Grand jury indicts Dennis for murder in wife’s death

A psychologist accused of killing his attorney wife and staging her death as a suicide was indicted on a murder charge Thursday.

Authorities have included a theory of manual suffocation in the death of Susan Winters in the indictment on one count of murder with use of a deadly weapon against Gregory Brent Dennis, according to prosecutor Marc Digiacomo.

An expert told a Las Vegas grand jury this week that Winters, 48, likely died of either an oxycodone overdose or suffocation, according to Digiacomo.

The case had been slated for a February preliminary hearing in Henderson Justice Court.

“I’m disappointed that the state elected to proceed with a grand jury instead of allowing me to challenge their evidence at a preliminary hearing,” Dennis’ lawyer, Richard Schonfeld, said.

Henderson police arrested Dennis on the murder charge in February in connection with the January 2015 death, and he remains free on $250,000 bail. The state’s medical board agreed earlier this year that 54-year-old Dennis could reopen his Boulder City mental health clinic as early as November.

Dennis stood to inherit roughly $2 million, including a $1 million life insurance policy, upon his wife’s death and was dealing with a cocaine addiction that was draining his finances, according to an arrest report.