Minnesota man will stand trial in murder of woman stuffed in refrigerator

LOS ANGELES (CN) — A man from Minnesota will stand trial for the grisly murder of a woman whose body was found stuffed inside a refrigerator in her downtown Los Angeles apartment in 2023.

After a four-day preliminary hearing, LA County Superior Court Judge Drew Edwards found prosecutors had presented enough evidence to hold 41-year-old Magnus Humphrey over for trial. Humphrey, who is charged with two felonies — murder and torture — has pleaded not guilty.

Prosecutors say Humphrey and Maleesa Mooney, a 31-year-old part-time model and part-time escort, met five days before her murder. The two were introduced by a friend of Mooney’s, who was also friends with Humphrey’s brother. From that day on they were all but inseparable, according to testimony by a friend of Mooney’s.

“They were getting very close, very quickly,” the friend, Kiersten Dossett, testified. “I would say they were obsessing over each other.”

Humphrey, in town to see his father and brother, took Mooney to Long Beach for a BBQ at his dad’s house. According to testimony by the lead detective, the two were said to be kissing and taking selfies together. And Dossett testified that Mooney said to her: “I’m gonna marry him.”

But there was a central tension in the relationship. Mooney was a sex worker. And Humphrey wasn’t paying — not for Mooney’s time, not for her groceries and not for the cocaine they were both snorting. This struck her friends as odd. According to LAPD Detective David Marcinek, Mooney told a friend of hers that Mooney “wanted to ask Mr. Humphrey for money, but she didn’t know how to.” Dossett testified that she advised Mooney to ask Humphrey to buy her a $500 gift card to Best Buy.

“He doesn’t have it," Mooney texted back.

On Sept. 7, at around 5 p.m., Mooney texted Humphrey two links: one from Amazon, for pots and pans; the other for a General Electric appliance.

“I believe it was a toaster oven," Marcinek testified.

Mooney was never again seen alive. The next day, Humphrey was seen on security camera footage leaving Mooney’s apartment and throwing away a black garbage bag. According to evidence presented by prosecutors, he drove back to Long Beach to return his father’s car, and flew home to Minnesota the following day.

Days after that, LAPD officers made a welfare check on Mooney, and discovered her body stuffed inside her refrigerator, her arms and legs bound, her head shoved unnaturally back. There were indications she had been whipped in the back, perhaps with a charging cable, and that some of her hair had been pulled out. She had been hit, hard, in the face and the back.

A forensic pathologist with the LA County Medical Examiner’s Office testified the cause of death was “homicidal violence.” In other words, he said, they weren’t sure exactly which act of violence caused Mooney’s death. But, he said, the most likely cause was asphyxiation — either from a rag placed in her mouth, or from being left unconscious inside a refrigerator.

Following the testimony, Humphrey’s public defender Michael Ambrose moved to dismiss both felony charges filed against his client, calling the case “too thin to survive.”

“There’s zero evidence of premeditation and deliberation,” Ambrose said. “At most what we have is an emotional outburst… based on the evidence of Ms. Mooney maybe asking Mr. Humphrey for money.” He also said there was no evidence that there was an intent to torture.

Deputy District Attorney Antonella Nistorescu disagreed, calling the murder a “cold, calculated, premeditated act of violence.”

She pointed to testimony from an ex-girlfriend of Humphrey’s, who said that after the two broke up Humphrey became so enraged that proceeded to beat her for three hours. That violent outburst from 2009, Nistorescu said, was an “almost mirror image” of the 2023 killing. Both women were whipped with a charging cable. Both had their hair pulled out. Both were confined to a closet for some time.

“It’s like a methodology that the defendant is engaging in, carrying out these acts,” Nistorescu said.

Judge Edwards agreed with the prosecutors and denied the motion to dismiss the charges. He ordered that Humphrey continue to be held without bail while he awaits trial. Prosecutors have not decided whether or not seek the death penalty in the case.

Four members of Mooney’s family were in court for nearly all of the hearing, including Jourdin Pauline, a Guyanese-American pop singer and songwriter.

“No matter how I feel, there’s nothing I can do,” Pauline said after the hearing concluded. “I just want justice for my sister. She was honestly a really great person.”

Thursday was her sister’s birthday, Pauline said. She would have been 34.

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