'Canal killings' testimony: Accused wasn't violent toward his ex-wife or daughter
Bryan Miller, accused of murdering two young women in Phoenix three decades ago, was never violent toward his ex-wife, she testified Wednesday, other than in their sex life, where she went along with bondage, piercing and knife play even though she didn't enjoy it.
Amy Miller told the Maricopa County Superior Court that her former husband never hit, slapped or pushed her, and she never saw him use violence toward their daughter.
On the day they separated in 2005, Amy said, she left their young daughter with Miller, confident she would be safe.
Amy returned to the stand Wednesday in her ex-husband's double murder trial, which has been underway since October.
She last testified on March 9, her time in court broken up by expert witnesses and several scheduled days off. On that day, Amy said she eventually left Miller because she feared he would hurt or kill her.
The violence in their sex life had escalated, she said, and she had gone from enduring it because she thought it was her duty as a wife to putting up with it because she was scared of upsetting Miller.
Amy testified Wednesday that when she left the marriage, she was already with another man, something she felt was necessary for her safety.
"I didn’t believe he would stand up to another male in order to hurt me," she said under questioning from the state.
Under cross-examination, she said on the day she left Miller, he was at work and she told him their daughter was sick and they couldn't go to church. Then, she said, the man she was seeing, one of her co-workers at McDonald's, took her and her daughter out on a date to Denny's and a movie.
When they got home, Miller was there, and Amy told him where they had been. She said he yelled at her and then went out into the yard, where he kicked and threw things.
She agreed her date — whom she went on to marry — had dropped her off at the house and she had confronted Miller alone.
The murders
Miller is charged with kidnapping, murdering, and attempting to sexually assault 21-year-old Angela Brosso in November 1992 and 17-year-old Melanie Bernas in September 1993.
Each woman suffered a fatal stab wound to the back and were mutilated as or after they died. Brosso's body was subject to a frenzied knife attack and decapitated, her head found 11 days after her body, and Bernas had cuts to her neck and chest.
Both women were out riding their bikes along Phoenix canals when they were attacked, and the murders were labeled the "canal killings."
Though DNA was recovered from semen swabs on both women, detectives couldn't match it to a suspect and the case went cold for two decades.
Miller, now 50, was arrested in 2015 after fresh DNA analysis led police to him. When he was arrested, he was still living in Phoenix with his teenage daughter, whom he gained full custody of when she was around 8.
He has pleaded not guilty for reasons of insanity.
'Canal killings': Miller 'walled off' experiences of childhood abuse, expert testifies
Amy Miller feared her husband would hurt her
Amy and Miller married in August 1997, after a courtship that lasted less than a year. He was the first man she had ever dated, she said.
The couple moved to Washington state and had a daughter together before returning to Arizona. Their divorce was finalized in 2006.
Earlier this month, Amy testified that Miller was the "epitome of a gentleman" on their first date.
On their third date, she said, he told her he had been in juvenile detention, but was light on detail and she assumed it was for something minor.
It wasn't until 2002, when Miller was arrested in Washington state for an unrelated crime, that she discovered he had been incarcerated at 16 for stabbing a woman at Paradise Valley Mall in 1989, she said.
Amy agreed under questioning from the defense that she didn't remember Miller actually telling her on their third date that nobody was hurt in his juvenile crime. She had assumed it was something like shoplifting because he was so polite, she said.
When Miller was incarcerated following his 2002 arrest — he was accused of stabbing a woman and eventually acquitted — he wrote Amy letters, many of which detailed sex acts he wanted to perform on her, the court has been told.
Amy agreed that in some of the letters Miller was asking permission for things he wanted to do, writing things like "Can I put needles in your breast?"
She agreed she could have told him she wasn't comfortable with needles or bondage. Asked if it was true Miller had no way of knowing she wasn't into it if she hadn't told him that, she said "I suppose so."
After his release from custody, Amy said, she realized her being in pain was arousing for Miller.
“My pain and fear, turned him on and made sex a lot more enjoyable for him,” she said.
Asked if she agreed that Bryan was under the impression she enjoyed the violent sex acts, she said "I don't know."
'Thousands' of Hot Wheels cars
Part of Miller's insanity defense rests on a diagnosis of autism spectrum disorder, which his attorneys say contributed to an inability to understand his actions were wrong.
Various defense experts have pointed to Miller's social awkwardness and intense interest in Hot Wheels cars and other collectibles as signs of his autism.
Amy said Miller was obsessive about Hot Wheels to the point where it caused problems in their marriage.
"We’d spend hours at toy stores looking at Hot Wheels and then spending a lot of money that we didn’t have on them," she said.
“We would end up with boxes and boxes of cars just sitting in our living room or our dining room. A couple of times that became an issue with Child Protective Services.
"There were probably thousands of them."
She agreed her ex-husband was socially awkward and a poor communicator. His worst trait, she said, was that he seemed incapable of seeing things from someone else's point of view.
His best, she said, was that he tried to treat people fairly and he loved their daughter the best he could.
Her testimony will continue Monday.
This article originally appeared on Arizona Republic: In 'canal killings' trial, ex-wife says accused wasn't violent toward her
