious plan into a true-life story. She’s the subject of Wondery’s new true-crime documentary podcast. “Happily Ever After: Dan and Nancy” Tretheway, who was once in the same writing circle as Crampton Brophy, will host the show and feature new interviews with people who knew Crampton Brophy over the years.
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Years before Nancy Crampton Brophy murdered her husband, Dan Brophy, she wrote an essay called “How to Kill Your Husband.” (Multnomah County Sheriff’s Office)
Before life became stranger than fiction, Tretheway inducted the Rose City Romance Writers of America, a local chapter of the Romance Writers of America, in 2013. The president at the time was Crampton Brophy.
“She was like the queen bee,” Tretheway recalls, “and seemed to enjoy all the attention that came with being president. She ran meetings, she stood at the front of the room, she gave unsolicited advice. She just loved being the center of attention.”
Ms Tretheway said she proudly showed off her new book, due to be published in early 2014. Ms Crampton Brophy was not amused.
The Nancy Crampton Brophy case is the subject of Wondery’s true crime documentary podcast, Happily Never After. (wonder)
“Nancy immediately criticized the cover,” Tretheway said. “She said the title was in the wrong place, the colors were in the wrong place, and a lot of other people in the group added their criticisms. At first I felt attacked because I was very proud of the book and thought it was well done.”
“I made the suggested changes and the book became one of my most commercially successful books, so the feedback wasn’t bad by any means. But the feedback from someone who wasn’t very successful as a writer was shocking.”
But Crampton Brophy wasn’t always so forthright about everything. Tretheway said this writer never mentioned her husband, Dan Brophy, an instructor at the Oregon Culinary Institute.
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Nancy Crumpton Brophy was arrested in September 2018. She was charged with murder in the death of Daniel Brophy, 63. (Dave Killen/The Oregonian via The Associated Press, Pool)
“There was no insight to suggest there were problems at home,” Tretheway said. “None of her friends who have spoken on this podcast have ever suggested there were problems. This crime seemed outlandish because I didn’t see Nancy as the type of person who would do something like that. She was very goofy, very outgoing and seemed like a sweet old lady who loved attention.”
“It was never imagined she would commit such a brutal crime,” Mr Tretheway added.
Friends explained that the couple are polar opposites but have a thriving and very loving relationship with each other.
Heidi Joy Tretheway, who met Nancy Brophy, is the host of “Happily Never After.” (wonder)
“Nancy was loud and always laughing, whereas Dan was very quiet and introspective,” Tretheway says. “He loved to go for mushrooms in the woods. He liked organic gardening. He probably preferred chickens to talking to people. They were very different personalities, but they had a loving marriage. One of Nancy’s friends said she would have sex with him every night and then go back to writing. True devotion.”
But behind closed doors, investigators said, a very different story was unfolding. Prosecutors said the Brophys were in financial difficulty. In the fall before Brophy’s death, the couple withdrew $35,000 from Brophy’s retirement account, or about half of the total, according to KOIN 6 News in Portland. The funds were used to pay off the mortgage and credit card bills.
Meanwhile, Crampton Brophy kept busy writing, and over the years published novellas and romantic suspense novellas with titles like “The Wrong Lover,” “The Wrong Hero” and “The Wrong Husband.”
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Nancy Crampton Brophy’s Amazon author page. (Amazon Screenshot)
Then in 2011, she penned a satirical essay called “How to Kill Your Husband.” KOIN 6 News In the article, Crampton Brophy listed several ways to kill someone, including firing a gun, the report said.
“It’s loud, it’s messy and it requires skill,” she wrote, according to the outlet. “If it takes 10 seconds for some idiot to die, he’s either bad at aiming or on drugs.”
“I think Nancy wrote it just for shock value, for clickbait,” Tretheway says. “It was consistent with her personality. At the time, people in the comments section were saying, ‘Nancy, I love the way you think. You’re so mean and stubborn.’ One of the authors even said, ‘I relate to this. There are many times when I want to kill my husband.'”
Prosecutors say Nancy Crampton Brophy’s motive was greed. (KPTV/Pool)
“I think it was written with black humour,” Tretheway said. “Nobody took it seriously or as a threat to Dan’s life. Some people joked, ‘I’ll call Dan and make sure he’s OK.’ I’m not defending it as good writing, but in context I can certainly understand the choice to write something a little sensational and create clickbait to get more people to read your book.”
Time passed and nobody thought much of Crampton Brophy’s work.
Then on the morning of June 2, 2018, Brophy was filling a bucket with ice and water by the sink, preparing for his day as an instructor, when a mysterious figure walked into the kitchen and shot him in the back. Brophy fell to the ground and was shot again, this time in the chest, at close range.
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Dan Brophy was murdered in 2018. He was 63 years old. (LinkedIn)
Brophy’s students later discovered his body.
The community was heartbroken – Brophy was well known and loved for his work with the local homeless – but none more so than his widow, who lost a loved one.
But it didn’t take long for Crampton Brophy’s tragic story to unfold.
Oregon State Police forensic pathologists determined Brophy, 63, was shot with a Glock handgun. Prosecutors said Crampton Brophy researched and purchased a “ghost gun” kit online, then bought a Glock 17 handgun at a gun show.
Prosecutors introduced firearms evidence at the trial of Nancy Crampton Brophy. (KPTV/Pool Camera)
Video camera footage also captured Crampton Brophy’s minivan, which was near the Oregon Culinary Institute at the time her husband was killed, but Crampton Brophy claimed she had “no recollection” of being there.
Prosecutors argued the motive was greed: Crampton Brophy had pocketed more than $1.5 million from her husband’s life insurance, they argued, and she also had full title to the $300,000 home.
“The prosecution alleges that Nancy had organised all of Dan’s life insurance policies but not her own,” Tretheway explained. “She was living a life she never wanted for herself. The prosecution says she wanted to sell her house, move to Portugal and live as an expat, while Dan kept chickens, experimented in his backyard and had an organic vegetable garden. The only solution to Dan’s financial problems was to work more. Nancy’s solution was to get Dan a second job, so he never took a day off.”
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Nancy Crampton Brophy’s lawyers disputed claims of financial troubles and called witnesses to testify about the couple’s strong, loving relationship. (KPTV/Pool)
“But it seems like she wanted a lifestyle that writing could never provide, because she was never a successful author,” Tretheway continued. “She never sold enough books to live a remotely comfortable life. She could barely support her Starbucks habit, so it seems like she saw murder as a way to get the lifestyle she always wanted.”
Crampton Brophy was arrested in September 2018. His shocked widow said she had no reason to kill her husband, noting that their financial problems had been nearly solved by cashing in some of Brophy’s retirement savings plan.
Police never found the gun that killed Mr Brophy, and prosecutors argued that Mr Crampton Brophy had replaced the barrel of the gun he used in the shooting and then disposed of the barrel.
Nancy Crampton Brophy was sentenced to life in prison with the possibility of parole. (Courtesy of Multnomah County Circuit Court/The Oregonian via The Associated Press)
The defense said the gun parts inspired Crampton Brophy’s writing. They suggested Brophy may have been killed by someone during a botched robbery. Crampton Brophy testified at trial that it was merely a coincidence that she was near the culinary school on the day her husband was killed, and that she had parked her car there to work on her writing.
Circuit Judge Christopher Ramras excluded Crumpton Brophy’s how-to essay from the case, noting that it was published in 2011, seven years before Brophy’s death.
Tretheway said it was impossible to ignore Crampton Brophy’s notorious work.
Prosecutor Sean Overstreet delivers opening statements in the murder trial of romance author Nancy Crampton Brophy on April 4, 2022, in Portland, Oregon. (Dave Killen/The Oregonian via The Associated Press, Pool)
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“This essay reveals a lot about her mindset,” she said. “She talks about how to kill someone. You’d probably shoot them, but then blood and brains would splatter on the wall, and you wouldn’t want to clean that up. But she committed the murder somewhere else so she didn’t have to clean it up.”
In 2022, 71-year-old Crampton Brophy was convicted of second-degree murder in a shooting in which she showed no visible reaction. She was sentenced to life in prison with the possibility of parole.
Mr Tretheway said he had tried to contact Crampton Brophy but had not received a response.
Witness Dorothy Sadie Damon testified on April 4, 2022, in the murder trial of Nancy Crampton Brophy. (Dave Killen/The Oregonian via The Associated Press, Pool)
“If Nancy had been a more successful writer, if she hadn’t been so short on money, would she have been so desperate?” Tretheway reflects. “Did she really love Dan? Only she knows the answer to that question…Nancy always thought she was the smartest person in the room…She thought she could plan the perfect crime and get away with it. In the end, she couldn’t.”
Wondery’s “Happily Never After: Dan & Nancy” is available to stream. The Associated Press contributed to this report.
