BARDSTOWN, Ky. — Just days after the prosecutor on the Crystal Rogers case asked the judge to consider combining the trials for the three men charged, one of the attorneys is fighting back.
Brooks Houck is charged with murder and tampering with physical evidence, in connection to the death of his girlfriend Crystal Rogers. Steve Lawson and Joseph Lawson are also charged in the case -- accused of conspiracy to commit murder and tampering with physical evidence.
The Bardstown mother-of-five disappeared over the Fourth of July weekend in 2015. Rogers has been presumed dead for years. Earlier this year, a trial date for the three men charged in Rogers’ death was scheduled for February 2025.
Now, Houck’s attorney has filed new court documents, objecting to the prosecutor’s request to combine all three trials.
The attorney claims the prosecutor lacks proof that Rogers is dead, and if she is dead, “they can do no more than guess at who killed her, how she died, why she died, and where she died.” The attorney goes on to say there is. “no crime scene, murder weapon, or realistic motive for the alleged crime. Ms. Rogers’ body has never been found.”
According to court documents, the investigators desperately needed to solve the case, despite “evidentiary problems.” The attorney said, “the nearly nine years law enforcement has spent digging up subdivisions and farmland across Nelson County tells a different story about what they know.”
Because of a lack of evidence, the attorneys claim detectives and the prosecutors targeted the Lawsons to build a case against Houck.
“The interviews of Stephen Lawson and Joseph Lawson demonstrate a ‘get Brooks’ mentality that colored every decision made by law enforcement in this investigation.”
The documents include multiple transcripts with police detectives, including one statement that reads, “Whether you killed her or not wouldn’t be our concern” and “I don’t care what your role was. I don’t care Joey’s role. You go home.”
According to the new documents, Steve Lawson has given more than 20 hours of police testimony that are, “full of inconsistencies, later-admitted lies, and responses to leading questions aimed at implicating Brooks in the disappearance of Crystal Rogers.”
The attorney is claiming if combined the trial would be built against Houck, using information that was gathered during a “biased investigation” using “coercive interrogation tactics.”
Prosecutor Shane Young filed his motion for a joint trial on Thursday, writing in court documents, “A joint trial will ensure [a jury] be given the complete picture of what occurred [on July 3 or July 4 of 2015] and the involvement of each defendant.”
Young also noted that all three suspects have recently filed motions to move the trial outside of Nelson County. Their attorneys argue their clients won’t receive a fair trial due to the investigation unfolding in the public eye over the course of several years.
Young said if the trial is moved to another county, it would be another reason to hold a joint trial.
Houck’s attorney is asking the judge to deny the prosecutor’s request to combine the trial out of convenience, writing, “the inconvenience does not outweigh each of these defendants’ constitutional right to a fair trial, especially when such gravely serious charges are involved.”
This latest motion is one of several to be discussed next Thursday when all three men are back in court.
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