A preliminary hearing has been scheduled for an Iowa man charged in the connection with the death of a Carney man and a pre-preliminary hearing has been continued for a Wellston woman in the case.
Each faces three felonies. Each is being held in the Lincoln County Jail in Chandler without bond.
Clyde Dean Clayton, 42, of Sioux City, Iowa and Janelle Berthna Brown, 39, Wellston, were formally charged July 14 in Lincoln County District Court.
The felony charges each faces include accessory to murder in the first degree, unlawful removal of dead body and desecration of a human corpse.
Each made initial appearances before Associate District Judge Sheila Kirk on July 17. She ordered them to make further initial appearances on July 27.
A preliminary hearing is scheduled for 9 a.m. Dec. 15 for Clayton.
Special Judge Emily Mueller originally scheduled their pre-preliminary hearings for 1:30 p.m. on Sep. 21.
She has rescheduled Brown’s for 1:30 p.m. on Oct. 12.
In Count 1 each is accused of on or between June 2 and July 7 of 2023 of actively aiding after the murder of Brian Corey, cleaning up blood and burning and/or destroying evidence with knowledge that Brian Corey had been murdered and with the intent that the offender avoid arrest and/or punishment.
Count 2 charges each on or between those same dates of removing the body of a deceased human being from inside a residence in Carney within Lincoln County without authorization from the district attorney or medical examiner or either of their authorized representatives and without circumstances to justify the removal.
In Count 3 each is accused of on or between June 2 and July 7, 2023 of desecrating the body of Brian Corey, after his death, by burning and/or scattering his remains for the purpose of tampering with the evidence of a crime, disposing of a dead body and/or impeding or prohibiting the detection, investigating or prosecution of a crime.
Supplemental information filed in the case by Assistant District Attorney Kelly Trimble shows Brown has a prior conviction on May 1, 2018 in the District Court of Dakota County, Neb., for the felony offense of theft over $5,000.
Clayton and Brown have been in jail since their arrest on July 7, 2023.
In a multi-page probable cause affidavit, investigators with the Lincoln County Sheriff’s Office detail their interviews with both Clayton and Brown and others they talked with during their probe.
The investigators also requested assistance from both the Oklahoma State Bureau of Investigation and the State Medical Examiner’s Office.
According to the affidavit, on May 12 this year, Deputy Kevin Roe was first dispatched to a residence on East 840 Road in Lincoln County regarding a welfare check on Brian Corey. The reporting person was Trudi Corey and she stated she hadn’t heard from Brian in over a week.
Trudi was Brian’s exwife, the affidavit states.
Roe said he went to the residence and couldn’t contact Brian, but spoke to his girl friend Janelle Brown.
Brian’s sister, Rebecca Suhr also called in, wanting to report him as a missing person, saying she hadn’t heard from him since June 5.
During the course of separate interviews by investigators, Brown and Clayton accuse one another of shooting and killing Brian Corey.
According to the affidavit, Brown claims she was outside after she and Corey got into an argument and that he and Clayton remained inside and were doing drugs (meth) while she was mowing the lawn.
When she went back into the house, she found Corey slumped over in a recliner and he had been shot in the neck and not breathing.
She told the investigator she saw blood on the wall behind him and blood on the floor.
Brown claimed she and Clayton waited until the next day to move him and she acknowledges helping Clayton move Corey’s body outside, says Clayton burned him, scooped up the ashes, went down the road and threw the ashes into a ditch.
She said she cleaned up the blood from the wall and helped Clayton burn the recliner in a burn pit in the front yard.
During the interview, she led Detective Larry Stover, Sr., to the location where he found burnt bones and the bags the ashes were put in.
OSBI Agent Derek White was requested to first interview Clayton at the Sheriff’s Office. White later suggested Stover continue the interview with Clayton in which reportedly Clayton changed his story.