Ready for this, kids? What a day for us. Nothing to do, nothing to think about.

Mind, we are a bit sandwiched in here.

Sandwiches, pack lunch.

Back to school. Stop, it'll be grand. Aldi's got back to school sorted with everything you need. So you can get back to summer.

Go all Aldi. This guy was as cold and calculated as they come. Maybe we weren't going to get it solved.

It was like the epitome of innocence that had been prayed upon.

This is a case that has no evidence. We didn't have DNA. We didn't have fingerprints.

Step inside the Court of Law with the new True Crime podcast, American Justice.

We realized we have four men who answered the same ad for a job on a farm.

My brother Ralph went to interview And he was never seen again.

A podcast that explores impactful crimes and reveals how our justice system works.

You have to consider that there are more possibilities than one.

And sometimes, how it doesn't.

We have to find whoever this monster is.

Go in-depth into chilling cases and their conclusions in this new True Crime series. You just have a pit in your stomach thinking, how many people are we going to find? New episodes of American Justice are available every Wednesday. Wherever you get your podcasts. Greg and Brenda Karkley owned a shoe store in Corvallis, Oregon. Brenda handled the finances, and Greg took care of sales. Making it a true family business, the couple's infant daughter was often present. On June 10th, 1982, as the store was opening, Greg Kirkley was shot in the back. Brenda was hysterical, and the baby was laying unharmed in her bassinet. Was Greg killed by a stranger? Or was it possible that the Kirkley's marriage wasn't as idyllic as it appeared? From A&E, this is Cold Case Files. I'm Brooklyn, and here's the sensational Bill Curtis with a classic case, a desperate housewife.

Hello, please. Oh, please, my mom. My husband. On a June morning, a woman calls 911.

It's been an incomprehensible call.

Mokey's Shoe Service. She hung up. Corvallis police officer Mary Eichler catches the call.

The dispatcher came on and said that they have a call from Mokey's Shoe store, that there's some disturbance, and there's a woman outside screaming.

Eichler knows the store well. It's owned by her friends, Brenda and Greg Kirkley.

Of course, I headed there because if you have a friend that's involved, you're going to go.

Outside, Eichler finds Brenda in hysterics. Inside, Brenda's infant daughter lies at a bassinet unharmed, while the baby's father, Greg, Greg lies on the floor, shot once in the back.

I saw Greg on the floor, and I still can see Greg on the floor. And he is already looking really bad. Very white. Not good.

Greg is later pronounced dead. And Mary Eichler finds herself asking a new widow what happened.

She just said a guy came into the store and he shot Greg.

He was described as an Middle Eastern Indian male, dressed in dark clothing, carrying a shotgun, and he ran down this alley, according to her.

Captain Wilber Hakema responds to the scene within minutes and a exists in the search for Greg Kirkley's alleged attacker.

If this person came out of this shoe shop and had run down the alley, this is the alley that would have been involved. This warehouse here on the left, apparently, was open. The people that were working in there saw nothing. The garbage cans were all checked. The rooftops were checked in case they had thrown the gun up on the roof. We had patrol cars circling the area. No one saw anything. It was as if this person had just evaporated in thin air.

Why did no one see anything? I mean, look at it even now. You can see straight down through. Even those garbage cans wouldn't stop you from seeing somebody running.

It just seemed like who's going to rob a shoe shop at opening in the morning because they probably would open with less than $100 and change. And that didn't sound quite right.

Questions about Brenda Kirkley's story begin circulating almost immediately.

When the photo, the sketch came out. I remember talking about how, Doesn't it be as strange it looks like Greg.

Police question Brenda about the state of her marriage and get nowhere. That is, until Jim West talks to police.

I knew in my heart that she had killed her husband.

West was Greg Kirkley's best friend. He knew the Kirkleys had their problems, especially when it came to Brenda's bookkeeping.

And I recall him having conversations with Brenda and said, Brenda, what's going on here? These people are calling me and saying that we have outstanding accounts, but yet in your books, it says they're paid. And of course, you would always say, Well, I don't know what the mistake is. Obviously, they've been paid. It's right there in the ledger.

West suspected that Brenda was cooking the books. He tells police he was present the day Greg made an appointment with an attorney willing to assist in the forensic accounting.

And I'll never forget the look on her face. It was just that of extreme guilt. I went home and I told my wife, I said, Honey, it looks like there may be a divorce in the works after this because it's going to be uncovered what's happened to these funds.

Instead of a divorce, Greg is found dead the next morning, just hours before his appointment with the attorney.

In my heart of hearts, I knew that she'd killed her husband. To me, there was no question about it. My concern was that she became very, very helpful.

Captain Hocomunt tells his detectives not to get too cozy with their potential suspect.

She wanted to talk to the detective. She wanted to talk all the time, and yet she did not want to take a polygraph exam.

Everybody just would say, Is there any chance Brenda did it?

Suspicion alone isn't enough to charge Brenda. Despite the small town whispers, Mary Eichler finds it hard to believe her friend is a murderer.

Here you have somebody that was around you all the time, was at a birthday party with your children sitting there laughing. And do you think that this person that you think is a nice person is going to turn around and shoot somebody? Right in the back?

The prospect of murder hangs heavy in the air, and the town of Corvallis grows very small for Brenda Kirkley. Eventually, she remarries and moves away, and her husband's case grows cold. Until one day, 18 years later, when a telephone rings.

When people enter into a relationship, there's an implied trust, the feeling that they can share anything without judgment. There are even laws protecting spouses from testifying or being testified against in court. But relationships aren't always permanent, and that protection information has a way of leaking out.

What can I do for you? Or what? Let's start this thing over.

I have a problem.

Okay.

I know what happened with Greg.

Detective Sean Houck is working late one night, when he finds himself on the phone with the ex-husband of a possible killer.

A gentleman by the name of Mc Pamplin introduced himself, said he was from Oklahoma. He was married to a lady by the name of Brenda Van Pamplin, formerly Brenda Kirkley. It sounds like you have some pretty intimate details about what occurred that day, don't you? Well, I don't check what occurred that day. You know who was involved, don't you? Yes, I do. I'm all ears. As the call continued, he mentioned at one point that there was... That Brenda had shot Greg, that she disclosed this to him in Newport, Oregon, in 1988. Was there anybody else involved? No. Just her?

Yes.

She shot him? Yes. Anytime anybody calls in, there's always a motive. In this case, he's going through a divorce, or their divorce had already completed. And so I knew that there was probably some issues there with Brenda, but yet if he had information, it didn't mean that all of his information was going to be deceptive. I know it was a shotgun, and I know it was... Did she say how many times? No, it was not. Did she say how many times?

No, she didn't. Okay.

He didn't stumble. He didn't create. He was very matter of fact. And only people who are actually in a situation who've had a conversation with somebody wouldn't know those details.

Howke learns the shotgun Brenda allegedly used is long gone. He has a few more phone conversations with McPamplin before Brenda's ex offers up what could be Howke's magic bullet, literally.

And as we're chatting, he mentions that Brenda had brought in some shotgun shells into the marriage. I'm like, Okay, that's good to know. What's the origin of these shells?

These came from Oregon.

Okay.

Were they with her when you met her? Yes.

Okay.

He mentions that those shells, which were brought from Oregon into their marriage, and then back to Oklahoma, were still in his possession, and that he could freely send them to me. This is what nick sent me from Oklahoma. These are the shells, and this is a box that Brenda brought into the marriage.

Hauke asks the FBI lab to compare the lead from Brenda's shotgun shelves with the lead found in Greg's body.

This is going to be the wadding and a pellet taken from Greg's body, and these were taken from his body during the autopsy. The scientists believe that there was consistency between what was taken out of his body and what was in this unuse shell.

Unfortunately, consistent doesn't mean perfect match. Even worse, spousal privilege laws make Brenda's confession to Mick during their marriage inadmissible in court. Detectives just don't have enough to arrest their suspect, and the case once again gets shelved.

There were just a series of events and other priorities that prevented us from actively putting this on the front shelf.

It was looking more and more like Brenda Kirkley had murdered her first husband, and now husband number two knew all about it. Unfortunately for the detectives, spouse Hustle privilege prevented his statement from being entered into evidence.

Three years later, however, investigators finally got a chance to sit down with Brenda Kirkley to discuss her first husband's murder. And this time, the one-time widow has a very different story to tell.

After I give him a hug and hold him a loul, and shine. If you're like me, you're constantly thinking about the safety of the people and things you value most. I've mentioned before that we've had a few incidents in my neighborhood. Unfortunately, it's been pretty quiet since then, but it still crosses my mind that something could happen. I knew I needed to secure my home with the best, and my research led me to SimplySafe. I sleep better every night knowing SimplySafe's 24/7 monitoring agents are standing by to protect me if someone tries to break in and to send emergency help when I need it most. I want you to have the same peace of mind that I and so many listeners experience every day, which is why I've partnered with Simply Safe to offer listeners 20% off a system. Just visit simplisafe. Com/ coldcase. What I love most is that Simply Safe just keeps getting better. With exclusive live guard protection, Simply Safe agents can act within five seconds of receiving your alarm and can even see and speak to intruders inside your home, warning them that the police are on their way. As a Simply Safe user, it's no surprise that Simply Safe has been named Best Home Security Systems by US News & World Report for five years running and the best customer service in home security by Newsweek.

Protect your home this summer with 20% off any new Simply Safe system when you sign up for Fast Protect monitoring. Just visit simplisave. Com/ coldcase. That's simplisave. Com com/coldcase. There's no safe like Simply Safe.

Got some hit and runs. This one on center point. Looks like we're getting hit in Southtown pretty well. It is always helpful to go back and take a fresh look at some of these old cases, and we have some that go back over 50 years. In 2005, Lieutenant Tim Brewer begins holding cold case meetings. The team decides to reopen the 1982 to shotgun killing of Greg Kirkley. The Greg Kirkley Homicide certainly was number one on the list. The investigation had taken a back seat to fresher cases. One person, however, remains at the top of the suspect list. Greg's wife and sole witness to the murder, Brenda. Some of the shotgun pellets were removed from Greg Kirkley's body, had been examined and compared against shotgun pellets that had been in Brenda Durand's possession. And his pellets were ruled consistent with those that killed Greg. While the ballistics testing doesn't provide conclusive evidence of guilt, it certainly bolsters detectives' confidence in their case.

There's no doubt my mind is solvable. None. She did it. We knew it. We all knew it.

Knowing it and proving it, however, are two different things.

It was basically straight on shot right here.

Detective Sean Howke and Karen Stouder dig through the original reports and diagram the crime scene to show how Brenda might have killed Greg. The pictures poke holes in Brenda's story.

Based on what she described in her handwritten statement, if the perpetrator turns and fires, he's going to basically hit this wall, and there's going to be damage, major damage to all of these boxes, the other items on the other side of the shelf.

However, nothing in the store was disturbed.

There's just no way possible that he could have had that turning radius with the shotgun to then be able to shoot and kill Greg.

What's the likelihood mathematically, of turning around, hearing somebody or seeing somebody firing and actually hitting them perfectly, to where the first time you pull the trigger is going to kill him. It was a perfect shot. It was a stage shot. It was prepped to kill him.

Another red flag, the Kirkley's financial records. In 1982, Brenda claimed the couple was in good financial shape. A review of the books, however, tells a different story.

Essentially, she was robbing Peter to pay Paul. They were struggling, and she was basically in charge of all the financial pieces. And he wasn't fully aware of what was transpiring with their finances, with their personal finances, with their business finances.

He was going to discover what was going on. He was going to see all this financial stuff that was happening, and he was going to be upset with her. And for whatever reason, she just didn't want to deal with that. To me, it looked like this was the beginning of a motive.

The team has some good circumstantial evidence, but not enough to take before a jury. The only thing that could really help us in prosecuting the case was to have a confession. To do that, detectives know they'll need a little help.

We knew without a doubt that she did this, but then we needed to understand her to then know what theme development we needed to use in order to encourage her to tell us the truth.

She wasn't a psychopathic, uncaring, sadistic killer. It wasn't that at all.

Dr. John Cochrane is a forensic psychiatrist in Salem, Oregon. He is approached by Corvallis investigators who want to get inside the head of their suspect.

What I came to was that she was a very dependent but depressed individual. She was a type of individual who would avoid confrontations. She was a type of individual who could be easily intimidated by those in control.

Dr. Cochrane tells detectives to hit Brenda hard with their evidence and not let up no matter what.

So, for example, if she were to fall on the floor and start crying or anything like this. You don't reach down and pat them on the back and say, Hey, we're going to take a time out here for 15 minutes. I'm going to go get you a Coke. You don't do that. You just continue with whatever you need to do because it's just an indication of their defense is breaking down and they're ready to give up whatever their story is.

Dr. Cochrane also recommends appealing to Brenda's emotions, something best accomplished by having another woman in the room.

With both of them there, with Karen playing her part, she acts as a female support person in that sense.

Investigators hope that one, two punch, a combination of hard facts and emotion will be enough to crack their suspect. On October 12th, 2005, detectives Howke and Stouder arrive in Oklahoma, where local police ask Brenda to come downtown for a chat. What Brenda doesn't know, she's about to get up close and personal with the ghost of marriage past.

She was stunned. She was. She was just taken back a little bit.

And Sean started right in and said, I'm sure you know why we're here. We're not here to play any games. But the fact of the matter is, in 1982, you can hold on to this. And we started walking through the scenario, the suspect that you said came in, the past of money. This isn't plausible.

We just laid the foundation for, You know that we know. And we just didn't leave her out.

Boom, boom, boom, right one after another with all the facts. And she was absolutely realizing that we knew what we were talking about.

Detectives follow Dr. Cochrane's psychiatric script, hitting Brenda hard, backing her into a corner, and offering a female friend in the room, in the person of Detective Karen Stouder.

You're going to be free, man.

I've seen this over and over and over. You are ready to get this off your chest. I think Brenda was just sitting there thinking to herself, What do I do? I'm in a corner. They know basically that I did this.

After just six minutes, Brenda begins to crack.

My life was very difficult. It was what she was telling us, and she couldn't handle it anymore.

I knew that I couldn't tell him the truth about it.

She built up all of this pressure within herself and in her mind, and the only option she thought she had was shooting him.

I just went on in and I was back in the corner. She said she remembered that she walked over to him, gave him a hug, and said, I loved you, and then walked around, went and got the shotgun, and stood between the shelves there, set it up, and fired a shot and killed him. Then I gave him a hug and told him, I loved him, and shot him.

Brenda says she shot Greg while the couple's infant daughter was asleep in the same room.

Yeah, I was pretty surprised that as a mother, that she would be willing to take the life of her husband with her young child just right there.

Detectives have their confession when Brenda poses a question.

She asked about the lead detective at the time in 1982 because he had been the one who had contact with her the most at the time.

Detectives learned Brenda and a Corvallis detective had a short-lived affair.

They had had a relationship. It happened immediately after the crime, and it didn't last very long.

The discovery of the love affair leaves one question regarding the original investigation, forever unanswered. To ask, did that compromise the case? I mean, really, the only people that know that are Brenda Durán and the detective assigned to the case. But obviously, if a detective develops a personal relationship with someone involved in an event like this. I could see where potentially you could lose some objectivity. Brenda is arrested for her husband's murder and extradited back to Oregon, where she eventually pleads guilty to manslaughter and receives a sentence of nine years.

You have these pictures of a friend that's gone.

For Mary Eichler, one of the first officers to respond to Greg Kirkley's murder 24 years earlier, the questions surrounding her former friend and now convicted killer are almost too much to bear.

We were just starting to get really close when he was killed, so we didn't have the time to really have all the relationship we should have been able to have. And now a whole family is just destroyed forever, and that's really a shame.

Detectives are human. We all are. It It was improper for a detective to have a relationship with the widow of a murder victim, especially when he was actively investigating the crime. It obviously affected the detective's objectivity. But did that affair make Brenda Kirkley more or less guilty? She pled guilty to manslaughter, also known as a crime of passion, for shooting her husband in the back. I'll let you decide if shooting someone from behind qualifies as a crime of passion, or if an improper relationship validates the plea she took, or really, if there's any justice in this case at all. Cold Case Files, the podcast, is hosted by Brooke Gittings, produced by Mkemi Lynn and Steve Delimater. Our executive producer is Tab Butler. Our music was created by Blake Maples. This podcast is distributed by podcast One. The The Cold Case Files TV series was produced by Curtis Productions and is hosted by Bill Curtis. Check out more Cold Case Files at aetv. Com, or learn more about cases like this one by visiting the A&E Real Crime blog at aetv. Com/realcrime.

It's summertime, and with Pluto TV's Summer of Cinema, the streaming is easy.

Stream hundreds of free movies on all your favorite devices, all summer long. Chill out poolside with Mission Impossible and Transformers.

Or stay cool inside watching Indiana Jones and the Riders of the Lost Art, Titanic or the Wolf of Wall Street.

No matter your vibe, download the Pluto TV app to spend summer doing what you love, watching endless movies. Tell me that's not the deal of the summer.

Summer of Cinema on Pluto TV. Stream now. Pay never.