BREVARD COUNTY, Fla. – The husband of a woman who was reported missing in January and later found dead in Mims was arrested Thursday in connection with her death, according to the Brevard County sheriff.
Brevard County Sheriff Wayne Ivey announced the arrest Thursday in a pre-recorded video posted to Facebook. The media was not invited to the announcement.
According to the sheriff, Amber Renee Estep was originally reported missing by her mother on Jan. 19 when she didn’t show up for work for several shifts. The sheriff said in Thursday’s video that her husband, Brian Estep, was the last person to see her on Jan. 16 after leaving a doctor’s appointment.
Ivey said Estep claimed that he and Amber got into an argument after the appointment and he dropped her off along I-95, just north of State Road 50, after “she requested to be let out of the vehicle.”
Investigators interviewed Brian Estep shortly after his wife was reported missing, and his pickup truck was found in Port St. John engulfed in flames, officials said.
“Estep stated that he had accused Amber of having extramarital affairs with multiple men, and that Amber slapped his face and told him to let her out of the vehicle near mile marker 15. Estep also stated that Amber collected a person’s cellphone and walked away from the vehicle despite his begging for her to come back,” Ivey said in Thursday’s video.
The sheriff said Amber was shot multiple times and had severe head trauma.
Ivey said search warrants were executed and teams went to the woods, an area referred to as the “Black Hole,” where they found blood that matched Amber’s.
“Further information demonstrated that Estep moved Amber’s body from the ‘Black Hole’ under the cover of darkness and then drove her around northern Brevard and southern Volusia counties, until he later discarded her remains where she was ultimately discovered off of State Route 46 in Mims,” Ivey said.
Estep left his home in Titusville and moved to West Virginia, where he was arrested, the sheriff said.
“Despite Brian Estep’s fabricated alibi, his attempts to destroy crucial evidence and just the disgusting evil in his heart, our BCSO agents and crime scene investigators were able to directly connect him to Amber’s murder so that justice can be served and her family can hopefully have closure in her death,” he said.
Estep is being held without bond in West Virginia until he is extradited back to Brevard County.
He faces charges of first-degree premeditated murder with a firearm and tampering with evidence.
Friday, Sheriff Wayne Ivey told News 6 reporter James Sparvero that he thinks Estep was trying to get away with killing his wife.
“I think he wasn’t only trying to get away with murder: I think he was trying to get away from everything that could connect him to that murder,” the sheriff said.
Amber’s uncle Jeff Matheny shared a statement on behalf of her family that reads in part, “Amber didn’t deserve what happened to her. She didn’t deserve to be brutally murdered by someone that was supposed to love and take care of her.”
Matheny said it’s been difficult for the family not to come forward with how they felt before the arrest.
“It’s been tough because we knew, pretty much, what was going on, but we couldn’t speak about it or anything,” he said. “We just had to keep quiet because they didn’t want us to spook him.”
Ivey talked more about the two months it took for investigators to build their case.
“We knew from the very beginning who most likely did this homicide, but we also wanted to bring together a case that was definitely going to be one that would hold up in court that would face any scrutiny, and we’d be able to win this case and send him to prison for the rest of his life,” the sheriff said.
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