Dead by Sunset: Perfect Husband, Perfect Killer?

by Ann Rule

  With Dana gone, Brad had become what he had always said he was—the primary parent. His three young sons were now completely at his mercy.

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  Brad might have walked away from his civil judgment, but he had not shrugged off the losses in his life as easily as he pretended. He was growing more and more paranoid. He had every reason to feel paranoid. Since late January 1993, a grand jury in Washington County had been listening to some ninety-one witnesses describe the events leading to Cheryl’s murder. For nine weeks the jurors met behind closed doors. And since grand jury proceedings are secret, no one knew if they were close to handing down a criminal indictment of murder against Brad.

  When he realized he no longer had Dana under his control, Brad was shocked that she, of all his women, had been able to walk away from him. He had been so busy convincing her that she was dumb that he believed it too. And yet she had been able to get away from him by leaving without really leaving. When he finally caught on that he was seeing her less and less, he panicked. Unlike the other women he had let go, he was obsessed with getting Dana back. She was many things to him. She was a meal ticket. She was young, sexy, and extremely beautiful. And she knew things about him that he never wanted her to tell.

  Brad wasn’t finished with Dana, nor was he finished with Sara. He still needed them both—for different reasons. He had told Sara that he detested her, but he wanted her to “stay healthy” so he could sue her for child support. He had really been scrambling for money. He had sold the little rental house in Tampico—the house he always referred to as “the boys’ house”—and collected a $40,000 balloon payment. They never saw the money; Brad bought a truck and trailer with it, and a Macintosh computer.

  On February 23, 1993, he kept his promise to seek child support from Sara by filing a motion in Multnomah County Circuit Court. In his affidavit Brad said he was unemployed while Sara earned about $350,000 a year. He stated that he was the “full-time primary care” parent of his sons and was commuting to Yakima, Washington, to work on the “family home.” No mention was made of the mountain of debts he had saddled Sara with when they divorced.

  District Attorney Scott Upham and his investigators in Washington County were getting antsy. They were more so when they learned from Greg Dallaire at Garvey, Schubert that Judge Sharon Armstrong had received a surprise phone call from Dana Malloy. Mike McKernan called Dana and learned that Brad was getting ready to vanish.

  On March 16, 1993, Brad had gone to Dana’s house in a rage and accused her of talking to the Oregon State Police. He told her that she had betrayed him and now he was about to be indicted on murder charges. Jess and Michael had been subpoenaed to appear before the Washington County grand jury and Brad was in a panic. “You can mess with me—but don’t mess with my kids,” he warned. He told Dana that he would never, never allow his sons to testify before a grand jury again. Dana had been frightened enough to call the Seattle police to have Brad removed from her premises.

  Then on Sunday, March 21, Brad had called Dana and talked to her for two hours. He told her that before he allowed his children to go to Oregon to testify before the grand jury, he would leave the country. His voice softened and he urged her to come back to him. She could go with them when they fled America. They would be together, just like old times.

  Dana told McKernan she knew that Brad had done thorough research on both Mexico and Chile by going to the library and by talking to people who had lived there. This wasn’t something new. Fleeing the country had long been his alternative plan if he ever felt pushed to the wall. Brad had had passports for himself and the boys since May of 1990. Now he told Dana that he planned to take Jess, Michael, and Phillip to Chile; he had already ranged for them to live with a Chilean family.

  Dana was ambivalent. Part of her still loved Brad, the other part was afraid of him. She told him that she couldn’t be with him because of what had happened to Cheryl. Brad said he wasn’t the one who had killed Cheryl; he personally believed that the killer was probably someone from Garvey, Schubert—one of the men Brad claimed Cheryl was sleeping with. “I was going to depose this guy in our divorce,” he said, “and his wife would have found out and then he would have gotten divorced and it would have cost him a lot of money.”

  “I want to know, Brad,” Dana pleaded. “I want you to make me believe you didn’t kill Cheryl.”

  Brad was quite willing to do that. As Dana later told Mike McKernan, he said he was home with his sons all night, and the only time he left was to do laundry and to put something in his car. “I wasn’t gone long enough for them to say I did it.”

  Brad went into greater detail with Dana than he had with anyone else, adding the information that “the police never found blood under my nails.” He talked on and on, certain he was convincing her that he was safe to be with. He told her that Cheryl was involved with cocaine and that she used cocaine with people in her law firm. “Maybe someone into drugs killed Cheryl Keeton,” he said.

  As Dana listened, Brad became more and more specific about names involved in the investigation of Cheryl’s murder. She suddenly recalled seeing the name “Sharon Armstrong” in some police files Brad had once shown her, and she asked him how Judge Armstrong fit into the picture of Cheryl’s murder. Brad was instantly upset. He said she must be hiding something from him and he accused her of talking to Judge Armstrong.

  Dana hadn’t talked to Sharon Armstrong, but now she wanted to. She scribbled that name down as Brad continued to talk. He told her he couldn’t let his kids go before a grand jury because it would “ruin” them. And he asked her again to go with him when they left America. “If you don’t go with me when I leave, Dana—there will be an ‘apocalypse’ and I won’t be around to be indicted.”

  Dana was beginning to believe that Brad really was going. He had always told her in the past that, if he had to leave, she would know because he would turn off his voice mail. Now he said, “I have brought you my last gift, and I am turning off my voice mail.”

  He did not go. He continued to harass Dana, creeping up to her house late at night and banging on her walls. He shouted at her, “I want all the information you have, Dana!” And he attached another listening device to her phone, recording her calls. It may well have been that he wanted his “Angel” dead. And it is just as likely that he was still obsessed with her sexually. “He always wanted me back,” Dana recalled, bewildered. “He was very jealous. . . . He phoned me so often in those first months of 1993. He told me that he had consulted a psychic. He said the psychic told him that four men had killed Cheryl and then the psychic said that I was going to commit suicide.”

  Dana shivered when she repeated that phrase to Mike McKernan. She knew what it meant. He thought he had enough power over her mind to make her take her own life. Brad had always been able to persuade her to do things she didn’t really want to do. It would be very convenient for him now if she did commit suicide. Then he could be sure she would never testify before the grand jury in Hillsboro.

  But Dana had become obsessed with knowing the truth. She located Judge Sharon Armstrong’s number and called her, identifying herself as a former girlfriend of Brad’s. Not surprisingly, Sharon was disturbed to hear from anyone connected with Brad. Dana confided that she had information about Brad, but that she was frightened. “He could have me killed if I came forward.”

  Dana had trusted Sharon enough to leave two phone numbers with her. And Sharon had passed them on to OSP Detective Mike McKernan.

  * * *

  The world was closing in around Brad. McKernan was working closely with D.A. Scott Upham’s office, helping to tighten the net. It was true that the Washington County grand jury wanted to hear testimony from Jess and Michael Cunningham. On March 12, the subpoena documents were sent to the Snohomish County Prosecutor’s office in Everett, Washington, ordering that Bradly Morris Cunningham be compelled to produce Jess and Michael before the Washington County grand jury on March 25. Snohomish County authorities were ho
peful that they could get Brad to come to the courthouse in Everett voluntarily with his sons so they might be served. He responded by saying that he had hired an attorney for his children. McKernan asked to be notified about any hearings in Snohomish County where Brad was expected to appear. He advised the Washington authorities of Dr. Herman Dreesen’s address. When contacted, Dreesen said it would be up to Brad to bring the children in. He would not override his nephew’s decisions.

  As he always had, Brad contested every legal document that came his way. Day after day, he had more delaying tactics. Finally Gloria Parker, a legal assistant for the Snohomish County Prosecutor’s office, informed McKernan that Brad and his attorney were scheduled to appear in the Everett courtroom at 4 P.M. on March 25 and promised to do so—if the court did not require them to bring the children.

  Brad knew the authorities were breathing down his neck. They had little doubt that he would, as he had told Dana, flee the country before he would submit himself or his sons to questioning. No way was he going to appear willingly in that courtroom in Everett, and if they didn’t move fast, he and the boys would be on a plane to Chile or Mexico.

  On Thursday, March 25, 1993, Scott Upham and investigators Jim Carr and Mike McKernan had reason, finally, to smile—and to take a deep breath. Even without hearing Jess and Michael Cunningham’s testimony, the grand jury had handed down a secret indictment charging Bradly Morris Cunningham with the murder of his wife Cheryl Keeton on September 21, 1986. The jurors believed the testimony they had heard, and stated their conclusion that Brad had killed his estranged wife by beating her on the head twenty-one times with an unknown blunt instrument.

  Now Upham and his team could get their arrest warrant. But their biggest fear was that Brad had somehow learned of the indictment and had already bolted and run, taking Jess, Michael, and Phillip with him. They had done their best to keep a lid on the grand jury proceedings, and there was no news release on the indictment. Brad was aware the police were watching him. But maybe he didn’t know they were now ready to move in on him. Brad had always been the stalker. He was now playing a completely different role. He was the one being stalked.

  McKernan flew to Washington before dawn to be sure he was in Everett when the arrest warrant arrived. Word was that Brad still had plenty of weapons. When the Mill Creek police checked back at the house where he had collected a virtual arsenal, they found almost every interior wall smashed; they speculated that Brad had been removing additional guns from their hiding places.

  Above all, McKernan wanted to facilitate a nonviolent arrest by working with authorities in Snohomish County. He contacted Captain Don Nelson of the Snohomish County Sheriff’s office, and Nelson assigned Sergeant Kevin Prentiss to coordinate Brad’s apprehension.

  It was 2:25 P.M. on March 25, 1993. The no-bail murder warrant—C930434CR—for the arrest of Brad Cunningham was entered into the NCIC (National Crime Information Center) computers. At 3:43 P.M. Jim Carr faxed a copy of the arrest warrant from Scott Upham’s office in Hillsboro, Oregon. In the best of all worlds, Brad would show up at the courthouse in Everett at 4:00 P.M. as he had promised.

  At 4:20 P.M. Doug Purcell, the boys’ attorney, arrived at the Snohomish Courthouse—without Brad. He said Brad had informed him he could not be there. He was in Burien, Washington, picking up items needed for a civil trial in Yakima the next day and said “he couldn’t make” this court appearance.

  At 4:45 P.M. McKernan spoke to a records clerk at Yakima County Superior Court. Brad’s civil trial there (which involved his selling of properties that were legally in Cheryl Keeton’s estate) had been rescheduled to April 16—and all parties were informed, Brad included.

  At 7:45 P.M. McKernan observed the black Isuzu Trooper that Dana said was Brad’s vehicle parked at Herman Dreesen’s house.

  At 8:05 P.M. the Snohomish County Sheriff’s office SWAT team and McKernan gathered near Dreesen’s house while Deputy David Vasconi stationed his patrol unit across the street so he could surveil the residence. The waiting lawmen observed a Jeep Wagoneer and a new maroon sedan drive away. Mike McKernan couldn’t help feeling nervous. What if they were watching Dreesen’s house while Brad was boarding a plane for Chile? He knew how adept he was at slipping through police lines.

  At 9:31 P.M. Sergeant Tim Shea called the house using his cell phone. All he got was Dreesen’s answering machine.

  At 9:41 P.M. Shea called the residence and spoke with Dreesen. Brad’s uncle confirmed that he was inside the residence. Brad came on the line and was informed that the officers had a warrant for his arrest. “We request that you exit the house now. If you don’t, we will obtain a search warrant and the SWAT team is coming in.” Brad asked for more time. He said he would call the police mobile phone to let them know when he was coming out.

  Outside in the dark, officers had completely surrounded the perimeter of the residence. Minutes later, they saw a large white male come out of the back door and look around. Apparently spotting the waiting police, he turned and went back inside.

  At 10:03 P.M. Brad came out of the house, accompanied by his uncle. Deputy Vasconi drove his patrol car to the front of the house and watched as Brad obeyed orders to put his hands up and walk slowly toward the patrol car. “When the suspect reached me,” Vasconi wrote in his report, “I had him get down on his knees, at which time I placed him into handcuffs.”

  Brad’s arrest was almost anticlimactic. He had put up no fight at all; he hadn’t even tried to run—not when he realized his uncle’s property was alive with cops. He was searched for weapons and put into the back of the patrol car. Mike McKernan advised Brad of his rights under Miranda and asked if he would like to explain his side of the story.

  Brad looked at McKernan and said flatly, “I want to talk with my attorney.”

  “Does that mean that you don’t want to talk to me—ever?” McKernan asked.

  Brad simply repeated, “I want to talk to my attorney.”

  That was no surprise to McKernan; he knew his prisoner had had almost as many attorneys as a law-school graduating class. Their names and faces changed continually. Brad scarcely went to the bathroom without consulting an attorney.

  McKernan asked Dreesen if he might speak with Jess and Michael about what they remembered of the night their mother died, but Dreesen shook his head. “I would be bitterly opposed to you talking with the kids. If I could grab you by the neck and tell you, ‘Don’t hurt these kids!’ I would.”

  The last thing in the world McKernan wanted to do was hurt Cheryl Keeton’s children. On that matter, he was in complete agreement with Dreesen. But sometime, somehow, there had to be a way for the boys to release whatever was buried in their memories.

  Brad was driven to the Snohomish County jail. On the way, he attempted to talk to Vasconi. “This has been hard on my children,” he said. “I was going to come to the police department . . .”

  “I don’t want to talk to you,” Vasconi said.

  For once, Brad shut up.

  He had plummeted a long, long way down from the successful bank executive and millionaire builder. On his knees, in handcuffs, silhouetted in the lights of police units, he had not made a very prepossessing picture. It had taken six years, six months, four days, and two hours, but he was finally facing criminal charges for Cheryl’s vicious murder. The charge he was booked under was “Fugitive from Justice.”

  A bail hearing was held at one the next afternoon. Brad had retained yet another lawyer, James Tweety, to oppose his extradition to Oregon. The hearing was conducted by video linkup between the jail where Brad was being held and Superior Court Judge Richard Thorpe’s courtroom. During the course of the hearing, Brad interrupted the proceedings and asked to speak to his attorney.

  He then began a lengthy statement in which he essentially blamed the women in his life for his current predicament. He said that Dana Malloy had given him an Uzi as a gift; otherwise he would not have had such a weapon. He said that he had lived with Dana for three
years, that she was a stripper, and that he had finally broken up with her. All the charges coming out of Oregon were the fault of one of his former wives, Dr. Sara Gordon. Brad suggested that both Dana and Sara had set him up to seek revenge—Dana because he had left her, and Sara because he was suing her for child support.

  As Brad watched the television image from his jail cell, Judge Thorpe set his bail. Brad always talked in millions, and his bail fit his lifestyle: $2.5 million. David Wold, a legal assistant in the Snohomish County Prosecutor’s office, said that he would have to post cash bail of $250,000 and post a security deposit for the remaining $2,250,000.

  Brad didn’t have $250,000.

  A hearing was set for April 23 when the court expected to review the bail and to consider extradition requests from Oregon. For the first time in his life, Brad was behind bars, dressed in jail issue clothes, treated like a criminal. It is quite possible that he never really considered that such a thing might come to pass.

  McKernan made one more effort to talk with Brad before he returned to Oregon. He explained to James Tweety that Brad had said repeatedly in television interviews and to newspaper reporters that all he wanted was a chance to “tell his side of the story.” McKernan was willing to listen.

  Tweety reported back that his client had nothing to say to any representative of the Oregon State Police or the Washington County District Attorney’s office. Disappointed, but not particularly surprised, McKernan headed home.

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  Jess, Michael, and Phillip stayed with their father’s recently widowed uncle Herman. He had grown to love them, but caring for three young boys was a daunting task for Dreesen, who had a busy medical practice and no woman in the house to help. Moreover, he was still grieving for his kind, beautiful wife. Jess was thirteen, Michael was eleven, and Phillip was nine. Their mother had been dead for six and a half years, they hadn’t seen their adoptive mother, Sara, for almost three years, their aunt Trudy was dead too, and their temporary “mother” Dana was virtually gone from their lives. They had lived in Houston, Portland, Seattle, Lynnwood, and Canada, traveling continually. The central figure in their world was their father—he had seen to that. Now they had watched him kneeling in handcuffs and escorted to a patrol car by uniformed officers. Brad had been correct in his statement to Deputy David Vasconi. His arrest had been “very hard” on his children.