Barry Morphew: Lead prosecutor withheld evidence, leading to new twists in murder case
AZ police rearrest man for his wife's murder
A husband is behind bars again, accused of killing his wife. How the lead prosecutor withheld evidence, leading to new twists in the case. Attorney Ben Taylor weighs in.
PHOENIX - New details are emerging in the murder case involving Barry Morphew. He remains in an Arizona jail after a grand jury indicted him again for the murder of his wife.
The killing happened in Colorado, but the first charges were dropped years ago over prosecutorial misconduct.
FOX 10 spoke with attorney Ben Taylor about the challenges in this case.
For the second time, a Colorado husband is charged with killing his wife and he recently appeared before an Arizona judge.
"Can I get your name and date of birth?"
"Barry Morphew," he responds.
Morphew was living in Gilbert when he was arrested June 20 and appeared in a Phoenix courtroom on extradition orders.
"And you do understand that you would have a right to bail... in this case a cash bond of three million dollars?" the judge asks.
"Yes," Morphew replies.
Barry Morphew to be extradited
A Colorado murder suspect who was arrested in Gilbert waived his right to a hearing in Arizona during a court appearance.
The backstory:
Five years ago, his wife, Suzanne Morphew, first went missing on Mother's Day. In 2021, prosecutors charged her husband with murder.
"Our belief is that Suzanne is not alive at this time," said Sheriff John Spezze of the Chaffee County Sheriff's Office.
Then the case took a stunning turn in 2022. A judge dismissed charges against Morphew, finding prosecutors withheld evidence. Lead prosecutor Linda Stanley was ultimately disbarred because of the case.
Dig deeper:
Arizona attorney Ben Taylor says that won't matter this time around.
"The fact that the prosecutor was disbarred in the first case, that most likely won't come up in front of the jury at all unless the jurors have read about this case in the media," Taylor said.
In 2023, police found Suzanne's body. With it, new evidence, they say, proves Morphew killed her with a drug cocktail, including an animal tranquilizer found in her bones, according to court records.
"If the prosecutor can't prove their cases beyond a reasonable doubt, they shouldn't be bringing the case in the first place," Taylor said. "It's more of an ethical obligation for them to be able to know that they can actually try to, when to try to get a conviction. But in the meantime, before that, they didn't have a body. They didn't have all this new evidence."
What's next:
For now, Colorado has 30 days to bring Morphew back. What he was doing in Arizona may factor into the case.
"Witnesses who may have seen him do anything in Arizona, his demeanor, his mannerisms, these people in Arizona who witnessed him, who actually helped get him arrested, might be able to testify in the Colorado case to help get him convicted in the future," Taylor said.
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The husband of a Colorado woman whose remains were found three years after she was reported missing on Mother's Day was arrested in Arizona.