A former friend and business associate of slain Pennsylvania mother Jennifer Brown was arrested this week in her murder, Montgomery County District Attorney Kevin Steele announced.
Blair Watts, 33, was arrested Thursday morning and charged with first degree murder, robbery by illegal appropriation and fraudulent access to a device.
“For 37 days since this devoted mother was reported missing, detectives have been amassing evidence, piece by piece, highlighting what happened to Jennifer and who murdered her,” Steele said Thursday. “That image shows that Blair Watts murdered Jennifer Brown on January 3, then moved her body and finally buried her in a shallow grave.”
Jennifer Brown, 43, was found murdered about two weeks after she went missing last month. (Montgomery County District Attorney)
Brown was originally reported missing on January 4 by Watts, who told police she had been unable to pick up her 8-year-old son from the school bus that afternoon.
Her son had spent the night at the Watts residence the night before, Jan. 3, to “give Brown a breather,” Watts told investigators.
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A two-week search followed and Brown’s body was finally found buried in a shallow grave behind a warehouse in Royersford on 18 January. A medical examiner determined that she was murdered and that she had three broken ribs.
Blair Watts, 33, was arrested and charged with the murder of his former business partner on Thursday. (Montgomery County District Attorney’s Office)
Before his death, Brown and Watts had planned to open a restaurant together in late January called “Birdies Kitchen” in Phoenixville.
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Investigators found that on January 3, the last day anyone saw Brown, Brown sent two cash transfers totaling $17,000 to accounts controlled by Watts. That transfer “was never part of a written agreement between Brown and Watts,” the district attorney said.
Property owners who had been in talks to rent their space for the duo’s restaurant also told investigators that on January 4, the day Brown was reported missing, Watts turned up unannounced “now saying he had money to put into a lease.”
Detectives also searched two Jeeps owned by Watts and his wife. A cadaver dog indicated in the rear seat area of both vehicles, meaning the human remains had been in the vehicles at some point.
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Brown’s son told police he noticed Watts had his mother’s cell phone on Jan. 3, which he recognized from the phone’s lock screen.
“The movements of Watts’ cell phones and the movements of Jennifer’s personal cell phone show that Watts was in possession of her cell phone until it became inactive on the morning of January 4,” Steele said Thursday.
