The Murder of Ronald Browning | Part 1 of 4 | Tuesday May 17, 2022
The Murder of Ronald Browning | Part 2 of 4 | Tuesday May 24, 2022
The Murder of Ronald Browning | Part 3 of 4 | Tuesday May 31, 2022
The Murder of Ronald Browning | Part 4 of 4 | Tuesday June 7, 2022
On February 7, 2015, Rexanna Walker Browning, walked into her home on Odessa Avenue home in Beckley West Virginia, and found her 69-year-old husband, Pastor Ron Browning, dead in the home. Ronald Browning had been viciously attacked, leaving a horrific scene in the home.
Investigators arriving shortly after described what they saw in the home as one of the most gruesome they had ever witnessed.
Join your host David as he invites you into a detailed conversation with the 2 seasoned investigators that investigated this brutal act of evil.
Beckley Police Deputy Chief David Allard and Sergeant Morgan Bragg will take you along for a fast-paced investigation full of chaos, twists and turns that resulted in the arrest of an unlikely suspect.
In Part 1, we learn about our investigators David Allard and Morgan Bragg; how they came into law enforcement and what drives their passion for investigations.
Then, you get the call when they do that a victim has been found dead in a home in Beckley West Virginia. You will walk into that house with David and Morgan and see the horror that they witnessed that remains unforgettable to this day. We learn more about our victim, Reverend Ronald Browning, and some suspicious behavior of potential suspects just hours after his death.
Part 1 Show Transcript
Morgan Bragg:
One of the most gruesome scenes certainly I’ve ever experienced, blood covered practically every surface in the home. There was clear evidence that the suspect had gone into the attic. There was blood in the attic. There was blood in the basement, blood in the sinks.
David Allard:
Yeah, there was blood in the refrigerator.
Morgan Bragg:
Blood in the bathrooms and in the showers and it covered practically the entire residence.
Wendy Lyons:
Warning, the podcast you’re about to listen to may contain graphic descriptions of violent assaults, murder and adult language. Listener discretion is advised. Welcome to the Murder Police Podcast, The Murder of Ronald Browning, part one of four.
Wendy Lyons:
Welcome to the Murder Police Podcast. I am Wendy.
David Lyons:
And I’m David.
Wendy Lyons:
Well, David, you went to Beckley, West Virginia and recorded another podcast without me.
David Lyons:
I did. And I’m sorry you weren’t there. And my guests were very sorry you weren’t there too.
Wendy Lyons:
Well. I’m sure they were were called and it just didn’t work out unfortunately this time. But why don’t you tell us a little bit about what we have here? I know it’s a murder of a gentleman named Ronald Browning. And what can you tell me about that?
David Lyons:
It’s a fascinating case. I know we say that about all of them, but this four-part series is going to take the audience on a little bit of a ride with a couple of professional investigators from Beckley, West Virginia. My guests were a friend of mine named David Allard, who by the way, was just promoted to Deputy Chief of the Beckley Police Department the day before I arrived. David and I met in 2017 when we completed the FBI National Academy Session 267 in Quantico, Virginia. So right now I have to stop and give a shout out to all of our brothers and sisters, literally from around the world that we met and attended that session with in Quantico, Virginia in session 267. He was joined by his Sergeant, Morgan Bragg, who runs the detective unit up there right now.
David Lyons:
And the case is going to be interesting in a lot of ways. I’m just going to hit the highlights. The crime scene that they went to, they both described it as one of the most gruesome that they’d ever seen based on the violence they saw. They also talked about how the case moved at a very fast pace. We’ve heard those before, but the suspect that ultimately identified was never on the radar and probably wasn’t even a consideration when the case started. And also what the people that are listening are going to hear, the importance of communication inside of a police department and with other police departments and the art of slowing down and listening to small things that you hear. And I’m going to leave it at that because there’s some big clues and some things that glued this case together based on communication skills and people taking the time to listen.
Wendy Lyons:
Okay, well with that, let’s dig in to part one of four on the murder of Ronald Browning.
David Lyons:
Let’s go. Well, welcome back to the Murder Police Podcast. I’m David. And today we’ve got some special guests. I’m actually in Beckley, West Virginia to interview two fine people on an interesting murder investigation that occurred here a few years back. First of all, a good friend of mine that I happened to meet at the FBI National Academy back in 2017, I believe.
David Allard:
Yes.
David Lyons:
And just newly promoted yesterday to Deputy Chief of the Beckley Police Department, my friend, Dave Allard. Dave, how are you doing?
David Allard:
I’m doing great, Dave, and we’re glad to have you here.
David Lyons:
Yeah. And I’ve been stoked about trying to get this one out. Wendy is sorry she couldn’t make it. It kills her not to be on these. And it kills me not to have her with us on these too because she brings so much more to them. So we also have Morgan Bragg, a detective with the Beckley police department. How are you doing Morgan?
Morgan Bragg:
Doing very well. I appreciate you being here today.
David Lyons:
Dave, tell me a little bit about you, your career, hobbies, interests, anything that would help the audience get to know you a little bit better?
David Allard:
Well, you know, I was born and raised here West Virginia. From an early age I knew that I wanted to go into the Air Force, follow my grandfather’s career. So never had an interest in law enforcement. I go straight from high school, into the Air Force. During that time period, I started to have some friends, as I graduated with, I would come in on weekends. They were policemen here in Beckley and some of the smaller surrounding areas. And then my aunt started dating an FBI agent and they ended up getting married. So I got exposed to it, really, at that point. And I would come home and do ride-alongs and really, from that point, I was hooked. I knew this was a career that I wanted to do. I finished my enlistment with the Air Force. I get hired with Newport News Sheriff’s Department in Newport News, Virginia.
David Allard:
I worked there for a year, pretty much in the jail the entire time. Applied here in 2002. As luck would have it, my grandmother sees the posting in the newspaper, sends it to me. My wife and I come back here, take the test, ultimately get hired. I’ve been here 20 years now. And as you said, yesterday, I just got promoted to deputy chief. I’ve had a very blessed career. Over the past 17 years, I’ve been in the detective bureau. The past five years, I’ve led our detective bureau as the chief of detectives. Morgan’s the assistant chief of detectives. I’ve also been a full-time task force officer with the FBI on the joint terrorism task force during the past four years.
David Allard:
So really, without having his leadership while I’m away, three days a week, I was working in Charleston, West Virginia with the FBI. Morgan was handling the day to day operations of the detective bureau. And then I really never saw this promotion coming to something. I getting ready to retire, thinking of retiring in just a few weeks actually. And then this was brought to me a couple months ago and I really couldn’t pass it up. I love this department. I love this city. I love the people here I’ve been our public information officer for probably the last five years. So I’ve done all the media interviews, all of our news releases, Facebook page, things like that. And I just really want to continue and hopefully keep our department on a positive note going forward.
David Lyons:
Nice, and congratulations again, for sure.
David Allard:
Thank you.
David Lyons:
That’s exciting news. And we were talking before we started recording about how many times in this business, somebody will set their sights on leaving and an opportunity will knock at the last minute and change your trajectory, which that’s just one of the many things about this whole business and this career that just keeps you moving, keeps you moving.
David Allard:
Yesterday. It’s the first time I’ve had a uniform on in many years. I think I haven’t been assigned to uniform patrol for over 17 years. My children had never seen me. I have three children, I’ve been married for 23 years. Like you with Wendy, I’ve married way up. Me and my wife, Stephanie, we have three children, 13, 10 and eight. And they never see me in uniform. So it’s been a big change for everyone.
David Lyons:
I bet it has. I bet it has. Well, Morgan, I didn’t realize until just now that you were the Deputy Chief of Investigations. Congratulations on that.
Morgan Bragg:
I appreciate that. Yes.
David Lyons:
Tell us a little bit about your career path like Dave just did.
Morgan Bragg:
Similar to Dave, I’m a local resident of the area I’ve been here my entire life. I spent a good deal of time preparing for law enforcement. Unlike Dave, that was something I always wanted to do. That was always my interest. It was not my parents’ interest and they did not really support that initially. They wanted me to go to college. And one of the things that they really pushed, they had a book publishing company, and one of the things, the subject matter that they covered was unsolved murder cases in the state of West Virginia. So I was kind of exposed to the law enforcement side, the investigative side from that. And that’s what really piqued my interest. Kind of the deal that we made is, go to college, get your bachelor’s degree. And then we won’t hold you back. If that’s still what you want to do, then they’ll support me. And they’ve been extremely supportive ever since that time. I’ve been with the Beckley Police Department 14 years now, three of those were on patrol. I did a period of time as a domestic violence officer in a combined role with the detective bureau. And the last several years, I’ve been the Assistant Chief of our bureau where I handled kind of the day to day investigative side of things.
David Lyons:
Well, I’m going to start with you and I’ll pitch it back to Dave a little bit. Specifically with investigations, what do you think the things are that draw you to spend that much time on that assignment?
Morgan Bragg:
Well, There, again, I would have to say probably my exposure through my parents having written these books on unsolved murders and cases. I was reviewing case files at 10 years old and looking at these homicide cases and so forth. There were times when we would get a phone call at our personal residence and it would be an inmate calling to speak to my dad from a homicide case that he was looking at. So I think that kind of drove me to be interested in that subject matter. And luckily here at Beckley, I’ve been able to kind of focus my effort in that direction. And I handle a lot of the homicide cases.
David Lyons:
Dave, how about you?
David Allard:
Well, really initially I had no intention of going to the detective bureau. I was thriving on patrol. I was the top DUI officer in the state of West Virginia, the first drug recognition expert in the state of West Virginia. And really I saw my goal was highway safety, going to go work with [NITSA 00:09:31] or somewhere once I retired. And then very early on though, my chief had different plans. So nine months out of the academy, he assigned me to the detective bureau. At that point, I really didn’t feel like I was ready for it. And luckily I had a good Lieutenant on patrol that sat me down and said, “You really should consider this. You’ve only been here nine months, you’re doing great job.” But he said, “I don’t really think you’re probably ready for investigations.”
David Allard:
And he’d been a prior chief of detectives. So I took that advice. It was hard to turn down, but the chief was agreeable, so continued to do the DUI thing and aggressive traffic enforcement. And then a year later, the chief really didn’t give me a choice at that point. He assigned me to the detective bureau. And instantly once I got back there and got to working with some of the seasoned experienced investigators, I just developed a passion for it and loved it. And I’ve actually been there ever since. Like I said, I spent 17 years there. I was a patrolman when I got put in the detective bureau and I’ve got promoted through the ranks the entire time without ever leaving. And I mean, just being able to, you see that you’re able to make a difference.
David Allard:
So much of law enforcement is reactive, but you really have impact with the victims in these cases. Somebody’s got to tell their story, especially the homicides and I really look at it, that’s our job. And then we have a lot of complex traveling groups that pass through here with the interstates converging here in Beckley. So I’ve really have focused a lot on those type of crimes as well with groups from Florida and Atlanta. And through that, intelligence has been a big driving factor for me and information sharing, getting out and making connections in the community, connections in law enforcement throughout the country. That’s what’s made me, I feel, very successful.
David Lyons:
That’s interesting stuff. I liked too to point out too, that you had somebody who was looking out for you in the beginning to kind of bridle you in until you had a little more experience.
David Allard:
Absolutely. at the time I was on patrol, but I was working a lot of, we had a lot of extra duty for highway safety and there wasn’t a lot of people that was doing that. So I was making actually a lot of good money. So I was going to take a loss to go to the detective bureau, but this guy sat me down. And really, I don’t think I was ready. And I look at officers like Morgan, when he got hired, we knew that he would be in the detective bureau at some point. And we could have done it, you could probably hire him and put him in the detective bureau straight, but I think you need that time on the road to develop what a good patrolman is, what a good initial investigation is. And I feel very fortunate that I had Lieutenant Lemon at that point set down with me. And then I took a pause and then ultimately came back.
David Lyons:
I will say this, Morgan, when I got a chance to look at the case file when we pulled the open records. Exemplary, and I’m telling you that just from my experience and everything, your articulation, organizational skills are amazing. And I think that will come out here when we start talking about this case, as people pick up on that, and that’s super important in this business. Very well intended and sincere compliment. Well, Dave, before we move into the case, one more thing is, tell us a little bit about Beckley, West Virginia and the Beckley PD. For example, how many people do you serve roughly in Beckley?
David Allard:
Beckley is very unique where the economic hub of Southern West Virginia. So Beckley is actually pretty small 12 square miles. I think our population’s 17,000, but during the day, that number swells. Some estimates with the Chamber of Commerce is 150 to 200,000 because all the hospitals, the shopping centers, the hotels, the restaurants. Everyone comes here from surrounding counties to Beckley. So we see a lot of crime from that, especially retail crime, a lot of petty crime, but we also see a lot of violent crime that’s associated with that, with the interstates converging here. It’s a very popular tourist destination with the New River Gorge close. We have ski resorts close by. So we serve way more of a population than just the 17,000 that live here.
David Allard:
We have two colleges here in Beckley, three hospitals. So we’re pretty busy. The department, we have 58 sworn officers. We have a new police department, as we’re in here just opened in 2019. Beckley is a great city. We have a lot of support from our elected officials, both with the regional, local, and state levels. So it is a great place to work and I feel that we represent the city very well here at the Beckley Police Department.
David Lyons:
Well, it’s a gorgeous town. I hadn’t made it this far. I think I’d been to Charleston and those areas before on road trips, but it never made it over in this direction. So it’s a gorgeous town. And the building we’re in at the police department is amazing. Usually you don’t see facilities like this, if you don’t have support from your local government and a good relationship. So hats off to you for that, that takes a lot of work for sure. Real quick. What would be a general thing about this murder? What sticks out with y’all that makes this maybe unique?
Morgan Bragg:
I would have to say the uncommon suspect in this case is what really stood out to us. I think when you hear the details of this case, you’re going to form an opinion as to what you would expect to see as a suspect and it’s going to be completely off. And what we determined was the suspect was really out of character for this person. And it didn’t fit the normal demographics of what we would expect to see somebody that would perpetuate this crime.
David Lyons:
Good. Looking forward to hearing those details. And I think the listeners will too, for sure. So, well, let’s start. The basic stuff, when, where, and specifically how you got involved, how both of you got involved in this investigation?
Morgan Bragg:
Well, back in 2015, it was February 7th. We received a call. It was about 5:30 PM. Our detective bureau was called to the scene of a homicide. We responded to a residence on Odesa Avenue, which is a very sparsely populated area. There’s not a lot of residences. There’s just two or three houses on the street. We responded there, and what we discovered is that a 69-year old man had been bludgeoned to death. And we immediately secured that scene, began to do a walk-through of the house, the residence, to see what we could determine. And we just discovered one of the most gruesome scenes certainly I’ve ever experienced. Blood covered practically every surface in the home.
Morgan Bragg:
There was clear evidence that the suspect had gone into the attic. There was blood in the attic, there was blood in the basement, blood in the sinks, blood in the bathrooms and in the showers. And it covered practically the entire residence. Now, when we were able to locate the victim in the living of the residence, how we determined that he had suffered some extraordinary trauma to his head and face. And what it appeared is that there was a large amount of change and glass shards around him. And it appeared that he had been bludgeoned with a jar of change, is what we were able to determine at that point.
David Lyons:
Do you recall what brought him and that home into the attention of the police department to locate him there?
Morgan Bragg:
We did. The initial responding officers were dispatched by our Raleigh County [inaudible 00:16:45]. They had received a call from Rexanna Browning. She stated that she had been in a family reunion earlier in the day, had responded back home and discovered her husband in that state.
David Lyons:
And his name was?
Morgan Bragg:
Ronald Browning.
David Lyons:
Ronald Browning.
David Allard:
My recollection, she had left that morning. His wife was the last one to see him. She had left, I think at eight 30 and went to a family reunion, returned home. She had thought that it was odd throughout the day that she hadn’t heard from him, but when she returns home and discovers this and they call, I remember the call. The initial officer actually told me that he thought that it was a gunshot wound. There was no clear indication at that point to him, the initial officer, as to what had happened. And I’ll never forget the time that Morgan and I walked through that house. Here in Beckley, we’ve worked primarily every major crime that’s happened, especially every murder. And like he said, it was definitely the worst scene I’ve ever seen. The most amount of blood I’ve ever seen. There was blood in the refrigerator. There was clothes in the washing machine. There was so much about this scene that didn’t make sense.
David Allard:
Initially when we get there, the front door is unlocked. I believe later when we can get into interviews, but later the wife told us, when she returned home, the front door was open. And our initial walkthrough around the exterior of the house, there was kind of a garage door that led into the basement. That door was ajar and there was blood on the lock of that. We could see blood outside of the house. So initially, it was a very chaotic scene. The way our department worked at that time, I was a Sergeant then. We were the initial responding officers. He was assigned as the lead investigator. We had a couple other investigators with us and traditionally we handled our own crime scene processing. We didn’t have a separate unit that did that. Normally we would take two detectives. They would be stuck on the scene. Then the other two, the assigned and co, we would then begin the investigation and the interviews. But we both got in this house and we knew that it was way more than we would be able to handle with a limited staff of people. Even with five detectives, seven detectives, it would’ve taken an enormous amount of time to process this scene. So at that point we made the decision to call the West Virginia State Police Crime Scene Response Team to come out. And I think, Morgan, you contacted Captain Minkins.
Morgan Bragg:
That’s correct. Yeah.
David Lyons:
Yeah. That’s what I was going to ask, in Beckley, how you all handle crime scene processing especially as involved in that is when you’re talking, I’m thinking, we’re talking about stressed resources right off the bat. Do you have a typical arrangement with that organization?
David Allard:
In my 20 years, we’ve used them twice. We used them in a murder in 2004, and then we used them in this case. And since then, this case really changed the way we go forward. Morgan leads our crime scene response team now. We’ve cross trained patrol officers and other personnel in the department, kind of like the FBI’s evidence response team. Now when we have a crime scene, we have dedicated people that have additional training. They respond out, they have no investigative responsibility in that case other than the crime scene itself. And that frees up all the detectives to begin to process and work the case.
David Lyons:
And they probably enjoy that, I bet.
David Allard:
Oh, anytime you can get officers involved and then give them additional training. We’ve sent them to various schools throughout the country, various disciplines. We allow them to specialize and it’s all been under Morgan’s direction. He’s led that we conduct training with local colleges to do some mock scenes and then he conducts training with them on a monthly basis to keep up on it.
David Lyons:
You’re training future detectives and giving them practical experience. That’s actually excellent.
Morgan Bragg:
Absolutely.
David Lyons:
That’s a good thing, because I know from where I came from, we were specialized maybe to a fault like that. If you don’t give people the opportunity to get their two cents in and get their hands dirty with it, no pun intended on this case obviously, is if you don’t give them a chance, it’s hard for them to engage in the whole process. And back home, it was real common for a lot of people on patrol to really feel like that they didn’t have a pivotal role in it when in actuality those first responding to officers really carry the foundation of everything that starts from there.
Morgan Bragg:
They certainly do.
David Lyons:
But that’s good, you’re cultivating your new detective stock on a regular basis. That’s pretty cool stuff. So you get to the scene, you call in and everything and you get the assistance. And who was it again that assisted with the crime scene processing?
Morgan Bragg:
It was the West Virginia State Police Crime Response Team.
David Lyons:
Gotcha.
Morgan Bragg:
That responded to the scene.
David Lyons:
And then where did we go from there?
Morgan Bragg:
At that point we wanted to speak to Ms. Browning, of course. She was still on scene. We asked that she come to our local office so that we could speak with her. One of the things that we noticed immediately is that there was an element of what we would consider to be overkill involved in this case. The injuries were so severe. The scene was so disheveled and ransacked and so forth that it seemed like someone had really gone out of their way, which is obviously, I’m sure you’re aware is more typical in interpersonal crime where someone has a connection to this person and a reason for this kind of level of violence. I wouldn’t want to say that she was necessarily a suspect, but she was a person of interest to us that we wanted to find out what she knew and if she could account for who may want to do this kind of violence to her 69-year old husband.
Morgan Bragg:
So we brought her in and we interviewed her. We were able to clear her pretty quickly. We spoke to her. I would say that she was in such a state of shock that her demeanor was uncommon. It’s not what we would typically expect. She was pretty stoic, I would say. So that was a little off-putting, but we certainly understood that with the traumatic scene that she had been through and had experienced. So based on her statement that she had been at this, we confirmed the details of her being at a reunion prior in the day. Like I said, we cleared her pretty quick. She provided limited information as to people who would want to do this. There was a contractor that had been involved in a kind of a dispute at the home that they weren’t happy with the work and he wasn’t happy with the pay and some sort of thing like that. Nothing that would arise to a level that would cause somebody to do this.
David Lyons:
Feel comfortable, you cleared her quickly, right?
Morgan Bragg:
It was pretty early on. Yeah, absolutely.
David Allard:
Sorry, Dave. There was some things in the scene as well that really didn’t make sense to us. And I think there’s a couple questions that, or a couple answers she provided that gave some clarification. Near the victim’s body was a gallon of milk and the milk clearly had been drank and there was blood on the milk. And she had told us, she’d actually purchased that the night prior and that the victim doesn’t drink milk at all. So that was very unusual to us. And then the contractor dispute, that was something. And then she also mentioned some family issues with, she’d only been married to him for a year and a half and our victim has a very low risk level. He’s a 69-year old man, a pastor of a church, no criminal history, no drug use, nothing that would indicate that he would succumb to a type of crime of this in his own home. So we did feel pretty quickly that she was not involved. But we also had some other family members that were brought to our attention, actually while we were on scene prior to, I think, interviewing, a granddaughter showed up and she was adamant, she wanted to get inside. She was concerned about getting money that she thought would be hers. And I think Rexanna also mentioned to us about possibly a suspect of the granddaughter or the granddaughter’s boyfriend.
Wendy Lyons:
Hey, you know there’s more to this story. So go download the next episode like the true crime fan that you are.
David Lyons:
The Murder Police Podcast is hosted by Wendy and David Lyons and was created to honor the lives of crime victims so their names are never forgotten. It is produced, recorded, and edited by David Lyons. The Murder Police Podcast can be found on your favorite Apple or Android podcast platform, as well as at murderpolicepodcast.com where you will find show notes, transcripts, information about the presenters and much, much more. We are also on Facebook, Instagram, and YouTube, which is closed captions for those that are hearing impaired. Just search for the Murder Police Podcast and you will find us. If you’ve enjoyed this podcast, please subscribe for more and give us five stars and a written review on Apple podcast or wherever you download your podcast from. Make sure to subscribe to the Murder Police Podcast and set your player to automatically download new episodes so you get the new ones as soon as they drop. And please tell your friends. Lock it down, Judy.
He was 70 years old.