Houck murder trial Day 8: Defense rests, closing arguments set for Monday
By JIM BROOKS
Nelson County Gazette / WBRT Radio
Thursday, July 3, 2025 — On the 10th anniversary of Crystal Rogers’ disappearance, the trial of her boyfriend — Brooks Houck, the last man to see her alive and is charged with her murder — heard the final defense witnesses.
Houck faces murder and tampering with evidence charges regarding Crystal Rogers’ disappearance. His co-defendant, Joseph Lawson, is charged with conspiracy to commit murder and tampering with evidence.
Now that the Commonwealth and defense have finished presenting testimony and evidence, Nelson Circuit Judge Charles Simms III said closing arguments are schedule for 9 a.m. Monday, July 7, 2025, in Warren Circuit Court in Bowling Green.
QUESTIONS RAISED ABOUT INTERVIEW TACTICS. The defense called Dr. Jeffrey Neuschatz, a cognitive psychologist who is an expert in eyewitness identification and explained how police interview tactics can change a witnesses’ memory and lead to false memories when being interrogated by police.
The defense team played a number of short video clips from the Kentucky State Police interview with Charlie Girdley, the witness whose testimony led to the indictments against Joseph Laws and Brooks Houck.
Newschatz explained that the KSP interviewers basically guided Girdley into telling investigators what they wanted to hear — even if it wasn’t correct. He watched additional video clips and identified the flaws by investigators that could affect the subject’s statements.
He told the jury he was also critical of the length of Girdley’s interview, which lasted more than four hours, as well as the offer of incentives for Girdley to tell the truth.
Special Prosecutor Shane Young said that the KSP’s interrogation tactics are the ones taught at the police academy, and after used by most police departments. He noted that the methods are legal and effective.
REBUTTAL WITNESS. Richard Sanders, the chief of the Jeffersontown Police Department and former commissioner of the Kentucky State Police, testified that he had never been to a school to learn the Reid interrogation methods in his 40-plus years of law enforcement. He defended the techniques used by KSP and other agencies as taught at the police academy at Eastern Kentucky University.
SEARCH WARRANTS EXAMINED. Retired LMPD officer and former state commissioner of juvenile justice Denver Butler testified about the numerous search warrants that were executive by investigators during the 10-year search for evidence in the Crystal Rogers case.
Butler noted that none of the search warrants produced any usable evidence, including DNA, fingerprints, body parts, bodily fluids, etc. Even excavations at several locations resulted in no evidence of what happened to Rogers on the night of July 3, 2015.
During cross-examination, Special Prosecutor Shane Young noted that the absence of evidence of a murder (no blood evidence, no crime scene, no body and no murder weapon) does not mean a murder didn’t take place the night of July 3, 2015.
As proof, he cited the case of Ann Gottlib, a 12-year-old girl who disappeared from the area of Bashford Manor Mall on June 1, 1983. While her body was never found, some 25 years later, a person of interest was identified as the most likely person to have abducted her.
By mid-afternoon Thursday, Nelson Circuit Judge Charles Simms III excused the jurors from the courtroom to consider motions filed by the defense teams representing Brooks Houck and Joseph Lawson.
CLOSING ARGUMENTS MONDAY. Closing arguments for both defendents and the Commonwealth will being at 9 a.m. Central time Monday in Warren Circuit Court. Once completed, the jury will be given its instructions by Judge Simms and then begin deliberations.
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