Kelsey Berreth and the phone that kept moving
Three days after she was killed, her phone told her boss she would be away for the week. By then it was hundreds of miles away, in someone else's hands.
- When
- November 22, 2018
- Where
- Woodland Park and Florissant, Colorado; Gooding, Idaho
- Status
- Convicted
Content note murder, domestic violence. No graphic images.
In brief
Kelsey Berreth, 29, a flight instructor and mother of a 1-year-old, was last seen on surveillance video at a Safeway in Woodland Park, Colorado, on Thanksgiving Day, November 22, 2018. On November 25 her employer got a text from her phone saying she would miss work that week, and the phone was tracked near Gooding, Idaho. Her mother reported her missing on December 2. Her fiancé, Patrick Frazee, was arrested that month. His former girlfriend, Krystal Lee Kenney, a nurse from Idaho, pleaded guilty to tampering with evidence and testified that Frazee killed Berreth, that she cleaned the townhome, that he burned the body, and that she carried the phone to Idaho and sent the texts. In November 2019 a jury convicted Frazee of first-degree murder. He was sentenced to life without parole plus 156 years. Berreth's remains have never been found.
Turning pointBerreth's phone last pinged near Gooding, Idaho, close to Malad Gorge State Park, about 45 minutes from the home of a woman Frazee had called on Thanksgiving afternoon.
- Victim
- Kelsey Berreth, 29, a flight instructor at Doss Aviation in Pueblo
- Convicted
- Patrick Frazee, 33 at trial, her fiancé and the father of her daughter
- Also convicted
- Krystal Lee Kenney, tampering with physical evidence; testified for the prosecution
- Last seen
- Thanksgiving, November 22, 2018, on Safeway surveillance video in Woodland Park
- The phone
- Last pinged November 25, 2018, near Gooding, Idaho
- Sentence
- Life without parole plus 156 years
- Remains
- Never found
Timeline
November 22, 201812:27 p.m.
Kelsey Berreth and her 1-year-old daughter are recorded leaving the Safeway in Woodland Park. It is the last time she is seen in public.
November 22, 2018Afternoon
A neighbor's camera records a person matching Frazee's description entering her townhome at 1:24 p.m. Prosecutors say he beat her to death inside. At 4:34 p.m. Frazee calls Kenney in Idaho, who testified he told her she had a mess to clean up.
November 24, 2018
Kenney arrives from Idaho and cleans the townhome. That evening, she testified, Frazee burned a plastic tote he said held Berreth's body in a trough on his property in Florissant, using gasoline, motor oil and wood.
Nov. 24 to 25, 2018
Frazee gives Kenney Berreth's phone, handgun and purse and tells her to take the phone as far away as she can. She drives north through Grand Junction and Salt Lake City toward Idaho.
November 25, 2018
Near Malad Gorge State Park in Idaho, Kenney testified, she uses the phone to text Berreth's employer that she will be away visiting her grandmother, then shuts it off. The phone's last ping is at 5:13 p.m. near Gooding. She later burns the phone and purse at her home in Kimberly, Idaho.
December 2, 2018
Berreth's mother, Cheryl, has not heard from her daughter in more than a week and asks Woodland Park police for a welfare check. The missing persons investigation begins.
December 21, 2018
Frazee is arrested at his home in Teller County on suspicion of first-degree murder. Police say for the first time that they believe Berreth is dead.
February 8, 2019
Kenney pleads guilty to tampering with physical evidence and agrees to testify against Frazee.
November 18, 2019
After deliberating less than four hours, a Teller County jury convicts Frazee on all counts. Judge Scott Sells sentences him to life without parole plus 156 years.
2022 to 2025
The Colorado Court of Appeals affirms the conviction on December 29, 2022. In February 2025 the Colorado Supreme Court upholds it.
The full story
What happened
Kelsey Berreth was 29, a flight instructor at Doss Aviation in Pueblo, and lived in Woodland Park, Colorado, with her 1-year-old daughter. Her fiancé, Patrick Frazee, the girl’s father, lived on a ranch in Florissant.
On Thanksgiving Day, November 22, 2018, a Safeway camera recorded Berreth leaving the store with her daughter at 12:27 p.m. Frazee told investigators they met that afternoon to hand off the child and that it was the last time he saw her. A neighbor’s camera recorded a person matching his description entering her front door at 1:24 p.m.
The phone
Berreth’s phone kept going. On Sunday, November 25, her employer received a text saying she would not be at work that week. The same day the phone was tracked near Gooding, Idaho. Her mother had not heard from her in more than a week when she called Woodland Park police on December 2.
At a news conference, police said the phone had pinged in Idaho. FBI analysts later mapped its path: across Teller County with Frazee’s phone for two days after Thanksgiving, then north out of Colorado. The records could show where the phone was. They could not show who was holding it.
Frazee was arrested at his home on December 21, 2018.
Kenney’s account
Krystal Lee Kenney was a nurse from Idaho who had known Frazee for years and had a relationship with him. She first told the FBI a story about visiting his ranch to look at a horse. Then she got a lawyer and began cooperating. In February 2019 she pleaded guilty to tampering with physical evidence and agreed to testify.
At trial, she said Frazee had tried three times to get her to kill Berreth, and that on Thanksgiving he called and told her she had a mess to clean up. She drove to Colorado, arrived on November 24, and spent hours cleaning blood from the townhome. That evening, she said, Frazee burned a plastic tote he said held Berreth’s body in a trough on his property.
Then he gave her Berreth’s phone and told her to take it as far away as she could. Near Malad Gorge State Park, about 45 minutes from her home, she texted Berreth’s boss that Berreth was going to see her grandmother. She turned the phone off, and later burned it and Berreth’s purse at her house.
The verdict
The jury deliberated less than four hours. On November 18, 2019, it convicted Frazee of first-degree murder, three counts of solicitation to commit murder and tampering with a deceased human body. Judge Scott Sells called the crime vicious and senseless and gave him life without parole plus 156 years. Frazee did not speak.
His appeals have failed. Kenney served about 14 months. Kelsey Berreth’s remains have never been found.
What the video couldn't include
Three times, she said no
Kenney testified that in the months before Thanksgiving, Frazee told her to drug Berreth's coffee, then gave her a pipe to attack her with. She drove to the townhome but left when a dog barked. The next day, she said, he handed her a bat and told her to "swing away." She told him she could not do it.
"No body, no crime, right?"
A friend of Frazee's, Joe Moore, testified that in April 2018 Frazee told him he had figured out a way to kill Berreth, then grinned and asked, "No body, no crime, right?"
Blood left on purpose
Kenney said she deliberately left small spots of blood, including on a fireplace and a baby gate, because she hoped investigators would find them.
A list without her name
According to the arrest affidavit, Frazee signed a document dated December 12 naming five people who could provide medical care for his daughter. Berreth was not on it, which investigators wrote was "presumably because she is deceased."
Requests from jail
An inmate testified that while they were jailed together, Frazee asked him to kill Kenney. A law enforcement official testified that notes between them listed more than 10 people who needed to "disappear or be unseen" until after the trial.
Kenney's sentence was cut
Kenney was originally sentenced to three years in prison. The Colorado Court of Appeals vacated that sentence over a procedural error, and in March 2021 she was resentenced to the 18-month maximum and released on parole. Judge Sells said he disagreed with the appeals court's description of her role.
The search for her remains
In early 2019, investigators searched the Midway Landfill in Fountain, Colorado. They did not find her. Her remains have never been recovered.
The video and the record
The episode tells this case in about 3 minutes with illustrated recreations. Here is how its key moments line up with what is documented.
Ten days after that supermarket image, on December second, her mother reported her missing
Documented
Cheryl Berreth asked police for a welfare check on December 2, 2018.
On November twenty-fifth, a message from her number asked her employer for the following week off
Documented
Police said her employer received a text on November 25 saying she would not be at work that week.
The records could place it there. They could not identify who was carrying it.
Documented
The FBI's cell analyst testified that the records show where a phone is, not who has it.
The phone pinged in Idaho three days after Kelsey was killed
Documented
Last ping November 25, 2018, near Gooding, Idaho. The jury found she was killed November 22.
Near Malad Gorge, Kenney testified, she used that phone to message Kelsey's employer
Documented
From her trial testimony.
The exact authorship of every post-death message was not established
Documented
Kenney described the texts she sent. Other activity on the phone between November 22 and 24, when it traveled with Frazee's phone, is not attributed to a specific person in our sources.
Watched Frazee burn a tote he said contained Kelsey's body
Documented
Kenney testified she never saw the body itself.
The supermarket, the townhome, the drive, the gorge
Reconstruction
AI-generated illustrations, including the portraits. No real photographs or surveillance images are used.
What the four marks mean
- Documented
- Shown as it is recorded in court filings, police statements, or consistent reporting.
- Reconstruction
- A reasonable visual recreation of a documented event. The event happened; the image is illustrative.
- Compressed
- Real events shortened, merged, or reordered to fit the runtime.
- Dramatized
- A storytelling choice (framing, wording, emphasis) that the record does not establish.
Sources
- [1]Denver7“Kelsey Berreth case: Timeline of investigation and Patrick Frazee's murder trial”Draws on Frazee's arrest affidavit.
- [2]CNN, via 6abc“Kelsey Berreth surveillance video shows last time missing Colorado mom was seen”
- [3]Denver7“Frazee trial: Kenney testifies, details murder cleanup”
- [4]CNN“Patrick Frazee convicted of killing his fiancée, sentenced to life without the possibility of parole”
- [5]NBC News“Patrick Frazee found guilty of first-degree murder in death of fiancée, Kelsey Berreth”
- [6]Denver7“Krystal Kenney resentenced to 18 months in prison”
- [7]CBS News Colorado“Patrick Frazee Ex-Girlfriend Krystal Kenney Released On Parole After Resentencing In Kelsey Berreth Murder Case”
- [8]KRDO“Appellate Court rejects Patrick Frazee's appeal to guilty murder conviction”
- [9]KKTV“Colorado Supreme Court upholds murder conviction of Teller County man”
SourcedFacts in this file come from the reporting listed above. Some details are still waiting on primary records. Last reviewed September 12, 2026. How we check cases
