Houck trial: Coonhunters find white Buick on July 4, 2015, near Houck farm
By JIM BROOKS
Nelson County Gazette / WBRT Radio
Monday, June 30, 2025 — The prosecutors continued to present witnesses and evidence to the jury of eight men and seven women on the fifth day of the murder trial of Brooks Houck.

Monday’s testimony provided insight about the actions of Brooks Houck’s brother, Nick Houck, during the 4th of July weekend when Crystal Rogers went missing.
MISSING IN ACTION. Nick Houck’s ex-girlfriend, Amber Bowman, said they were moving to a fixer-upper home on Olympia Drive the weekend Crystal disappeared.
Instead of helping Amber and her father with the move, Nick left the morning of July 3, 2015, saying he had to go help Brooks. He disappeared for nearly 24 hours, and Amber said he was unreachable by phone or text. She even drove to the Olympia Drive house but only found his cell phone there.
Nick showed up at their home the next morning, and told her he was working on the Olympia Drive home. She was not convinced.
Nick’s phone was off or dead the entire time, she said, adding that it was very unlike Nick to have his phone off that long a period of time.
DOOR KEY WOULDN’T WORK. On July 4, 2015, Anna Whitesides daughter, Francy Holt, took her mother to visit Bernheim Forest. When the returned to town and Holt took her mother to her home on the corner of Forrest and Pulliam in Bardstown, Whitesides house key would not unlock the home’s door.
They attempted to contact Nick Houck, who had a key to her home, and had helped Whitesides from time to time. However, he he did not answer his phone. Unable to get her mother’s door unlocked, Holt took her mother to her home o spend the night.
WHITE BUICK FOUND ON FARM ROAD. A coon hunting contest club was hunting on the Fabian Ballard farm located adjacent to the Houck family farm on the evening of July 3, 2015.
While they were conducting the contest, hunter Ryan Cecil said the men ran across a white Buick parked on the access road on the property. Inside they found a felt jacket and a bottled drink. The car had Nelson County license plates.
Cecil said he thought it was odd to see a car parked out there at that time of night. It was a rainy evening but the car had no mud on it, he told jurors.
He later reported finding the car on the Fabian Ballard farm once he learned of Crystal Rogers’ disappearance.
Investigators didn’t act immediately on his tip. It wasn’t until Crystal Rogers’ father, Tommy Ballard, made a post on Facebook in April 2016, asking if anyone had information on a white Buick sedan that could be connected to Crystal’s disappearance.
Investigators immediately went to work following up on the tip, getting a search warrant for the home of Houck’s grandmother, Anna Whitesides, who owned a white Buick. But investigators were too late — they found that just days earlier, the Buick had been traded in for another car at a Louisville dealership.
Investigators located the Buick at the dealership in Louisville, seized it, and it was taken to the Louisville Metro Police Department’s forensics lab for examination. Hair samples from the trunk of the car included long blonde hairs that resembled samples of Rogers’ hair, as well as grey hair samples, facial hair and pubic hair.
The sales manager of another car dealer near the dealership where the car was traded testified the Houcks came to his dealership first and offered it for sale. The sales manager said he asked for the keys so he could fully appraise the car’s value, but they refused to give him the keys. They left the dealership without an offer.
MORE PHONE RECORDS. Crystal Rogers last text message was sent at 7:06 p.m. July 3, 2015 — the day she disappeared.
A different phone records analysis showed that Brooks Houck called and texted Crystal’s phone on July 4, 2015, as well as contacting friends to see if they could contact her.
CRYSTAL’S CAR ON THE BG. Two additional witnesses testified they saw Crystal’s maroon Chevy near the 14 mile marker on the Bluegrass Parkway the weekend she disappeared.
Shana Norton, the chief deputy coroner for Hardin County, told jurors when she drove past the car on July 4, 2015, there was an extended cab Cheverolet Silverado pickup truck with a vehicle trailer parked behind Rogers’ car.
However, she noticed the trailer had a flat tire, and could not have been able to move Rogers’ car.
ASKED TO MOVE ROGERS’ CAR. Charles Girdley, a carpenter who framed houses for Brooks Houck, admitted to jurors that he lied to investigators through several interviews and did not tell them everything he knew about the Crystal Rogers case.
Girdley said that he and Joey Lawson were asked to move Crystal Rogers’ car, and also later, when it broke down on the Bluegrass Parkway when Joey Lawson was driving it, to pull a trailer to the 14-mile marker and retrieve it.
The defense counsel pointed out that KSP investigators were adamant that Girdley give them more information. During an interview that lasted for more than four hours, Girdley’s statements he told investigators changed several times and were inconsistent.
The defense also noted that Girdley had been charged for failing to meet with his probation officer, and that his cooperation would make those troubles disappear, raising suspicions that investigators lured Girdley into cooperating with promises of how they could help him with his pending legal issues.
VOICE RECORDERS FOUND. Two agents for the IRS who helped execute a search warrant at Brooks Houck’s mothers home testifed about the digital audio recorders they found during that search.
Three audio recorders were taken in as evidence. When examined, the recorders contained interviews family members had with investigators and testimony of family members before the Nelson County grand jury.
NEXT UP. Day 6 of the trial of Brooks Houck and co-defendant Joseph Lawson resumes Tuesday morning at 8:30 Central time in Courtroom D on the fourth floor of the Warren County Justice Center.
-30-