Boyfriend, police testify in murder trial of SLO woman whose body was dumped in creek
The second day of the Kristen Marti murder trial began Thursday with witness testimonies from friends of Marti and law enforcement.
Robert Koehler, 40, of Arroyo Grande is accused of slashing Marti’s throat and weighing her body down in a Prefumo Canyon creek bed with rocks on his and his wife’s wedding anniversary.
Koehler plead not guilty to the crime in June 2018. He has remained in San Luis Obispo County Jail custody without bail since he was arrested in May 2018.
Judge Jesse J. Marino is overseeing the case, and a jury will decide the verdict.
Boyfriend questioned about vehicle of interest
A large part of both the prosecution and defense’s questioning Thursday focused on establishing the appearance of the car Nickolas Reed — Marti’s boyfriend at the time — said he saw Marti in on the night she disappeared.
Reed said in his testimony Thursday that he most vividly remembers the color of the car: maroon or red. He said he remembered as he walked past Marti in the vehicle, someone told him to get away from the car.
Former San Luis Obispo detective Jacob Dinsmore, who took the missing persons report for Marti, testified that Reed said he saw Marti in a red four-door sedan, but that another witness, Phil Furia, said the vehicle was gray, silver or blue.
Shortly after Marti’s body was found, the San Luis Obispo Police Department did identify a mid-’90s red Chevy S-10 Blazer in March 2018 as a vehicle of interest in the case. The department released a photo of the vehicle in April 2018.
During the trial on Thursday, Koehler’s attorney, Trace Milan, noted that Reed had previously said he thought the car might have been a four-door sedan, but in his current testimony, indicated he could only really remember the color.
Upon further questioning, Deputy District Attorney Lisa Muscari asked Reed if he had used heroin prior to going up to Prefumo Canyon with Furia and Marti that day.
Reed confirmed he had. When asked if heroin affected Reed’s ability to perceive things sometimes, Reed said, “Yes,” and reiterated that he is the most certain the vehicle was maroon or red.
Furia, meanwhile, testified Thursday that he did drive Reed to a mobile home park on Prefumo Canyon Road to look for Marti, and said he remembers Reed telling him he saw Marti in the car, but did not see Marti himself.
Furia said he had driven Reed and Marti around that day, and the last place he saw Marti was at the Conserv Fuel across from Santa Rosa Park before she went missing.
On his cross-examination, Milan focused on what Furia told police at the time Marti went missing.
Milan asked Furia if he remembered telling police the vehicle Marti may have last been seen in was a silver, gray or blue Honda. He also asked if Furia remembered telling police Reed was allegedly violent toward Marti and that she was supporting the pair through sex work.
Furia testified that he did not remember telling police any of these details. He also said to his knowledge, he had never given Marti rides to meet someone who was paying her for sex work.
Defendant used anonymous texting app, police testify
Another witness called to the stand Thursday was Greg Benson, a patrol officer in San Luis Obispo in 2018 who was familiar with Marti and Reed.
Benson testified that he stopped Reed for having an open container of alcohol a few days after Marti went missing and Reed asked him if he had seen Marti, and told him she was missing.
Benson said he told Reed he had not seen her since Jan. 9, 2018 — the day Marti went missing — when he saw her during the day. He testified that Reed seemed “concerned, depressed and a little timid.”
Caleb Kemp, who was a police detective at the time, said during testimony on Thursday that he asked to be assigned to Marti’s case Jan. 19 after seeing that she was listed on a missing person’s report.
Kemp said he knew Marti and Reed well and would see Marti almost daily when he worked as a downtown San Luis Obispo bike officer. He described Marti as problematic and verbally combative, but said he had never had any negative interactions with Reed.
Kemp said he requested and obtained Marti’s phone records from January and looked at all the calls Marti had had on the night of her disappearance. Kemp said he was able to identify and contact all the individuals who had been communicating and texting with Marti, except for one phone number which couldn’t be traced back to a person.
Kemp said the people whose numbers could be identified were all ruled out of the investigation.
Kemp and his detective partner traced back the unknown number to TextPlus, a third party phone application that can conceal someone’s real phone number. Through a search warrant, Kemp found thousands of messages attached to the account, including texts and pictures, he said.
One of the pictures was a selfie of a man wearing a mechanic-style button down, which Muscari presented as evidence to the case. The shirt had the name “Robert” on the front, and the name of a mechanic shop in Arroyo Grande. Kemp said that after contacting the mechanic business, they were able to identify Koehler as the man in the selfie.
Other pictures found on the account included other selfies of Koehler, male genitalia and naked women.
Kemp said he and his partner surveyed Koehler over the next few days, identifying where Koehler lived and both his personal and business Facebook accounts. The detectives confirmed Koehler’s home address when Kemp called him about an item he was selling on Facebook Marketplace.
Kemp said that the police was able to obtain a search warrant for Koehler’s house for Feb. 26, 2018. Court ended before Kemp could talk about the results from the search.
The trial is expected to resume Monday at 10 a.m.
