The 19 sonogram photos displayed on the refrigerator, backrubs to ease his pregnant wife's cramps and a loving Valentine's Day card left on the nightstand appeared to show that Roger and Margorie Holland had a happy marriage.
But beneath the surface lay fights about finances and threats of divorce via text messages, Internet searches about how to kill someone, maxed-out credit cards and lies to his wife and to police, prosecutor Phil Prokopowicz told a Dakota County jury Monday in his opening statement in Roger Holland's trial on charges of first- and second-degree murder.
That deceit and fraud by Holland, 37, turned his marriage into a "house of cards," Prokopowicz said, a house that collapsed when he strangled his 37-year-old wife the morning of March 7, also killing their 15-week-old fetus, then tried to cover it up.
The jury heard how Holland had maxed out his wife's credit cards, and how he'd told her he had gotten a high-paying job when, in fact, he hadn't. The prosecution also described how he'd done searches on his cellphone and his laptop for "If you pass out and fall down the stairs can you break your neck?" and similar subjects, as well as "Can you go to jail for using your wife's credit cards?"
Defense attorney Eric Nelson, however, told the jury that Holland arrived home from fetching breakfast for the couple that morning to find his wife cold and not breathing at the bottom of a staircase. Frantic, he called 911. Officers made two decisions early on, Nelson told the jury: First, that Margorie Holland's death was a homicide, and second, that Roger Holland was responsible.
"Investigators' minds were made up before they investigated," he said.
They chose to ignore the blood and DNA of another person that was allegedly found on or near Margorie Holland's body, didn't preserve surveillance video from the apartment complex that day and focused only on certain aspects of the couple's relationship and "ignored the mutual affection they showed for each other in those very same texts," Nelson said.
Shortly after investigators arrived at the Hollands' home on the day of Margorie's death, they noted that Roger had fresh scratches on his neck and that Margorie had bruises and abrasions from head to toe, some inconsistent with a fall down the stairs, according to a criminal complaint. She had broken capillaries in her eyes and on her face, consistent with strangulation, the document said. Blood had pooled in her hands and feet, suggesting she had been dead longer than the few minutes Holland said he was gone.
