Posted: Friday, Oct 14th, 2011
Perjury suspect Vernon Braun
DEL NORTE — Perjury charges against Vernon Braun will be tried in district court.
The six perjury charges stem from Braun’s 2005 testimony about the Jan. 9, 2002 disappearance of Danice Day.
Vernon is the father of Victor Braun, who was convicted of manslaughter in the death of Day, then 19.
Victor was allowed to plead guilty to manslaughter and to have several theft charges dropped in exchange for the location of Day's remains.
He is serving a 12-year sentence at the Buena Vista Minimal Center.
Under the plea agreement, Victor gave authorities information that not only led to the recovery of Day’s remains, but also led to perjury charges against his father.
In June 2009, seven-and-a-half years after her disappearance, divers recovered Day’s remains from the lake at Lyman Lake State Park, Ariz.
Dr. Leon Kelly, a forensic pathologist from the El Paso County Coroner’s Office, described the remains found in the barrel as “charred small pieces of bones, oil, glass, skeletal muscles, a femur.” He said there was very little soft tissue left, and not enough left of the body to determine how the young woman died.
She was identified by mitochondrial DNA provided by her mother.
Victor Braun told authorities how he took a barrel, cut the top off, put the body in it, then soldered it back together.
He said he then put the barrel in a boat, took it out into a lake, pushed it overboard and waited for it to sink.
The statements upon which prosecutors based perjury charges against Vernon Braun include:
“I was going to Cortez. But if I couldn’t find the car, then I was going to go into Gallup and see a friend over there that had a couple of cars. And he wasn’t home, so then we come back to Navajo and got the boat.”
“Hard to say, probably maybe — maybe a hundred miles, more or less.....maybe we went 40 or 50 miles south of Cortez, and east......to the Navajo.”
Vernon Braun is scheduled to appear before District Judge Martin Gonzales at 1:30 p.m. Monday, Oct. 17.