Wheeler takes stand as murder trial nears conclusion

The Dusty Wheeler murder trial should wrap up today in the Criminal Division of Baxter County Circuit Court.
On Thursday, the state rested its case just before 10 a.m. and the defense finished presenting its evidence to the jury and rested about 4:30 p.m.

Both sides will give closing arguments and then Circuit Judge Andrew Bailey will give instructions to the jury and the panel will then began deliberating.

As is customary, the defense asked for directed verdicts of not guilty based on the contention that the state had not met its burden of proof. Judge Bailey denied both motions.

DAY FOUR TESTIMONY

Wheeler took the stand Thursday afternoon and said he had been in such a state of shock that the events beginning with him being awakened by police and his detention by those officers at the house he had shared for a short time with then 36-year-old Heather Bradford.

He testified that Bradford had become angry on the night of June 13, 2024, apparently over her belief that Wheeler was in contact with another woman.

He said she came into the bedroom and “was just out of her mind.” He said she began pulling items of clothing out of a closet and that he had left the room and gone into the living room to sleep on the couch.

Wheeler said she had made it clear she wanted him to get out of her house and that she had called U-Haul to rent a vehicle to facilitate the move. He said at one point while he was still in the bedroom Bradford had poured water on him.

During the early morning hours of June 14, 2024, Bradford called a number of people, including her mother and stepfather, and said that Wheeler had punched her in the face.

The mother and stepfather left their home in Flippin and arrived at Bradford’s house at 305 Sunny Ann Lane about 45 minutes later. They saw their daughter sitting in a camping chair outside and in front of the garage door.

They then saw that blood was coming from her ear and running down her neck.

WHEELER ASLEEP ON COUCH

After the body was found, police entered the home, found Wheeler allegedly asleep on the couch, woke him up and put him in handcuffs. He was then transported to the Mountain Home Police Department.

Wheeler has said during the pre-trial period that he had been in shock, did not completely understand what was happening and only vaguely remembered being awaken, put in cuffs and taken away in a patrol car. He said his initial statements had been “full of inaccuracies.”

SELECTIVE MEMORY PROBLEM

During cross examination, Deputy Prosecutor Kerry Chism led Wheeler through a series of answers he had given to various law enforcement officers either at the house on Sunny Ann Lane or at the Mountain Home Police Station.

Wheeler was asked if he had told the officers who made the initial entry into the home that he did not think anyone else was at home. While Wheeler said he did not recall actually answering the questions, his memory was refreshed by looking at video tapes taken at the house and during interviews with police later.

Chism said Wheeler had also told police no children were present in the house.

After going through the set of questions he had been asked and answered on the day of Bradford’s death, Chism pointed out that Wheeler had provided correct information to all of them.

“It’s amazing but this deep shock you were in seems to only have effected your memory when it comes to incriminating information, the rest you get correct,” Chism told Wheeler.

Chism asked Wheeler if he had actually been asleep when police entered his house on the day Bradford’s body was discovered. He said he had been. “So, you didn’t hear the sirens on all those police cars, fire trucks and ambulances pulling up to your house?” Wheeler said that was correct.

“You didn’t hear the sound of the 10 or so people out in your front yard?” Wheeler said he had not heard the noise.

On a number of occasions, Wheeler asked Chism to repeat his questions or sat in silence after a question was asked.

Defense attorneys recalled a number of the state’s witnesses, mainly police officers, and questioned them about testimony they had given earlier in the trial, mainly about what was investigated and what not looked into.

One new defense witness, Shane Blair of Mountain Home, identified as a long-time friend of the victim was put on the stand by the defense. He was asked if the victim had been depressed at the time of her death. He answered no. He testified that he was aware that she and Wheeler had been fighting. He was asked if Bradford had been suicidal or had ever talked about ending it all.

Blair testified “she never said anything like that to me, ever.”
The defense case was based on a theory that Bradford had killed herself. An Associated Medical Examiner testified Wednesday that it had been determined that Bradford’s manner of death was homicide and not a self-inflicted gunshot.

The victim’s minor daughter was on the state’s witness list but was not called. In a motion filed in mid-January, the state asked the court to allow the daughter to testify facing the jury. In the motion, the state argues that the young girl has expressed concern that she would have to face the defendant.

The layout of the courtroom where the trial is being held would mean the minor would be in close proximity and directly facing Wheeler if she testified from the normal “witness box.”

The mother and stepfather had both testified that they received early morning calls from Bradford on the day she was found dead. In one of those calls, she had reported Wheeler had hit her in the face and in another she asked where they were and her mother told her, “we’re on the way, baby.”

One of Wheeler’s defense attorneys, Ben Burnett of Mountain Home, asked the mother, Leigh Ann Ash, a series of questions about statements she had made and about a phone call that did not show up on the data dump report.

She said many of the details of the day on which her daughter was found dead were hazy. “My whole life was destroyed and it’s hard to remember everything that happened and when it happened,” the mother said in response.

INITIAL ARREST

The 46-year-old Wheeler was arrested June 14, 2024, after Mountain Home police were called to Bradford’s residence near Cooper Park about 6 a.m. where they found a woman’s body sitting in a camper chair outside the house.

The body of the victim was reported to be cold and no cardiac rhythm could be detected when Baxter Health paramedics/EMTs arrived on scene.

The victim had been shot in the head. An entry wound was found “high-up” on the top left side of the victim’s skull behind her ear and an exit wound on the bottom right side of the head behind the ear.

Wheeler, who was found inside the residence asleep on a couch, was arrested and eventually charged with first degree murder. He entered a not guilty plea during a court session held shortly after his arrest.

PARENTS PRESENT AT SCENE

The victim’s parents had come to Bradford’s home in response to phone calls they said they received from their daughter in the early morning hours of June 14. Brandford is alleged to have told them that she and Wheeler had been fighting and that he had struck her in the face.

A bullet casing was found in the driveway next to the chair where Bradford’s body was located, but officers were not immediately able to locate a weapon.

The stepfather of the victim told officers that his wife had taken possession of a pistol which was in the daughter’s lap when they arrived on scene.

Police reported the mother saying she had removed the gun because she feared if her daughter “woke up” she might reach for it or it might fall, hit the ground and fire a round. The mother said she put the weapon under the front seat of her vehicle.

She said she initially believed her daughter was asleep and that the parents would wake her up and take her to their home in Marion County. She said she did not imagine at the outset her daughter had been killed.

The stepfather turned the pistol over to police. It was noted in incident reports that the barrel end of the weapon was clear of blood and tissue and that no power burns were visible on the entry wound. If those signs had been detected, it would have pointed to the possibility that the fatal wound was self-inflicted.

Investigators also noted that the entry wound was found to be on the left side of the victim’s head. Her mother and stepfather told police she had always been right-handed.

As Wheeler was being led to a patrol car, he told officers he had seen a pistol in the victim’s hand, but investigators said that was not possible since the victim’s mother had taken the weapon and put it in her vehicle by that time.

Wheeler has been free on a $500,000 bond. He is required to wear an ankle monitor and to live at his mother’s home in the small Independence County community of Newark.

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