St. Pete police investigate suspicious death of woman found hanging in garage
ST. PETERSBURG, Fla. - Police are calling a woman's death in St. Pete as suspicious after it was initially reported as a suicide.
According to an affidavit for a search warrant, first responders found 59-year-old Katrin Simpson hanging by a black wire attached to a wooden beam in the garage of the St. Pete home she shared with her boyfriend, 48-year-old Gregory Shinn, on Feb. 20. Court documents say Shinn had a neighbor call 911 because he didn’t have a phone. Paramedics responded around 11:40 p.m. to the home on Whiting Drive Southeast.
Shinn told officers he last saw Simpson between 10 - 10:30 p.m., and said he was in his room watching YouTube videos. He told detectives he felt like he should check on her because he hadn’t heard from her in a while, went to the garage and found her hanging from the beam, court documents say.
Shinn told officers Simpson had said she wanted to kill herself and had regular thoughts about it, but hadn’t said anything that day.
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He also told them she had been journaling in a diary titled "my feelings."
Johanna Monighan reads a text her friend, Katrin Simpson sent her.
The medical examiner said Simpson’s injuries, however, weren’t consistent with someone who took his or her own life.
"Due to the severity of the victim’s injuries and them not aligning with a typical suicide by hanging, this investigation was deemed a suspicious death," the affidavit said.
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Court documents say Simpson’s injuries included multiple fractured ribs, hemorrhages on the bottom of her brain, a contusion on her forehead and cuts, among other injures.
Shinn told detectives they had been doing work on the house and Simpson hit a rotten door frame with a sledgehammer and the door frame fell and hit her.
Police say Simpson was found hanging in the garage. Her death was initially ruled a suicide, but they now say she was murdered.
Police haven’t named Shinn as a suspect. The affidavit for the search warrant of the home says Shinn was arrested two other times for domestic violence charges against Simpson.
Police executed the search warrant on the home on Feb. 22.
Officers seized two spools of black electrical wire, loose black electrical wire, three pliers, wire cutters, needle nose pliers, cameras, red stain gauze, a pillow case, a fitted sheet and a doorbell camera.
Pictured: Johanna Monighan and Katrin Simpson.
"There are too many emotions," Simpson’s friend Johanna Monighan said.
Monighan said her friend was a disabled veteran, and was very creative.
"We both studied fine arts and, just really nice. She thought the best of people and, you know, very talented and it’s just so sad," she said.
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