On July 18, 2024, a 35-year-old Appleton man died on the floor of his North Park Drive Lane apartment from a puncture wound to his heart.
According to Outagamie County District Attorney Melinda Tempelis, the man’s fiancée, Samantha Krebs, inflicted the fatal injury.
Krebs, 40, of Appleton, is charged with first-degree intentional homicide and accused of stabbing the victim. She appeared in court Sept. 3 for the first day of trial, becoming emotional as her attorney, Stephanie Rock, gave the defense’s opening statement.
According to Rock, the victim’s death was self-inflicted. “Whether it was accidental or intentional, it is not something that Samantha participated in,” she said.
Krebs’ trial is scheduled to last until Sept. 12. If convicted of her original charge, she will face a mandatory life sentence.
‘She knew he wasn’t’ OK
On the night of July 18, Krebs and the victim had plans with one of Krebs’ good friends and his girlfriend, Tempelis told the jury. When the friends arrived at the apartment, they walked in to find the victim lying on the floor.
When one of the friends called 911 seven minutes after arriving, he told the dispatcher that the victim fell on a knife, Tempelis said.
During the trial, Tempelis said the jury will listen to an audio recording from one of the friend’s phone that captured them entering the apartment. In the recording, she said, Krebs is heard saying, “He’s breathing, I don’t think it went through an organ,” and, “What are we supposed to say? He fell on a knife?”
Although the two friends initially protected Krebs and told police she wasn’t at the apartment when they arrived, Tempelis said, they eventually told police that Krebs was there. One of the friends told police in his second interview that Krebs looked at him and said, “Just tell the police he stabbed himself.”
The friends also told police that before leaving the apartment, Krebs kissed the victim and said, “Sorry, I love you,” Tempelis said.
After police responded to the apartment, an officer spoke to Krebs on the phone, telling her to come to the apartment because the victim had collapsed, Tempelis said. During the phone call, which will be played for the jury during trial, Tempelis said Krebs asks several times what was going on and, “Is he OK?”
“She knew he wasn’t,” Tempelis told the jury. “He was bleeding on the floor in the kitchen when she left.”
‘The truth in this case is that there was no homicide’
Rock agreed with Tempelis that on the night of July 18, Krebs and the victim had plans with the two friends. According to Rock, those plans were made earlier in the day, before “out of nowhere, something changed.”
The victim told Krebs he was going to see his uncle, Rock said, and Krebs said he shouldn’t, which caused an argument. During the argument, Krebs said she was going to leave and began putting her shoes on when she saw a knife sheath “fly across the living room,” Rock said.
The sheath was part of a brand new knife set the couple had recently purchased, Rock said. When Krebs looked up, Rock said, she saw the victim holding his side and realized he had an injury. According to Rock, Krebs immediately began putting pressure on the victim’s wound.
Krebs was rendering aid to the victim when her friends arrived to the apartment, the defense said. Rock said the jury will come to their own conclusions about what was said in the audio recording mentioned by Tempelis, but that they won’t hear Krebs say to tell the police the victim stabbed himself.
Krebs was on probation at the time of the incident and had items in the apartment she knew she wasn’t allowed to have, Rock said, which is why she left when one of the friends told her to.
The friends’ changing statements isn’t evidence that Krebs tried to cover up a crime, Rock argued. “You’re not going to hear any testimony … about Samantha asking anybody to cover up for her,” she said.
Rock said the jury also won’t hear evidence of Krebs’ friends planning a cover-up, any history of physical altercations between Krebs and the victim, defensive wounds on the victim or any motive Krebs would have to harm the victim.
During the prosecution’s opening statement, Tempelis focused heavily on how video and audio recordings will show Krebs’ demeanor in the aftermath of her alleged crime. Rock told the jury to remember that “everybody responds to things differently.”
“She is essentially trying to cope with something very tragic that she just witnessed. It was the tragic death of her fiance,” Rock said. “The truth in this case is that there was no homicide.”
Vivian Barrett is the public safety reporter for the Green Bay Press-Gazette. You can reach her at vmbarrett@greenbay.gannett.com or (920) 431-8314.
This article originally appeared on Green Bay Press-Gazette: Samantha Krebs’ defense claims boyfriend’s injuries were self-inflicted in homicide trial opening statements
Reporting by Vivian Barrett, Green Bay Press-Gazette / Green Bay Press-Gazette
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