‘I was afraid for my life.' Adriana Blake homicide Scott County trial continues
Our Quad Cities News was in the courtroom when Scott County Attorney Kelly Cunningham asked Blake about details of taking an Uber to her uncle's house. Blake said she wasn't sure about some of the details and that she doesn't remember many details from that day. Blake said Braet had her cell phone the majority of the time between Jan. 14-16, 2024, and Braet used her phone to call for an Uber.
Cunningham told the court that personal items were carried into the uncle's home and Blake admitted taking a DVR from Goodwin's home. That DVR contained recordings from video cameras around the property.
Blake said she didn't know the password to the DVR, so Braet told her to take it, and they would figure out the password later. She said she did it because she was afraid for her life.
Blake said Braet thought Blake's ankle monitor was listening to them and recording them.
Cunningham asked how a gas can was removed from the home of Braet's mother. Blake said it might have taken by Goodwin and Braet to use while they were snow-blowing the property. Blake said the can might have been in a Dodge Nitro SUV they drove.
A witness said the Nitro smelled like gas, like a gas can had tipped over in it. Blake admitted she may have driven the Nitro for days with the gas smell.
Blake said she and Braet recruited a person to work on the SUV to repair the heater and broken headlight so as not to draw the attention of police.
But Blake said she probably wanted to draw police attention to the situation. When Cunningham suggested that Blake could have called police, Blake said 'By the time they got there I'd be dead.' Blake said she was too afraid of Braet to call, even when she was with her uncle.
Blake said Braet had accidentally fired a gun in the house when the firearm was in a backpack, and she was afraid to lock him out.
Her uncle's testimony didn't mention a gunshot or accidental discharge of a gun. He testified earlier that Blake and he had a falling out and hadn't talked in months, but Blake told the court they had been communicating on Facebook during that time. There were no phone call records between her uncle and Blake until early Jan. 15, 2024. The uncle said he didn't know Braet, but Blake said the two had met at her grandmother's house and that her uncle's testimony was incorrect.
Blake said she had no idea how Smith's identification ended up in Blake's wallet and that Blake was surprised to see this during discovery. Blake said there was no body-camera footage of police finding the identification. She said she didn't dispute that it was in the car, but she had no idea how it got in her wallet.
Testimony in the trial continues Thursday.
Blake spoke quietly and sometimes see,d embarrassed as she described the events leading up to the deaths of Smith and Goodwin. The jurors watched and listened attentively along with more than 20 other people seated in the courtroom.
A fire and two deaths in 2024
In January 2024, Brian Goodwin, 44, and Amy Smith, 44, were found dead after a fire in a home on the 5200 block of Division Street. Both had been shot, investigators found.
Blake faces two charges of first-degree murder, a Class A felony; two charges of first-degree robbery, a Class B felony; two charges of assault while participating in a felony, a Class C felony; dominion and control of a firearm by a felon, a Class D felony; two charges of going armed with intent, a Class D felony; two charges of abuse of a corpse – mutilate/dismember to hide a crime, a Class C felony; and first-degree arson, a Class B felony; along with misdemeanor charges.
Braet will be tried separately.
Copyright 2025 Nexstar Media, Inc. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.
Try Our AI Features
Explore what Daily8 AI can do for you:
Comments
No comments yet...
Related Articles
Los Angeles Times
an hour ago
- Los Angeles Times
Officials scour Montana mountains for Army veteran suspected of killing 4
Authorities were scouring a mountainous area of western Montana on Saturday for a military veteran who they say opened fire at a bar, killing four people. Michael Paul Brown, 45, fled the Owl Bar in the small town of Anaconda in a white pickup truck but ditched it at some point, said Lee Johnson, administrator of the Montana Division of Criminal Investigation, which is overseeing the case. He urged residents late Friday to stay at home and on high alert. 'While law enforcement has not received reports of Brown harming any other individuals, he is believed to be armed, and he is extremely dangerous,' Johnson said. Authorities said they would release the names of the victims once all of their families have been notified. 'This is a small, tight-knit community that has been harmed by the heinous actions of one individual who does not represent what this community or Montanans stand for,' Johnson said. Anaconda, about 25 miles northwest of Butte, is hemmed in by mountains. The town of about 9,000 people was founded by copper barons who profited off nearby mines in the late 1800s. A defunct smelter stack looms over the valley. Brown lived next door to the Owl Bar, said owner David Gwerder, who wasn't there during the shooting Friday morning. Gwerder told the Associated Press that the bartender and three patrons were killed and he didn't think anyone else was inside. He also said he wasn't aware of any conflicts between Brown and any of the victims. 'He knew everybody that was in that bar. I guarantee you that,' Gwerder said. 'He didn't have any running dispute with any of them. I just think he snapped.' Brown served in the U.S. Army as an armor crewman from 2001 to 2005 and deployed to Iraq from early 2004 until March 2005, said Lt. Col. Ruth Castro, an Army spokesperson. Brown was in the Montana National Guard from 2006 to March 2009, Castro said. He left military service in the rank of sergeant. Brown's niece, Clare Boyle, told the AP on Friday that her uncle has struggled with mental illness for years and that she and her other family members repeatedly sought help. 'This isn't just a drunk/high man going wild,' she wrote in a Facebook message. 'It's a sick man who doesn't know who he is sometimes and frequently doesn't know where or when he is either.' With no sign of Brown in the white pickup or his home, authorities converged on the Stumptown Road area west of Anaconda by ground and air Friday, locking it down. A helicopter hovered over a nearby mountainside as officers moved among the trees, said Randy Clark, a retired police officer who lives there. The search continued Saturday morning, according to Chase Scheuer, a spokesman for Montana's DCI. As reports of the shooting spread through town Friday, business owners locked their doors and sheltered inside with customers. The owner of the Firefly Cafe in Anaconda said she locked up her business after a friend alerted her to the shooting. 'We are Montana, so guns are not new to us,' Barbie Nelson said. 'For our town to be locked down, everybody's pretty rattled.' Brown, Slevin and Baumann write for the Associated Press.
Fox News
4 hours ago
- Fox News
Uber announces women-only ride option after death of user
Father Seymour Josephson joins 'Fox & Friends Weekend' to discuss Uber announcing their 'women-only' ride option amid his push to protect women on rideshare apps after his daughter's death.
USA Today
6 hours ago
- USA Today
Thousands join effort to find treasures in the mud after Texas floods
The deadly flooding of the Guadalupe River swept away priceless belongings, but volunteers have helped reunite families with their possessions. The items range from the everyday to the extraordinary. Pieces of jewelry and children's toys. Blankets and photographs, fine china, trophies and plaques. Keychains and stuffed animals. Clothes and dolls. A church pew. A canoe. Some were found miles from home after being carried away by the Guadalupe River flood. They're the remnants of homes, cars, cabins, trailers and campsites. They're also pieces of people's lives, family heirlooms that in some cases hold generations of memories. But thanks to volunteers and social media sleuths, families are being reunited with their possessions after the river flooded on July 4, killing at least 135 people. A Facebook group is connecting people who have found things along the river with flood victims searching for pieces of their lives. Several new items are added each day, even weeks after the flood. Some items have been cleaned of the mud and dirt that soiled them. Others won't ever look the same after being washed away, buried and submerged, reemerging days or weeks later. Here are some of their stories. 'The lady picking up personal effects' Dondi Voigt Persyn of Boerne, Texas, wanted to help in the flood's immediate aftermath. So she joined other volunteers in the recovery along the Guadalupe River. The first days were "overwhelming," she said. "There were still children missing, people missing. "I decided, let's let the professionals do their job, so I started collecting trash and personal effects. By the end of the day, I was the lady picking up people's personal effects." But the volume of debris was so great, and Persyn knew many of the items she and fellow volunteers found meant something to people who had already lost so much. Along with some friends, she now administers Found on the Guadalupe River, a Facebook group with more than 47,000 members who share photos, information and tips about items found during cleanup and recovery. The group grew "exponentially" within days, she said. "It was shocking how organized and effective we were able to be in such a short time," she said. Fellow administrator DeAnna Kaye Lindsay and Persyn "have been friends for 40 years, and our experience in life prepared us for this moment," said Persyn, who added she has volunteered in various capacities and for a variety of organizations throughout her adult life. "Being grandmothers, we wanted to handle everything the way we would for our own children and grandchildren," she said. So their "heart-driven" mission includes working with families and local agencies to verify ownership and make sure recovered items go to the rightful owners. A timeline: Hour by hour, how deadly flooding struck Texas Hill Country She recalled returning a life vest to a man who saw a photo of it on the Facebook group. "He just needed one thing," she said. "It was a connection to the past, his life before." A retired teacher lost her trailer and everything in it, but she and her grandson were both able to get to safety. Persyn talked about returning some of her jewelry: "I know these are things, but she talked about how 'This was a time when my grandkids played,' and 'I remember this from when we all went to the beach.'" Helping her bring back those memories, Persyn said, "was really heartwarming." "There's also been a lot of behind-the scenes reunions with people who'd lost loved ones," she said, and she's keeping those stories to herself, out of respect and deference to their losses. "I will keep those close to my heart." A family's heirlooms returned The Deupree family has been on the receiving end of the Found on the Guadalupe River group's kindness. Taylor Deupree lives in Houston and much of her extended family is in Dallas. But to all the Deuprees, home is their grandmother Penny's house in Hunt, Texas, near the Guadalupe River, just 2 miles from Camp Mystic. It's been a family gathering place for decades, said Deupree, and Penny Deupree is the family matriarch who keeps "scrapbooks upon scrapbooks" of Deupree family lore, her granddaughter said. Penny Deupree was among nine family members rescued from the home's roof as floodwaters raged around them. The house was heavily damaged, Taylor Deupree said, but the garage, which held many of the family's keepsakes, was destroyed. Among the items that have been found and returned to the family: photographs, heirloom silver pieces and mementos from lost family members, including a pocket watch from Dr. Tague Chisholm, a pioneer in the field of pediatric surgery, and a painted portrait of Frances Hodgson Burnett, who wrote "The Secret Garden." The people contributing to the Found on the Guadalupe River group and the way the community has stepped up to help people, even after so much loss, are "the real silver linings," Deupree said. An errant oar and how 'hope floats' Andrew Diggs was among those who responded as part of a joint search and rescue team with TEXSAR and Heroes for Humanity to help find people who vanished in the flood. While he was searching, he came across an old wooden paddle with markings that gave him pause: the year 1962, Greek letters. "It was a 1-of-1 piece of memorabilia lost in the chaos," he wrote in a social media post he titled "Hope Floats: It was never about the paddle." "At first, it was just an artifact," he wrote. "A personal item amid the wreckage. But the more I looked at it, the more it felt like a message. Someone, somewhere, loved this thing enough to hold onto it for 60 years. That meant something. And after everything that had already been taken by the flood, I knew I couldn't let this be one more thing lost to time. I made it my mission to return it." That mission, and the Facebook group, led him to Tom Schulze, who had given it to his wife when they went to a University of Texas Sigma Nu formal in 1962. It had been hanging in his daughter's house − more than 3 miles from where it was found − but the house was heavily damaged in the flood. Diggs shared a text message with USA TODAY from Schulze expressing his gratitude to Diggs and a vow that "we will never clean it up and (will) do something to preserve it as a reminder of that night of infamy." "When we reunited Tom with the paddle, he called it a 'bright spot in a time of immense loss and suffering,'" Diggs wrote. "To him, it wasn't just wood and paint. It was family. History. Resilience." Diggs told USA TODAY he had never been very sentimental about material things; he was "a minimalist" who believed "memories live in your heart." That has changed, though: When he heard "the stories behind the paddle, and the web of stories from those stories, I realized it's a physical thing that can remind you of so many good times. I've seen so many small things that I previously would have deemed insignificant, but now I can see what they mean to people." Family photos from a home called 'Kerplunk' Mille Kerr's family called their vacation home of more than 50 years "Kerplunk." On July 4, they lost the home, even though it seemed safe, high off the ground and set back from the river. "We are mourning the loss of the special gathering place built by my grandparents, but we're also counting our lucky stars because a large group of family members who were at the property during the flood escaped just in the nick of time while so many others suffered unimaginable loss," Kerr wrote in an email to USA TODAY. An aunt saw several family photos posted on the Found on the Guadalupe page, including one with Kerr's mother and grandmother at a wedding at Kerplunk. "I have many mixed emotions about the fact that we are going to be reunited with undamaged photographs while others await the bodies of missing loved ones," she wrote. "I'm so proud of the community for coming together to mourn this tragedy − and find whatever goodness is left."
