Jury convicts KY man in 2020 murder after three hours of deliberations
A jury convicted a Lexington man of all counts against him in connection to suffocating Lexington woman Ava Creech and hiding her body in a closet.
All parties agreed the evidence against 54-year-old William Parker “Bill” Brown was circumstantial — indirect evidence — but a jury decided Thursday afternoon it was enough to convict him after three hours of deliberations.
Brown was found guilty of murder, receiving stolen property and being a felon in possession of a handgun.
He did not react when the verdict was read.
“Sometimes you don’t have all the pieces,” Assistant Commonwealth Attorney James Judge said during closing statements. “But the question isn’t whether you have all the pieces; it is whether or not you can tell by looking all the pieces, that you can tell what happened.”
Prosecutors said Creech, 62, died September 11, 2020, but her body wasn’t found by police until October 2 in her apartment closet. Creech had been bound with duct tape and had paper towels shoved down her throat.
Her cause of death was ruled as asphyxiation and blunt force trauma.
During closing statements on Thursday morning, Judge presented a bulleted list and related timeline which he said confirms Brown’s guilt.
Brown was found with Creech’s pills in his possession after her death. Brown was driving Creech’s car. Prosecutors allege he attempted to toss her keys in the woods and that he pawned Creech’s jewelry.
Judge said the biggest proof of guilt was duct tape that tested positive for Creech’s blood and Brown’s DNA.
For Dan Parker, Brown’s attorney, there were “innocent explanations” to all of the prosecutors’ claims.
Parker said Creech had a habit of falling asleep smoking with her apartment door open, so it was possible anyone could have come inside to harm or attack her.
Regarding the duct tape, Parker said Brown helped Creech box up her things to prepare for a bed bug exterminator, which is how his DNA got on the roll.
Brown took the stand Wednesday afternoon and denied any involvement in Creech’s murder. His demeanor on the stand was calm, relaxed and conversational.
Not only was there an abundance of innocent explanations, Parker argued, but there were more questions left than answers, which cast a shadow of reasonable doubt on the commonwealth’s claims.
Parker said prosecutors’ witnesses were unreliable, evidence wasn’t tested and other suspects weren’t investigated by police. One such example was a hammer found at the scene that was consistent with the trauma on Creech’s head. Police opted not to send this evidence for testing.
“There are way more questions than answers,” Parker said. “In this country when you are accused of a crime, it is not your job to prove your innocence.
”The job of doing the proving, is from those who do the accusing.”
Brown’s case began Monday. The jury began deliberating at 11 a.m. Thursday.
