A Killer Defense

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And if it's not, it's still not worth it. Yet, start an Aufantar.com. Every time I'm on the way to a barn or on my way to see a horse, I want to call my mom. It's really nice to feel to be around horses that she really love. I don't get to share that with her anymore.

It's torture. Jennifer was the best friend that anybody could ever have had. She was my best friend. I didn't realize that there was trouble in the marriage. I saw a woman who dearly loved her husband.

She trusted Kirk.

“It takes to to keep a marriage, and he was not willing.”

He announced that he was leading. My mother even went so far as to tell me that he didn't love her anymore. She's devastated. She's very confused. She didn't know whether to be sad, angry. She loved him until that night.

We could spend all kinds of time speculating about why Jennifer did what she did, what set her off. There's a reason it's called a snap. She went over into this corner and got the spear, which was over here. She thrust the spear at him. Going all the way through, then she pulled the spear out and plunged it in again.

She launched a vicious and potentially deadly attack on him.

He finally went inside his pocket to get his knife to defend himself.

It's a complete fairy tale.

“I think he cornered her, and he slid her throughout.”

You don't deny that you killed Jennifer. I don't deny it. If Kirk Turner had not had his pocket knife, with him, Kirk Turner would be dead. Did you cause your wife's death to protect your own life? Yes.

It's a text book, self-defense. It was just one big lie. Alright! September 12, 2007, was reckoning day for the defendant. Pending divorce, unresolved property settlement, huge support payments was on his mind.

Nearly two years after Jennifer Turner was killed, Greg Brown, a North Carolina prosecutor, lays out the case against her husband, Dr. Kirk Turner.

The visible evidence will speak loud and clear that the defendant is guilty of first-degree murder.

She stabbed me with a spear. She just kept stabbing me. But defense attorney Brad Bannon says the last thing on Dr. Turner's mind that night was murder. The most primal human impulse that we have is that of self-preservation. And that is what this case is about.

Bannon says Kirk Turner stabbed his wife with a knife. Only after she attacked him with a seven-foot spear. This is where she stabbed Kirk in the arm. This is where she stabbed him twice in his leg. There's no way that could have been my mother.

I can't imagine her with a spear in her hands. Wendy Turner is Kirk and Jennifer's daughter.

There was no way that Jennifer would attack. Kirk, she never would have done that.

Friends, Linda Ernst and Susan Doran believe they knew the real Jennifer Turner. Could Jennifer be a violent person?

“Could there have been a part of her that you didn't know?”

I never saw that side. I can't believe that it ever existed or ever would have. This is one of Jennifer's horses. She handled her horses very well. She took care of them, incredibly well. She absolutely adored them.

And Gould rode with Jennifer nearly every day. How many horses did Jennifer own? At the time of her death, she owned nine horses. It was her dream to start a breeding farm. But it was her husband who put that dream into reality

and encouraged her to make this a business. A money-making business. That would be another money-making business since Kirk was already a very successful dentist with an annual salary of $650,000. Any time you ask a patient with a thought of Kirk Turner as a dentist,

they all thought he was a great man. Jennifer's friend, Tara Whitaker, worked at Kirk's dental practice.

I always treat us very well. I always took us out to lunches.

He was very generous man towards all of us. And he talked about his wife. How much he loved her and about the children about vacations they would all be taking together. Kirk and Jennifer seemed like a terrific match she loved it.

Yes, absolutely.

“And that's why everyone, especially Jennifer,”

was shocked when Kirk announced he was leaving her after 23 years of marriage. Did you talk to your father when you learned they were having marital problems? He insisted on coming to my school and telling me to my face that they were going to be separated. And I asked him that night if he was cheating on my mother and he said he was not. But that was a bald face lie.

My mom had video evidence of him cheating on her. Where'd she get that? Private investigator. She'd hired someone. She had.

Jennifer was shocked to see that Kirk was frequently at the home of another woman.

A woman who once was the family's personal banker, Tanya Culver. I would have been so angry. I mean, I think most women would be angry to find out that she has been to see your personal banker. Yeah, I think I would have been very angry.

And she was just hurt, over it. Did she ever say anything to you? I'm going to get that S.O.B. No, no. I mean, she's just trying to figure out how to survive and where to go next.

A lot of money was on the line. A 10,000 square foot house, a 35-acre horse farm, and Kirk's collection of vintage corvettes. Jennifer stayed in the house after Kirk moved out and accord ordered him to pay her more than $30,000 a month.

That's a lot of money. It's a lot of money. I'd like to get that a month. It was a lot of money, but Anne says Jennifer needed it to operate the horse breeding business that she and Kirk own together.

She was clearing pastures on her own. She was putting in fences. It was a 12-hour day job. She was running a business. And then there was the human cost.

Kirk's actions splintered the family. Their son Richie left his mother's home, and he and Kirk eventually moved in together. People wonder how could you support your dad when there was another woman in his life. He had so hurt your mother emotionally. He will still my dad.

My mom will still my mom. It was still family to me. Wendy, a way it college, sided with her mother, and cut Kirk out of her life. He stopped talking to him because he was cheating on my mom.

Kirk retaliated. He cancelled all of my credit cards and stopped paying my tuition.

“I think you thought that I would talk to him if he would give me money.”

But I was doing what I thought was right, which was standing up for my mother. I know I'm not a money would have changed to that. Jennifer filed for divorce, but was also determined to go after Kirk's lover, slapping her with an unusual alienation of affection lawsuit.

It was a suit against the other woman. Jennifer was suing Tonya Colvin for stealing her ma.

but was going to ruin her children's lives too.

“If Jennifer wanted to get under Kirk's skin by filing that lawsuit, it worked.”

I know that he really wanted the alienation of affection suit to disappear. Wendy says that Kirk kept pressuring her mother to drop the suit. When your father is upset, is he a menacing man? It's very scary, very scary. Jennifer began to take precautions.

Alone in her big house, she bought mace, and at night, sealed herself off in her bedroom with a baseball bat, an extra cell phone, and a lock on the bedroom door. What was Jennifer afraid of? Jennifer was afraid that he was going to hurt her or kill her.

Why did she think that? She was afraid of him blowing up and losing control. All right. Two years later, Wendy Turner tells a spellbound courtroom the exact words spoken by Kirk

that made Jennifer cringe with fear. She told me that he said there was more than one way to end the marriage. She thought that he was going to check it out.

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My mother really loved horses. She spent a lot of time with them. She felt really lucky that she was able to do that. She's Jennifer Turner. But Jennifer's passion for horses turned into an obsession.

She says her son, Richie, once we moved out to the farm, horses really took over her life. She was out working with the horses all day, feeding, mucking stalls.

“What was happened to the love and the relationship in your opinion?”

Well, I think the love was still there. But there was no time spent with each other. You want to be recall. Facing life in prison, if he's convicted of murdering his wife, Dr. Kirk Turner makes the bold and risky decision to take the stand

to explain the events that led up to that fateful night. Jennifer really wanted to raise horses. Kirk is questioned by his own high-priced attorney, Joe Cheshire, who earned national attention in 2006 when he defended the wrongfully accused players in the Duke Lacrosse rape case.

Why did you agree to purchase the Jackwood property in the-- Make her happy? Was that important, too? Yes. But Kirk says his desire to make Jennifer happy proved to be the undoing of their marriage.

I was working, and then when I came home, I had to work on the barn. It was pretty consuming. We spent no time at all together. Two years after buying the horse farm, Kirk was lonely. That's when he began spending time with the other woman,

the family's former personal banker, Tonya Colvin. We were friends and started talking more about our marriages and kind of commiserated about how bad our marriages were becoming. And that relationship became an adulterous relationship. It did, yes, I'm ashamed to say it did.

Just two weeks after he first slept with Tonya Kirk told Jennifer he was leaving.

I knew my marriage had been over a long time. I thought it'd best just to ask for a separation and move out of the house. Even though it was Jennifer who filed for divorce, Kirk says she offered to drop the whole matter if he agreed to stay married on some pretty easy terms. She'd offered that I could, if I moved back home,

that I could keep Tonya as a girlfriend and see her and even vacation with her.

but something he said to her would end up becoming a focal point of this case.

“Kirk, have you ever said to your wife there's more than one way to end the marriage?”

I have. She'd asked me if I wanted a divorce. I said no, that was more than one way to end the marriage. And what were you referring to? Separation is my parents have done. But Wendy testified her mother took Kirk's statement as a threat on her life. She knew he carried a knife and a little gun.

And to see indicate to you what type of fear that calls in her? Terrible fear. She'd be very shaky and scared. And her eyes would have tears in them. Then came September 12th, 2007, the last day of Jennifer's life. Family friend Greg Smithson called, telling Jennifer he needed to pick up some equipment at the ranch.

Jennifer, to me, was a wonderful person. She always treated me real good.

Never had any problems with her.

“You were so close to the two children. What did they call you? Uncle Greg.”

Greg asked Jennifer if he could bring Kirk along to help him load up his equipment. Surprisingly, Jennifer put her fears aside and said yes. I walked up to the house to get Jennifer an informer that we were there. When you told her that, what was her reaction? The Kirk was there on the property. She told me she said it was fine.

Jennifer actually helped Greg and Kirk move some furniture. Then they went to his shed on the property to pick up a welder. Greg says Jennifer wasn't fearful. But the conversation got personal and Greg felt uncomfortable. I heard the word sex and then I'm like, okay, this is things that I just don't want to hear.

But you heard the word. Yeah. Sex and reconciliation. Greg headed out to his truck with the welder, leaving Kirk and Jennifer alone. Kirk says he used the private moment to change the subject to some papers he'd brought with him. I took two documents with me.

What documents did you take? I took an order that we were going to file with the court to force the sale of the farm.

And I took an affidavit from her first husband this spoke of their marriage.

That affidavit claimed that Jennifer's first marriage, nearly 25 years earlier, had failed because of her obsessive love of horses. Jennifer's ex also alleged that she had been unfaithful. I just wanted to show Jennifer that I didn't want this to get ugly. And if we had to proceed in court, that it wasn't going to be nice for either one of us.

I don't think that he thought that these papers would inflame Jennifer. They did inflame. Kirk says an enraged Jennifer grabbed a seven foot long decorative spear that was leaning against a wall and took him by surprise. I remember turning around and seeing a symmetrical silver thing in my light.

Kirk says that silver thing was the tip of the spear. Defense attorney, Brad Banner. She thrust the spear at him right here. Right in the middle of the thought. Right there, going all the way through, then she pulled the spear out and plunged it in again.

This time, much closer to his groin and it went all the way through. At 5.11, 187 pounds, Jennifer was a strong athletic woman. Kirk says he defended himself.

We know we had his crucial pocket knife in his front light pocket to defend himself against the attack.

The knife was just four inches long, but razor sharp.

“Do you remember going into your pocket and getting your knife?”

No. I remember going like this. Do you remember Jennifer falling? No. Do you remember standing over her?

I remember looking down at her eyes. Greg's mission says about two or three minutes had passed since he'd last seen Kirk and Jennifer together. Then he heard a noise. I heard Carcaller. I was screaming at several points in time.

I heard him say that she had attacked. But when I'd seen he was bleeding, Greg ran into the shed to call 911.

I saw Jennifer laying there. I'm so shook up. I couldn't tell she was alive or not.

“The 911 operator instructed Greg to give Jennifer CPR.”

I went back and forwarded between the telephoned and Jennifer's multiple times. Multiple, multiple tubs. I grabbed her nose. I put my hand under her neck and started blowing. But there was no saving Jennifer.

Kirk had severed one of her main arteries and she bled out. Kirk was hospitalized going into shock from blood loss and requiring a transfusion. Through it all, Kirk told anyone who had listened that Jennifer attacked him first.

I would never have killed my wife unless I thought I was going to die.

Was this a case of self-defense? It was not. What was it in your mind? It was a cold, blooded murder. It was probably one of the hardest things I've ever done in my life.

He asked if I was sitting down. I couldn't tell her. You know, I sat there and I cried. Richie Turner could barely find the words to tell his sister Wendy the unimaginable news. He said that, "My mom had died."

And I was frantic. She said, "I have to go. I have to go." That was very hard to do. Their mother was dead. And their father lay in a hospital bed in serious condition.

Did you want to rush to your father's side? No, no, absolutely not. I knew that when they said that my mom had been killed. That it was him. Nobody had to tell me that. I knew that.

I saw it on the knees.

And my first reaction was Kirk did this.

Jennifer's friend, Susan Doran. Nobody else would ever try to harm Jennifer. Nobody. So I knew immediately it was him. The long drawn out divorce.

The fact that he had a girlfriend. The fact that he was a millionaire. The fact that this was an embarrassment to his practice. All these things are called motive. Dr. Turner, I have a number of questions that I wish to ask you.

Prosecutor Greg Brown could not wait to challenge Kirk when he took the stand.

“Can you tell this jury at what point did you decide to kill your wife?”

I could not tell you that. But Brown is convinced. Dr. Turner is lying. He believes Kirk made a conscious choice to kill Jennifer just moments before their fatal encounter. She had no idea what was coming.

By Brown's reckoning, Dr. Turner was itching for a fight that September night when he arrived at the farm. The defendant came with the purpose to confront her. Kirk's aim was to get Jennifer to drop her embarrassing lawsuit against his girlfriend, Tonya Colvin. He was devastated because of the alienation of affection lawsuit. So Kirk sprung a surprise on Jennifer that damaging affidavit from her ex-husband to show that Kirk too could play dirty.

I'd never thought of it as a threat.

Alone in the shed that night, tempers flare, especially Brown says after Jennifer read over those documents. She crumpled them up. She may have said something offensive to him. She may have scratched his face. And at that point in time, he made a decision that he was going to kill his wife.

The defendant took out his knife. I always have a pocket knife on my person. Stay up to his wife. I just remember my hand going out. This was not self-defense.

That's correct.

“You do remember your wife's eyes being open when you kill her.”

I remember her laying on the floor and seeing her eyes and they were open. Kirk insists he had no choice but to protect himself once Jennifer began stabbing him with that seven-foot spear. Are you buying it? No, absolutely not. Prosecutor Rob Taylor.

All the physical evidence that the scene did not show an attack by Jennifer Turner on her husband.

Were any of Jennifer's fingerprints on the spear?

“No fingerprint that we can say was lifted that absolutely puts that spear in her hands.”

With Jennifer dead at his feet, prosecutors believe Kirk needed a way out. They say he staged the scene to make it look like self-defense. Then he did the unthinkable. He grabs the spear, sits down in a chair or some location and puts those wounds into his leg. Kirk's attorney Joe Cheshire says, "That's ludicrous."

I've had doctors say to me if you were wild and crazed on PCP, maybe you could do it once.

But you could never do it twice.

It does sound unbelievable, but Taylor says take a close look at those injuries to Kirk's thigh. Two wounds going through and through the leg with no twisting of the blade it appeared, no ripping of the skin. They appear to be pre-clean wounds through and through. That's not consistent with someone in a spear battle trying to dodge maneuver,

trying to avoid the conflict or trying to get away.

“The attorney isn't a fact that you inflicted those two wounds to the fat part of your leg,”

so you could give a convincing reason why you butchered your wife, so you could claim self-defense. Isn't that correct? That is not correct. The mystery of what happened to Jennifer Turner can actually be found right in this area. This is going to be the heart of the case, the blood.

This is her blood, some of Kirk's is here as well. That's shot up on the side of this wood. Why it happened? How it happened? That's at the heart of this case. This is the blood of the pre-heat. Johnny Marx, the prosecution team's lead investigator, shows us why he thinks the blood evidence contradicts Kirk's story.

Now if you believe Kirk's story that he was facing her, the knife goes in, he rips across.

This second, there's a second wound across there.

Now we all know that when the crowded artery is cut, each beat of the heart, blood shoots out of the body. That's correct. So there should be blood, your investigation claims there should be blood right up here. Right, that's correct.

And there isn't any right. The blood spatter was found on the side of the work table just inches above the floor. Police say that proves Jennifer was not standing when her throat was cut. The doctor backwards. He went down on top of her.

She was defenseless. She did not have the spear. He had to bury that knife in her neck and rip it across over to her breast area. That's not a defensive thing to do. That's an attacking murderous event to do. And it wasn't only the blood spray that led them to that conclusion.

“One of the most important things that we looked at when we looked at any of the evidence”

was these bloody footprints. According to Kirk, he was stabbed first. But investigators determined that some of Jennifer's blood was dried or drying before Kirk's fresh blood began falling on top of it. Her blood should be on top of his because he claims he was attacked first.

That's correct. But it's just the opposite. And that makes you suspicious. That's correct. The drawing blood is evidence, prosecutors say, of Kirk's elaborate cover-up.

And they alleged that he had some help. From his good friend, Greg Smithson. Did you rearrange any of the furniture? Did you ever touch a small pocket knife? You didn't pick up a spear?

Then pick up a chair? We really had to show that Mr. Smithson was not telling the truth. I think they were out on a witch hunt. I'm Anna Garcia, host of True Prom News, the podcast. Every week, we bring you in-depth coverage on cases making headlines as well as those that

go under the radar, tune in for murders that defy explanation, mystery, seeking exploration, and shocking secrets that will leave you breathless. Each week, we honor the victims by going beyond the salacious in our search for justice.

Crime never stops, and neither do we.

Listen to True Crime News available now on the Odyssey app or wherever you get your podcasts. Greg Smithson is a salt of the earth human being. What we would call down here in the south, just a good old beard drinking boy. Defense attorneys Joe Chesher and Brad Bannon say,

He is not terribly educated, but he's very, very wise from experiences that he's had in his life. There's another spot there, but it's not as bad. He became a Kirk Turner's best friend, which says a lot about Kirk too because he comes from this educated background, making lots of money. Kirk Turner is a dentist.

You're a body shop guy. To some people, they would think that's kind of an odd couple, but it's really worked for you guys. Kirk is a downed earth kind of guy. He's just a slaper-dops guy. In fact, Smithson tells Jerusalem that he was a friend to all the turners.

“The one thing I think I really enjoyed about the whole family was I'm just a working class staff.”

Of course they had mine, but they never acted like they were better than anybody else.

Jennifer was one of those that she was a kind person. I really love Jennifer. Smithson is a key figure in this first-degree murder trial because he's the closest thing either side has to an eyewitness. It's really, really simple. If Greg Smithson is telling the truth, Kirk Turner's not guilty of homicide. That's because Smithson swears the fatal encounter between Kirk and Jennifer happened in a flash.

In the two or three minutes, after Smithson left the shed, and he insists there was no cover-up. No time for Kirk to stab himself as prosecutors alleged. My only concern at that point was talking to the people in the phone and trying to help Jennifer. We absolutely do not buy Mr. Smithson's version. You think he's lying?

We think that he told an untruth. Why?

“Prosecutor Greg Brown says there's a problem with Smithson's story.”

He participated in developing a timeline that didn't fit the evidence.

Smithson figures it was around 8 p.m. when a wounded Kirk came stumbling toward him from the shed. But he didn't call 911 until 935 p.m. Levy 90 minutes on a counted four. And we believe that during that time period, a plan was developed to cover up this brutal murder. Dave.

Take your time. Your left is broke my God. All right. Take your time. Smithson says he falls apart.

Somebody in here, less nervous than I can snap. Or less upset, snap is back in for me. Any time he thinks about that night and says he was simply confused about the time. I didn't take a stopwatch. I don't know how long we were there.

But if there's one thing, Smithson is sure of about that night, it's that he gave Jennifer CPR. Do you hear any sounds from Jennifer? I heard some noise. I thought maybe she was breathing.

I don't know. Don't think I remember. He indicated that he gave chest compressions. There are no impressions consistent with someone giving chest compressions. You just believe that that Mr. Smithson gave her CPR.

I do not. He would have had blood all over him and there would have been bloody handprints on Jennifer's open chest. Greg, it's been alleged by the prosecutors in this case that you didn't really do that CPR because there wasn't enough blood on you. What do you say to that?

I don't care too much for the prosecution in this case. I know what I tried today. Despite branding Smithson, a liar, prosecutor Rob Taylor admits there is not enough evidence to charge him with a crime. Did police ever name Greg Smithson as a suspect? No.

They did not.

“If the lead investigators don't think he was involved, why should you?”

We continually found places in the physical evidence that just didn't match what his statements were. Did you lie to police officers about what really happened in that building? No. I cooperated with everybody. When it's the defense's turn, forensic scientists, Merlin Miller, describes what she found inside Kirk's front jeans pocket.

The pocket where he kept his knife. That is Dr. Turner's DNA and only Dr. Turner's DNA. The fact that there was only his blood on that pocket definitively shows that he had suffered all of his wounds before he ever went to defend himself.

If he had killed Jennifer first and then tried to cook up a tail wound himself for a cover story,

Absolutely.

“In terms of important evidence that's in this room, how important is that blood in the pocket?”

Critical. It's probably the key fact in the case. Watching this all play out are the Turner children. Wendy, who thinks her father is guilty, and Richie, who believes in his innocence. I'm really sad for him. I feel like he's stuck in a position that he can't get out of.

My mother was the one that really stood up for Richie and Kirk was really hard on Richie, really hard.

You never call your dad dad. You always call him Kirk. Why is that?

He took my mom from me. I can't call him dad when he did that. He just didn't deserve to be called that anymore. Can you see your mother going after your dad with a spear? She's come out with a horse whip before. A horse whip? Yes. She wasn't swinging it as hard as she could, but yeah, she was.

“Does that make you wonder today if maybe she was capable of picking up that spear in a moment of rage and attacking your dad?”

It does. While the children remain divided, the jury unites, delivering a verdict that stuns the state of North Carolina. Jennifer Turner was found to be lifeless, and she thrust this spirit. Kirk Turner has told you the truth. Kirk Turner's month-long murder trial has been a gut-wrenching experience for all those who cared about Jennifer.

She thought that he was going to take care of her. Now, after just six hours of deliberation, the jury has decided whether or not Kirk Turner is guilty. Layla informs me that the jury has reached a verdict. Sir? Members of the jury, you have returned a verdict of not guilty by reason of self-defense.

Not guilty. The verdict sends shock waves through the courtroom. Kirk Turner is vindicated.

I want to first thank God for all that he's done for me.

I don't want to thank the jurors. That's because he's anything though. Where are you right now? She's a great girl. I am crushed.

I am. I really thought he'd be guilty of something. We were very, very shocked. It's okay to kill your wife. That's the message that was sent.

Jennifer's friends, the community, and even the local newspaper, all expressed outrage at the jury's decision. 48 hours brought six of the jurors together to discuss their controversial verdict. One guy wrote that it's North Carolina's O.J. Simpson case. Would you like to respond to that? Absolutely.

I was just stunned that they would say things like it to sell papers that we were a bunch of dumb country bumpkins. They were fooled by the big flashy lawyers from out of town. That was not the case at all. I heard the evidence in the courtroom and went with what we were shown. Both sides offered reasonable interpretations of blood spatter.

But the jury focused on the blood inside Kirk's genes. The only blood in this pocket was his blood. He had already been cut when he went in at a grab the knife.

That convinced me, as who was staggered cut first.

And the jurors also came to the conclusion that Greg Smithson, who was with Kirk that night, was a stand-up guy. Do you believe Greg Smithson? Absolutely.

“And what do you think of the prosecution's attempt to cast a spursions on him to suggest he may have been part of a conspiracy?”

They were grasping at Strauss. But there was one person who really rubbed these jurors the wrong way. Prosecutor Rob Taylor. I don't remember planning a knife into the chest of a living, breathing person. Maybe he was making his point on top of us.

She is not she, Rob, mighty spearwoman.

And as for Kirk Turner, these jurors saw nothing wrong with him carrying a knife that night.

How many of you carry a pocket knife? Two of you.

“And matter of fact, I had the same knife they killed her with.”

Mine's moving to one hand.

The not guilty verdict has only widened the gap between Wendy and Richie. Do you talk today? No.

You're completely estranged.

I am nervous that if I talk to him that he will tell a Kirk about me. And to me, I can't risk that.

“What do you want people watching this to know today about your father?”

He's a good man. He loves me. He loves my sister. And if Wendy came back right now, he'd let her in with open arms. But Wendy won't be coming back anytime soon.

“If you had an opportunity to speak with your father,”

say have one last conversation with him. What would you want to say to him? Was it worth it? [Music] In 2018, Kirk Turner reached a $200,000 settlement in a lawsuit

against the North Carolina State Bureau of Investigation.