No Early Release Slated for Convicted Murderer Patrick Frazee
Trevor Phipps
The Colorado Supreme Court has denied another appeal by former Teller County resident and convicted murderer Patrick Frazee, whose prospects of ever getting out of jail now appear doomed.
After he was convicted of murdering his then fiancée Kelsey Berreth on Thanksgiving Day 2018, Frazee still maintained he was innocent of the brutal baseball bat-slaying.
Frazee’s first attempt to appeal the guilty verdict on first degree murder (and other charges) occurred at the end of 2022, after he was convicted of Berreth’s murder in 2019. However, the panel of three judges in the Colorado Appellate Court made a quick, unanimous decision to uphold the jury’s conviction in the case. In fact, the judges opted to not even publish their opinions about the court’s decision.
Frazee didn’t stop there though, in an ongoing effort to prove his innocence. In fact, the convicted murderer, who reportedly killed his wife with a baseball bat, appealed a second time. His case was recently heard by the Colorado Supreme Court, which sided with the Court of Appeals and upheld Frazee’s murder conviction.
Frazee drafted his appeal on the grounds that statements he made to Department of Human Services (DHS) caseworker Mary Longmire before his trial should not have been admissible in court. Frazee claimed that he was never read his Miranda Rights, so Longmire’s testimony should not have been allowed during the trial.
According to the Colorado Supreme Court’s opinion summary, Frazee agreed to meet with the case worker shortly after he was arrested. Longmire (the Teller County caseworker) requested to meet with Frazee while he was incarcerated to discuss the custody of his and Kelsey’s young child.
Longmire told Frazee that he didn’t have to answer any questions and was free to leave the jail’s video advisement room at any time during the interview. Frazee told her details about the custody arrangement he had with his fiancée, and claimed to have spoken to Berreth on Thanksgiving Day, the day she was killed in her townhome.
After DHS determined to give custody to Berreth’s parents instead of Frazee’s mother, Longmire took the stand and told the jury what Frazee had told her during the interview. However, even during the trial, Frazee’s legal team didn’t like the idea that what Frazee told Longmire could be used in court since he was never read his Miranda Rights.
Frazee’s public defenders filed a motion to suppress all of the statements he had made to Longmire during the meeting they had at the Teller County Jail. The court held an hearing on the matter,but then denied the motion in writing a few days later.
Longmire’s testimony was heard and Frazee was convicted by a jury and then sentenced to sit in prison for the rest of his life. But ever since his conviction, he has maintained to a number of local residents that he is innocent.
Frazee even once wrote a letter to former District Attorney Dan May, who played a big role in the prosecution effort, asking May to take his side in his appeals efforts. But May wrote a letter back, following his retirement from the DA’s office, refusing the request, and telling Frazee, “You are right where you need to be.” But in 2022, Frazee further contended that he was innocent after filing his first attempt at an appeal using the same Miranda Rights argument that was denied by the district judge at his trial.
Overall, the Supreme Court agreed with the district judge and the appeals court when they said that Miranda Rights (a law requiring that suspects be read their rights and told that anything they say can be used against them in court) only apply to law enforcement officers during an interrogation while the suspect is in custody.
“To the contrary, her actions in this case were consistent with her duties under the Children’s Code, and because a court had placed legal custody of the child with the department (DHS), she was required by law to investigate the matter and to make a recommendation to the court regarding child placement,” the state Supreme Court Justices stated in their ruling. “As a result, in the court’s view, Longmire was not acting as an agent of law enforcement but, in fact, was acting independently of law enforcement. In addition, the court found that although Frazee was in jail, no custodial interrogation had taken place. Based on these findings, the court concluded that Longmire had no legal duty to provide Frazee with a Miranda advisement or warning.”
Despite Frazee’s aggressive appeal efforts, he will not be leaving his home at the Arkansas Valley Correctional Facility (located in Ordway about 50 miles east of Pueblo) anytime soon. Frazee was sentenced to life in prison without the possibility of parole plus an additional 156 years after being convicted on eight felony charges after brutally beating his fiancée with a baseball bat, and then burning her body on his Florissant property. The case, and the murder trial, gained national media attention, and was profiled on the 48 Hours real-life crime series, aired on CBS.
