BISMARCK — Jurors on Friday, Sept. 30, noticed time-stamped surveillance digital camera video of a person and girl getting into and leaving a Bismarck lodge and a house northeast of town on the day authorities say the 2 carried out a plan to kill Chad Entzel.
Entzel’s spouse, Nikki, 41, and Earl Howard, 43, a person with twin citizenship in the U.S. and Canada, have been accused in early 2020 of plotting his dying and making an attempt to cowl it up via a number of means together with beginning fires in the Entzel dwelling’s furnace room and bed room.
Chad Entzel, 42, was shot twice with a shotgun and died of his wounds in the bed room, in response to Dr. William Massello, who was the state medical expert in 2020.
Authorities say Nikki Entzel and Howard have been having an affair, with plans to money in on insurance. They have been charged with three conspiracy felonies: murder, arson and proof tampering.
Howard a few yr in the past pleaded responsible underneath a take care of prosecutors and was sentenced to serve 25 years in jail.
Matthew Heinz of Dickinson, Nikki Entzel’s brother, testified Friday in her trial that it appeared his sister was “pretty close” to being moved out of the house when he visited her lodge room the day Chad Entzel’s physique was discovered on Jan. 2, 2020, by emergency crews who responded to the home fires. Nikki Entzel advised him the subsequent day that she had insurance plans in place, and Heinz testified that he advised her to inform the businesses dealing with the insurance policies.
Heinz mentioned he and his sister received alongside “OK” however didn’t see one another usually. He met Earl Howard a few month earlier than Chad Entzel’s dying, when Nikki and Howard went to Dickinson to drop off Christmas items for Heinz’s kids. Nikki Entzel sat subsequent to Howard after they left, which Heinz mentioned upset him “because she was married, and not to him.”
Authorities say Nikki Entzel was staying in the lodge room with Howard on the time of her husband’s dying. Surveillance video confirmed them on the home in the hours main as much as his dying, in response to earlier trial testimony. Investigators keep Nikki Entzel thought she had disabled the video surveillance on the dwelling, however that her efforts had failed.
Nikki Entzel advised investigators that she was bored with dwelling in a home that was having furnace issues in the center of winter.
Technicians from two furnace restore corporations testified Friday that in service calls to the house in the weeks earlier than Chad Entzel’s dying, they discovered no points or solely minor ones with the house’s heating system. Anthony Ortega with H.A. Thompson and Sons in Bismarck mentioned that in one name he discovered no fuel was attending to the furnace as a result of somebody had turned off the valve on the tank.
Burleigh County State’s Attorney Julie Lawyer in her opening assertion to the jury on Tuesday mentioned Nikki Entzel in the times after her husband’s dying inquired with an insurance firm about widow advantages and claims to renter and life insurance insurance policies. The renter coverage was only some days previous and price as much as $31,000, the prosecutor mentioned.
Nikki Entzel inquired about life insurance advantages via her husband’s employer the day after his physique was discovered, Interstate Power Co. Benefits Specialist Heather Schwartz testified Friday. No advantages from the corporate’s primary life coverage, which Schwartz mentioned was price between $113,000 and $120,000, have been paid.
Jurors on Thursday heard testimony associated to the 2 fires in the Entzel dwelling.
A portion of a cigarette bundle discovered on the murder scene matched the model discovered in Howard’s pickup, and was a doable ignition supply for a furnace hearth, in response to state Bureau of Criminal Investigation Special Agent Michael Mees.
Another hearth was in the bed room the place Chad Entzel’s physique was discovered. Mandan Fire Department Battalion Chief Shane Weltikol testified Thursday {that a} canine educated to detect hearth accelerants signaled that the substances have been current on the mattress subsequent to the physique, which was on the bed room ground. Weltikol is the canine’s handler.
Former Deputy State Fire Marshal Levi Roline testified that the 2 fires have been set individually.
Jurors Thursday additionally heard testimony associated to Nikki Entzel’s claims that her husband drank closely and abused her. Friends, co-staff and Chad Entzel’s former spouse, Susan Entzel, disputed that, describing him as a nonviolent man and a social drinker.
The jury earlier in the week watched an hours-lengthy videotaped interview that then-Deputy Burleigh County Sheriff Aaron Silbernagel and state Bureau of Criminal Investigation Special Agent Joe Arenz performed with Nikki Entzel in January 2020.
The investigators bit-by-bit revealed data to her they mentioned proved she was mendacity, and the forwards and backwards ended with Nikki Entzel telling them she felt a type of aid that her husband was useless.
She additionally maintained that Howard shot and killed her husband. Authorities have mentioned that an analysis of the gun didn’t conclude who pulled the set off.
Nikki Entzel might face life in jail if convicted. Friday was the fifth day of her trial, which is scheduled for 2 weeks. Twelve jurors finally will resolve her destiny.
Lawyer advised South Central District Judge Douglas Bahr she expects to complete her case late Monday or early Tuesday. Defense lawyer Thomas Glass firstly of the trial reserved his opening assertion till he offered his case.
