Leave? Over your dead body
Gal, 31, ‘killed dad’ amid eviction threat
At age 31, Brittany Simpson was being pushed out of a very well-appointed nest: a $1.4 million waterfront mansion in suburban Charleston, SC.
But just days after her parents won an eviction order, something inside her snapped, authorities said this week.
As other family members slept, she faced her father — London native and filmindustry worker Robert Simpson, 66 — and fatally shot him in the chest with a 9 mm Smith & Wesson pistol, according to police.
Then she tossed the gun, along with her bloody clothes, off the backyard dock into scenic Hobcaw Creek, police said, and tried to pin the murder on a mysterious intruder.
Authorities say the die was cast on Thursday, May 4, when the eviction was approved. The following Tuesday at 6 a.m., Brittany’s younger sister, Brooke, dialed 911, according to tapes obtained by the Post and Courier.
“I don’t know. I just woke up and I heard a gunshot and my dad is screaming and there’s blood everywhere,” a hysterical Brooke said when asked to describe the emergency.
“I think he’s been shot,” she added, her voice dissolving into wailing sobs.
The operator asked, “How many suspects were involved?”
“My sister is insisting that somebody came in the house,” Brooke answered.
As the operator continued asking about suspects and weapons, Brooke wailed, “I don’t know, I don’t know. Brittany come here! Brit. Come here! Someone just came in the house?”
Brittany can then be heard insisting, “Someone just came in the back door!” and “Someone just came right in!”
Brooke tells this to the operator, adding, “Oh, my God, please hurry!”
The father was dead in the bedroom when paramedics and police arrived.
The evidence against Brittany — who once sold handmade jewelry to her tony neighbors but had been unemployed of late — was considerable, according to authorities.
A neighbor told cops of seeing a woman run to the end of the dock and back. In the creek, divers found the gun and a green book bag stuffed with a pink T-shirt and Nike shorts, according to court papers obtained by the Post and Courier.
The clothing matched what Brittany had been wearing earlier that morning in surveillance images from a neighbor’s security camera.
Before nightfall, Brittany confessed, according to police.
Robert Simpson immigrated to Charleston in 1975, according to his obituary, which described him as “the life of the party.”
A Teamster, he was recently a crew member on the upcoming TV series “Mr. Mercedes,” written by Stephen King.
“Rob was passionate about his work in the film industry and was on the cusp of retirement after thirty years,” the obit reads.