Marissa Devault was hysterical and drenched in blood when police responded to an emergency call at around 2.45am and it didn’t take long for her web of lies to be exposed
In the early hours of January 14, 2009, police received a frantic phone call made from a suburban home.
On the other end of the line was Marissa Devault who was pleading for “help” before the line went dead. During a third call, Devault asked “are they coming” before telling the operator: “He was strangling me.”
It was the first time the mum-of-three, who lived in a suburb in Phoenix, Arizona, US, gave an official account of the horror that unfolded inside her family home, but her version of events would change multiple times. When responders arrived at the house, Devault was hysterical and her head was covered in blood.
And upstairs, lying on the bedroom floor, was her naked husband, Dale Harrell, who was somehow clinging on to life, despite having a fist-sized hole in his head. Blood covered the bedsheets, walls and floors and paramedics did all they could to keep him alive as they rushed him to hospital.
Giving an explanation to police, Devault said Dale attacked her in her sleep and choked until she was unconscious. After waking up, she said she saw Stanley Cook Jr, who was a tenant in their home, hitting Dale over the head with a claw hammer.
She said Stanley’s actions saved her life and the man himself confessed to cops that he struck Dale with a hammer. However, he soon told police he had short term memory loss, dating back to a traumatic brain injury in 1998 from a motorcycle accident, and he could not remember a thing.
Despite their version of events, the crime scene quickly revealed to investigators that it must have been false.
The blood stains showed that Dale, who suffered multiple skull fractures, was alone in the bed during the attack and Devault could not have been under him. Photos were later shown in court showing Devault’s perfectly manicured nails which showed little evidence of any struggle.
Then, in a follow up interview, while Dale was in critical condition, Devault switched her story, saying she was the one who used the claw hammer to hit him multiple times while he slept, before Stanley intervened and took the weapon away from her.
As for her motive, she claimed her husband sexually assaulted her, which sent her into a rage.
Dale died almost a month after the hammer assault, after his loved ones made the gut wrenching decision to turn off his life support.
The chilling case was recently retold by a YouTuber called Adrian for his Coffeehouse Crime channel. Giving some background, he explained how Dale and Devault knew each other in high school.
After education, Devault worked customer service jobs before having a child where the father was not around. This led her to dancing at a gentleman’s club.
Dale meanwhile had studied mechanical engineering and he started a relationship with Devault in his early 20s where he embraced her daughter like she was his own.
Due to his stable income, Devault was able to be a stay at home mum, and the pair eventually had two daughters of their own after getting married.
Eventually, supporting a family of five with one income proved challenging, and as such they welcomed a tenant, Stanley, to ease their financial struggles.
However, despite appearing like any other normal family trying to get by, Dale ended up being bludgeoned to death in his sleep, and it didn’t take long before his wife’s secret life emerged.
On February 27, 2009, Devault was charged with one count of first degree murder with premeditation.
Prosecutors wanted her to be punished with the death penalty and their main witness was Allen Flores, a man who had been having a secret affair with Marrisa, who was 20 years his junior.
During their two-year fling, unbeknown to Dale, Devault had been loaned $300,000 from Allen.
In court, he testified that Devault intended on either hiring someone to kill her husband, or doing it herself before telling cops he tried to rape her.
Devault’s attorneys questioned the credibility of Allen given he was given immunity on child pornography allegations so that he would testify. The disturbing material was found on his computer during a house search while the murder investigation was going on.
Her daughter meanwhile, 13 at the time of the killing, testified that home life was “tumultuous”.
She also claimed Dale was abusive towards her mother at times, something friends and neighbours had not ever encountered.
Prosecutor Michelle Arino argued Devault killed her husband to get her out of a financial hole, saying: “The defendant likes money, and she likes easy money.”
He argued that Devault believed she could get an insurance settlement before then being able to pay off the money she owed to Allen. Devault’s argument meanwhile was that she killed her husband in self defence.
The mum was sentenced to life in prison after being found guilty of first degree premeditated murder in April 2014 by beating Dale to death with a hammer. She was spared the death penalty after a three day deliberation.
During the sentencing, Devault sobbed and apologised for the killing, and for the pain she caused to Dale’s loved ones.