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Jennifer
TRAYERS
Classification: Murderer
Characteristics:
Love triangle
Number of victims: 1
Date of murder:
December 4, 2010
Date of arrest:
Next day
Date of birth: 1968
Victim profile:
Navy Lt.
Cmdr. Frederick Trayers, 41 (her husband)
Method of murder:
Stabbing with knife
Location: San
Diego County, California, USA
Status: Sentenced
to 16 years to life in prison
on March 9, 2012
SAN DIEGO —
Calling the crime an “irrevocable tragedy,” a judge sentenced a
woman Friday to 16 years to life in prison for fatally stabbing
her Navy doctor husband more than a year ago.
Jennifer
Trayers, 43, was convicted of second-degree murder last month in
connection with the death of Lt. Cmdr. Frederick Trayers III, who
was killed in their North Park home. He was stabbed more than 10
times, including twice in his chest and eight times in his back.
During
the sentencing hearing, San Diego Superior Court Judge Joan Weber
noted that the couple had problems in their 18-year marriage but
had found a way to work through them in the past and move on.
But on
Dec. 4, 2010, Jennifer Trayers made a decision that changed
everything when she picked up a knife and ended her 41-year-old
husband's life, Weber said.
The
killing illustrates “the irrevocable tragedy of domestic
violence,” the judge said.
Violence, she added, can never be a solution to marital disputes.
“You
lost the man that you loved more than life itself,” Weber told the
defendant, who sat quietly in the courtroom with her lawyers.
The
judge said a letter submitted to the court by the victim’s mother
was particularly moving. In it, the mother described how she had
not only lost her son, but a daughter-in-law who had been part of
her life for nearly two decades.
“How can
I just turn off the feelings that I’ve had all these years?” Carol
Trayers said in the letter, which the judge read aloud. “I will
grieve for both of them all of my life.”
Jennifer
Trayers did not make a statement during the hearing. Her lawyer,
Kerry Armstrong, said Trayers was “extremely remorseful” for what
she had done, a sentiment she wanted to be expressed to her
husband’s family in particular.
Armstrong said it was heartbreaking to see Trayers be sentenced to
prison for such a long time, possibly the rest of her life. He
said he wished California’s sentencing guidelines for
second-degree murder were more flexible as they are in other
states.
“I just
think that people should be treated a little differently for their
background and the reason that they kill,” he said.
Armstrong argued in trial that Trayers should be convicted of
manslaughter instead of murder, because she lost control during a
heated confrontation with her husband while trying to talk to him
about his affair with another woman.
Deputy
District Attorney Fiona Khalil argued that Trayers committed
first-degree murder. The prosecutor said Trayers had collected
evidence of the affair — emails and other electronic
communications — for months, and waited to stab her husband when
he was in bed and groggy from taking a sleeping pill.
The jury
decided on second-degree murder, meaning they believed the killing
was intentional but not premeditated.
The
victim’s sister, Cathie Trayers Mislan, wrote in a letter read in
court by a friend that her brother had dedicated his life to his
country and to saving others. She said she would miss his laugh
and his positive outlook on life.
“I
cannot forgive Jennifer for taking the life of my brother,” she
said.
Woman is convicted of
murdering her husband, a Navy doctor
Los Angeles Times
February 8, 2012
A San Diego woman was
convicted Wednesday of second-degree murder for fatally stabbing
her husband, a Navy doctor, allegedly in rage because he was
having an extramarital affair.
Jennifer Trayers, 43, was convicted in the
December 2010 stabbing of Navy Lt. Cmdr. Frederick Trayers, 41,
who was on the staff at Naval Medical Center San Diego. The couple
had been married for 18 years.
Prosecutors said Trayers waited until her
husband was in bed and groggy from cold medication before she
stabbed him 11 times in the back, head and chest with a knife. Her
defense attorney said Trayers "snapped" because of the pain of
finding her husband was having an affair.
The San Diego County Superior Court jury
deliberated for three days. Trayers faces a maximum sentence of 16
years to life in prison when sentenced next month, according to
Dist. Atty. Bonnie Dumanis.
The jury found Trayers not guilty of
first-degree murder which could have brought a life sentence in
prison. At issue was prosecutors' assertion that Trayers planned
the murder in advance.
Navy Doc's Wife: Intended to Harm Herself
Trayers faced 26 years to life in prison if
found guilty
By Gene Cubbison and Sarah Grieco -
NBCsandiego.com
Tuesday, Jan 31, 2012
Jennifer Trayers testified on Tuesday that her
Navy doctor husband died during a struggle over a knife that she
intended to use on herself.
Trayers said she approached her husband of 18
years, Fred, in their bedroom of their North Park condominium with
a knife on Dec. 4, 2010.
She said she was hoping to get him talking
about his ongoing affair by cutting her wrist, then poking the
knife in her chest.
She testified Fred said, "Let me help you."
“He's never acted this way before and I didn't
know -- it was so unlike Fred, this behavior,” Trayers said. “I
didn't know what would happen if he got hold of the knife."
It happened in the couple's North Park
condominium, where Trayers says she was obsessed over Fred's plans
to leave her for another Navy doctor.
The knife that inflicted the fatal wounds: a
military “Ka-Bar” that Trayers testified Fred offered her, after
laughing at her attempts to cut herself with a butcher knife from
the kitchen.
Trayers insisted she never planned to kill
Fred, whose emails and text communications with the other woman
she'd intercepted using a spyware program.
She'd written the woman, who testified last
week as a prosecution witness, saying in essence, she'd seen Fred
for the last time.
During the struggle for the knife, Trayers said
she was cut and stabbed numerous times before Fred reached for,
and dropped, the butcher knife.
"I stabbed him in the back of the neck,"
Trayers replied.
"And when you stabbed him, what were you
thinking?" Armstrong inquired a short time later.
"I was just so angry and mad and I didn't know
what was going on, what was happening, why he was acting the way
he was acting," Trayers said. "I didn't know what was going to
happen.
Trayers testified she "blacked out" after the
first stab, and was out of it for many hours later.
Fred's body was found with nine more stab
wounds.
Earlier in the week Trayers admitted she was
having an affair as well.
Closing statements begin Wednesday -- Trayers
faces 26 years to life in prison if found guilty.
Navy Doc's
Wife Was Also Having An Affair
The Navy wife who defense attorneys maintain
killed her husband in a suicidal rage suffered about three dozen
superficial stab wounds one expert testified Monday.
By R. Stickney and Paul Krueger -
NBCsandiego.com
January 30, 2012
Judge Joan Weber declined to dismiss a murder
charge against a woman accused of stabbing her Navy doctor husband
to death in his bed in December, 2010.
Prosecutors argue Jennifer Trayers' planned the
murder, after learning of her husband's extra-marital affair with
a fellow Navy doctor.
The prosecution finished its initial
presentation of witnesses this afternoon, at which time Trayer's
attorney asked the judge to dismiss count one of the complaint.
Attorney Kerry Armstrong said there is
insufficient evidence of "premeditation and deliberation" and that
the killing was, if anything, an act of "uncontrollable rage," or
manslaughter.
But the defense argued that Jennifer Trayers
wrote at least one letter before she killed her husband, Fred
Trayers. In the letter, she revealed she knew he was having an
affair, and that the jury could find that she planned to kill him.
The prosecutor also said that the evidence
shows that Jennifer Trayers had "plenty of time" to plan the
murder.
The judge sided with the prosecution, ruling
that the jury should decide on the murder charge.
Trayers says she became suspicious that her
husband was cheating on her in late 2002, eight years before she
allegedly stabbed him to death.
She testified that Fred Trayers was ignoring
her and sending emails and instant messages, and talking on the
phone, with a woman he had met at his work.
She was also having an affair with a man with
whom she worked. In late 2007 Trayers said she saw an email her
husband wrote to the woman he had earlier had an affair with. It
included the word "passionate".
She said she was hurt by that and considered
leaving him, but stayed with him and their relationship remained
good. She said she never had another affair.
Until August, 2010, she said the relationship
remained "good". But by September 2010, she became suspicious that
he was having another affair, with a woman he met on the hospital
ship. She said her mental state changed, she was anxious and had
trouble sleeping and was losing weight.
In addition to her testimony, defense attorneys
discussed Trayers medical state on the night of Dec. 6, 2010. She
required surgery and additional blood when she was brought to the
hospital that night.
However, her wounds didn’t go inside the body
and could be compared to paper cuts a forensic pathologist
testified in a downtown courtroom Monday.
Defense attorneys say their client never
planned to kill her husband and was trying to kill herself.
Forensic pathologist Christina Stanley
testified that when she examined Jennifer Trayers in the hospital,
there were marks on her neck, wrists and over her heart but many
of them appeared more like scratches than stab wounds.
Michael Sise, M.D., a vascular surgeon with
Scripps Health, also testified Jennifer Trayers' wounds were
superficial. Sise said he operated on the defendant and found one
laceration in an abdomen muscle. He also placed a chest tube on
the right side of her chest because of a collapsed lung.
Mistress of Navy Doctor Stabbed to Death by
Wife Speaks Out
By Jeannette Rogers - News92fm.com
January 26, 2012
The physician mistress of a Navy doctor who was
allegedly stabbed to death by his widow testified at her trial
that he said he planned to leave his wife for her, but the
mistress broke off their relationship when she was told that his
wife was pregnant.
Dr. Danielle Robbins was 30 when she met and
fell in love with Navy Lt. Cmdr. Frederick Trayers, a married ER
doctor, while they were both working aboard the USS Mercy in
2010. Although Trayers had been married for nearly 20 years,
Robbins continued the relationship.
“Every time we would talk and communicate I
would just feel more connected,” Robbins said in court Wednesday.
“He said [he and his wife] had issues, and he was unhappy for a
long time.”
Robbins says she ended the relationship when
Trayers’ wife, Jennifer Trayers, told her husband she was
pregnant. But the defense said Frederick Trayers was lying, and
alleges that when Jennifer Trayers found out about the affair in
December 2010 she stabbed her husband eight times in the back and
through the heart at their San Diego home, killing him.
Prosecutors said that the evidence will show
that Jennifer Trayers waited to catch him unprepared, that she
armed herself with the knife and that she attacked him with
planned marksmanship.
Police responding to the scene found Frederick
Trayers curled up in his bed, and Jennifer Trayers lying nearby
with apparently self-inflicted stab wounds.
While Jennifer Trayer’s lawyer does not deny
his client killed her husband, he says she lost control while they
were wrestling over a knife.
Frederick Trayers and his wife both had a
history of infidelity and were going to counseling, according to
ABC News’ San Diego affiliate 10 News.
In court, Robbins recounted secret meetings
including jogs on the beach and hikes, and bar-hopping the night
of Jennifer Trayer’s birthday, according to 10 News, which
reported that Jennifer Trayers sent Robbins an eight-page email
telling her, “My husband is not going to be yours."
The Love Triangle Murder of Lt. Commander
Fred Trayers
By Bryan Lavietes
A Romantic Beginning
Jennifer and Fred Trayers had a cute story of
how they first met. In February 1991, Jennifer was working as a
travel agent at the University of Notre Dame in South Bend,
Indiana when Fred -- an avid outdoorsman from Peabody,
Massachusetts, now a student at Notre Dame -- came in to book a
trip to Glacier. Fred was smitten with Jennifer and started making
frequent trips to the office to ask her out. "I thought he was a
geek," Jennifer has said. But Fred's persistence paid off -- "I
said if you stop coming around to my work, I'll go on a date with
you," Jennifer recalled.
The two soon became
a couple and grew closer, even as Fred -- who had joined the
military before dating Jennifer -- began Navy flight school in
Pensacola, Florida. Fred learned he would be stationed in San
Diego, and the couple decided to marry before he moved. So in
December 1992, they met up in Denver, Colorado and eloped. In
November 1993, Fred and Jennifer Trayers renewed their vows in
South Bend to celebrate their marriage with friends and family.
Jennifer happily
assumed the role of military wife, moving often as the Navy
transferred her husband. Jennifer loved traveling and enjoyed her
time with Fred. One day they hoped to start a family, but kept
putting it off for "when we move" or "at the next duty station."
When Fred decided he wanted to become a doctor, they put their
family plans on hold again while Fred attended medical school in
Florida.
The Marriage is Tested
The Trayers lived in Fort Lauderdale from 2001
until 2005 so Fred could attend medical school at Nova
Southeastern University. Jennifer took a job at a timeshare
company to earn money for the couple's living expenses. Fred began
spending time with Danielle Merket, a female psychologist who did
research with Navy pilots. Danielle became a friend to both Fred
and Jennifer, who was happy to meet a work colleague of her
husband's. However, as Fred grew closer with Danielle (Jennifer
stayed behind when the two went on a week-long hiking trip with
another friend,) Jennifer began to suspect her husband was having
an affair. When Danielle came to visit the Trayers for
Thanksgiving in 2002, Jennifer noticed a tenseness between the
three of them. Although Jennifer never confronted her husband
about her suspicions, she noted that Danielle and Fred had stopped
communicating by the Spring of 2003.
Jennifer's distress
over her husband's suspected affair helped drive her to an affair
of her own. In early 2003, Jennifer became romantically involved
with Orvill Webb, a co-worker at the timeshare company. Although
both were married, they began a sexual relationship that went on
for a few months until Webb's wife discovered the affair and
called Fred Trayers. Jennifer didn't deny the trysts and offered
to leave Fred if that's what he wanted -- but recounted that Fred
blamed himself for ignoring her.
Although the next
two years in Florida were strained, the Trayers never resorted to
violence or even loud arguments. In 2004, Jennifer even began
seeing Webb again because she thought Fred was still in love with
Merket. Still, when Fred finished medical school in mid-2005, the
couple agreed to forget everything that had happened in Florida.
The Navy would next station Lt. Commander Fred Trayers at Camp
Pendleton in Oceanside, California. The Trayers would start fresh
on the west coast.
The Other Woman
Once out of medical
school, Fred resumed his regular salary, and the Trayers' were
able to buy a home in Oceanside in 2005. Jennifer was happy at her
job at Pacific Western Bank. The couple renewed their wedding vows
in 2007 to mark their 15th anniversary. By 2010, Fred
was sent to work at Balboa Naval Hospital in San Diego, so the
couple moved to a condominium in the San Diego neighborhood of
North Park. Fred was popular with his colleagues in emergency
medicine, many of whom would later say they had never seen him
lose his temper or act aggressively.
Jennifer Trayers
thought they had have emerged from the past with their
relationship intact. But in mid-2010, Fred went on a humanitarian
mission to the South Pacific and set off a chain of events that
would spell doom for the Trayers' marriage and their lives.
On August 5, 2010,
Fred Trayers flew to Australia to board the USNS Mercy, a floating
hospital tasked with sailing through Timor, Indonesia, and Guam on
a Naval humanitarian mission. It was on the Mercy that Trayers met
Ensign Danielle Robins, a pretty young Navy doctor over 10 years
his junior. Over the course of the trip, the two became close --
they even shared a romantic kiss just before Trayers was to return
home. For Ens. Robins, this was a precarious situation because a
Navy officer caught committing adultery is subject to sanctions
from demotion up to discharge.
The two kept in
touch via e-mail and text -- and as fate would have it, Robins was
soon transferred to San Diego after her stint on the Mercy. With
Robins living in the Bachelor Officer's Quarters at the Balboa
Navy base, she began seeing Trayers more often. By October 2010,
the two were discussing a possible future together. Still, Fred
Trayers was conflicted about his marriage, and seemingly unsure if
he wanted to end it. That ambivalence was a major theme of his
e-mail correspondence with Robins.
On October 16,
Robins wrote an e-mail to Fred that was "addressed" to Fred's wife
about his great qualities and their unhappy marriage. The e-mail
had the salutation "Dear Mrs. Wonderful" -- Robins wrote: "I
apologize for the presumptiveness in telling you all about the man
to whom you are married... you have daily access to an amazing
person... One day they will be gone and the only thing you will be
left with is wondering why you didn't appreciate what you had at
the time. I guess the point of this stupid letter is to remind you
how lucky you are and to ask that if you can't see that, you
should let him go."
Trust is Broken
When Dr. Fred Trayers returned from the South
Pacific in early September 2010, his wife noticed he was texting
more often than normal -- Jennifer had a gut feeling that
something was wrong. They started to see a marriage counselor, and
although Fred denied he was having an affair, Jennifer's anxiety
continued; she lost weight and battled insomnia.
In October 2010,
Jennifer Trayers installed tracking software on their home
computer, so she could see what her husband was up to. She started
to amass a collection of e-mails between Fred and Danielle Robins.
One day in early October, Jennifer missed a day of work because
she hadn't been eating or sleeping and was surprised when Fred
came home early from a "workout" -- he was sweaty and wasn't
wearing his wedding ring. Jennifer recalled Fred didn't make time
to talk to her until after he showered. Whatever suspicions
Jennifer had were confirmed in mid-October when her tracking
software found Robins' "Dear Mrs. Wonderful" e-mail. Although
Trayers never told her husband that she had seen the emails
(because there was no way she could have known without admitting
to having installed spyware), she repeatedly quizzed Fred about
whether or not he was having an affair. Fred consistently denied
it, and told her over and over again that he would never leave
her.
On the evening of
Friday, December 3, 2010, Dr. Trayers left his wife at home to go
to a work Christmas party and then an overnight shift at the
hospital. He would never be seen alive again.
Strange Communications
On Saturday December
4, 2010, Deborah Smith texted her daughter Jennifer Trayers at
roughly 9 am. No response. Smith called Trayers later that morning
and the two spoke briefly. Smith recalled that Jennifer sounded
tired -- she had stayed up waiting for Fred to come home from the
overnight shift. This was not unusual, Smith thought. Jennifer
sounded groggy -- not distressed. Smith had no idea anything was
amiss.
Danielle Robins also
corresponded with Jennifer Trayers the morning of December 4, 2010
-- this would be the only time Jennifer ever reached out to her,
and it was far from typical. At 8:23 am, Jennifer Trayers used her
husband's Gmail account to send a long missive castigating Robins
for her relationship with Fred, and it showed a knowledge of
Robins' previous communications with Fred Trayers. The e-mail was
titled "Mr. Wonderful" and it began "Dear Little Miss Grass is Not
Greener on My Side" before rambling on for 8 pages. In the email,
Jennifer Trayers enumerates her husband's good and bad qualities
-- an inventory she knew well after 18 years of marriage -- and
tells Robins that their marriage was strong before she came into
the picture: "We were getting along well and trying hard to make
it work. Then you come along and all of a sudden he had been
miserable in this relationship for years and has wanted to end it
a long time ago."
Jennifer Trayers'
email took a desperate turn, describing their sexual activities
during the time of Fred and Danielle Robins' affair. And then came
a passage written in the past-tense that prosecutors would seize
on as evidence of premeditation: " I will have the joy of knowing
I got to spend quality time with him. I got to travel with him. I
got to sleep with him... I got to hear him say 'I love you' softly
in my ear while he's hugging me. I was the last person he was
with." The final words of the e-mail were emphatic: You should
feel guilty now! You just ruined the marriage of a wonderful man!
The career of a wonderful man! The future of a wonderful man!
Sincerely, Mrs. Wonderful".
As it turned out,
the future of both Fred and his wife would soon be damaged
forever.
Saturday Morning
According to Jennifer Trayers, she slept little
Friday night as her husband worked the overnight shift at Balboa
Medical Center. When he got home around 7:15 am on Saturday
morning, Jennifer said she was desperate to speak to him about
their relationship and about their future. Fred told her he was
tired and that he wanted to sleep before having their serious
talk. As he took a shower, Jennifer noticed Fred had left his
Gmail account up on the computer. Jennifer said it was at that
time she sent her e-mail to Danielle Robins.
Having tipped her
hand about the other woman, Jennifer knew it wouldn't be long
before Fred realized he had been found out. Fred continued to put
off their conversation, but Jennifer wouldn't be denied. She
grabbed a butcher knife and got on the bed -- then she asked Fred
how she should best slit her wrist. Jennifer expected Fred to
protect her and then talk to her, but he just started laughing and
exclaimed he had a better knife; he took a K-Bar knife out of his
nightstand drawer and gave it to her. Surprised and enraged,
Jennifer began poking her own chest with the knife in order to
draw a reaction from her husband.
At this point, Fred
reached for the knife and the two struggled, causing a few more
incisions to Jennifer's chest in the process. Jennifer said she
was feeling "hot and angry" in a way she had never felt before.
When Fred reached over to his nightstand, Jennifer assumed he was
reaching for the butcher knife, and she stabbed him in the back of
the neck. The last words Jennifer remembers Fred uttering were
"let me help you." After that, Jennifer says, she blacked out.
All in all, Jennifer
Trayers would stab her husband 11 times.
Police Arrive at a Grisly Scene
When Fred Trayers missed his hospital shifts on
Saturday and Sunday without so much as a phone call, his
colleagues called law enforcement. Police arrived at 3750 Grim
Avenue Apt. 2 at about 6:20 am on Monday, December 6, 2010 -- what
they found shocked them. Fred Trayers was dead, his body curled up
on the floor next to the bed, still entangled in bedding. He was
stabbed about the neck and back -- knife wounds had perforated his
heart, lung and kidneys. The intense struggle had saturated the
bedding with blood -- and blood drops were found on the headboard
and the wall above the bed as well. Fred Trayers suffered multiple
defensive wounds on his hands and forearms. A coroner would later
find the prescription sleep aid Zolpidem in Fred's blood.
Toxicologists later said the amount of drugs in Trayers' system
would have relaxed him, but would not have left him incapacitated.
Jennifer Trayers was
still alive, but seriously injured. She was transported to Scripps
Mercy Hospital where doctors found approximately 36 sharp force
injuries to her chest area -- including a cut artery in her upper
gastric area and a partially-collapsed right lung. Jennifer had
lost a lot of blood, and might have died in hours had police not
arrived when they did.
As the condo was
locked and there was no sign of forced entry, police quickly
determined that the Trayers were victim and perpetrator. Who was
who became clearer when investigators found four manila envelopes
stacked neatly on the kitchen counter -- the envelopes contained
printed e-mails and text messages between Fred Trayers and
Danielle Robins.
Jennifer Trayers
would soon be charged with the murder of her husband. She was
arraigned in her hospital bed, and held on $2 million bail.
Trial & Verdict
The murder trial of Jennifer Trayers began on
January 23, 2012 in downtown San Diego. Prosecutor Fiona Khalil
methodically laid out the evidence -- citing Trayers' final e-mail
to Robins which stated "I was the last person he was with" as
proof that the killing was premeditated. Unsurprisingly, defense
attorney Kerry Armstrong claimed his client had been put through
an "emotional roller coaster" by her philandering husband, and
that the killing was a spontaneous response born of Jennifer's
sleeplessness and anxiety. He argued his client was guilty of
voluntary manslaughter, not murder.
The two-week trial
featured Danielle Robins calmly describing the e-mails sent during
her relationship with the deceased (and denying she and Dr. Fred
Trayers ever had sexual intercourse). But the main event came
during the defense case when Jennifer Trayers took the stand in
her own defense. Over two days of testimony, she often lost
control of her emotions while discussing her doomed relationship
with her husband.
On February 8, 2012,
after roughly three days of deliberations, the jury returned a
verdict. They found Jennifer Trayers guilty of second-degree
murder for the killing of Dr. Fred Trayers -- a middle ground
between the first-degree charge urged by the prosecution and the
voluntary manslaughter finding championed by defense attorneys.
Jennifer Trayers betrayed no emotion as the verdict was read.
Afterward, her attorney Kerry Armstrong told reporters, "She feels
absolutely horrible about what happened to her husband...she still
loves him."
Jennifer Trayers was
called back to that San Diego courtroom on March 9, 2012 for
sentencing by Judge Joan Weber. Before passing down her decision,
Judge Weber spoke about "the irrevocable tragedy of domestic
violence," telling Trayers that violence was no way to settle
marital troubles: "You lost the man you loved more than life
itself," Weber told Trayers before sentencing the placid defendant
to spend no less than sixteen years and as much as life in prison
for the killing of her husband.
Although Jennifer
made no statement at sentencing, several of Fred's family members
wrote letters to the court. Fred's mother Carol Trayers wrote of
the anguish of losing her son and the daughter-in-law who she had
loved for almost 20 years: "How can I just turn off the feelings
that I've had all these years," her letter read, "I will grieve
for both of them all of my life."
