Colorado man sentenced to life for pretending to be wife’s stalker, killing her
By Logan Smith
A Broomfield man convicted yesterday of impersonating his wife’s stalker was sentenced to life in prison Friday for her murder.
Daniel Krug, 44, won’t ever be eligible for parole.
Evidence presented at his murder trial suggested Krug used a fake social media identities, a phony email address and burner phones to harass his wife in the month’s prior to killing her. Krug connived the scheme to throw investigators of his tracks, prosecutors alleged, and “terrorized” his wife.
“I go to Boulder every few weeks and thought we could hook up. U game?” read a text message to Krug’s wife two months before she died. It used the name of a man she had briefly dated more than 20 years earlier.
Another message from the same number featured a photo of Krug walking into work, apparently in an effort to convince his wife that both of them were being threatened. “This ur husband?” the text stated. “He needs to drive safe….Ur license plate expired. Gotta fix that.”
Krug took the photo himself and sent the message to his wife, alleged prosecutors. More messages – “U don’t belong in that big house. U belong with me.,Ill get rid of him and then we can be together,” for instance – created the illusion that Krug himself was in danger. Many of the attempts to frame the ex-boyfriend often contained vulgar sexual references and threats. Some tried to establish proof that Krug’s wife had been unfaithful.
Investigators, however, were able to prove the ex-boyfriend – now living in another state – could not have committed the murder. His alibi was verifiable, they said.
Krug, in fact, went to even greater lengths of deception.
Police officers responding to a 9-1-1 call found Kristil Krug lying in the couple’s garage with obvious head trauma and a fatal stab wound to the heart on Dec. 14, 2023. She was pronounced dead 15 minutes after officers had arrived.
Krug made the 9-1-1 call, per case records. He asked officers to check on his wife’s safety.
Evidence provided in court, however, showed that Krug used his wife’s phone to disable the home’s security system and covered the family’s doorbell camera with blue masking tape. Krug was seen on other surveillance recordings leaving the house 30 minutes later than usual. On his way to work, his car’s dashcam was deactivated.
Investigators were also able to determine many of the text messages from the ex-boyfriend were sent through the IP address of Krug’s employer in Denver.
Kristil Krug’s mother also told investigators the couple was planning on getting a divorce. The couple had three children.
Krug was convicted of 1st Degree Murder, two felony counts of stalking, and felony criminal impersonation. The life sentence was mandatory based on the murder conviction alone.
Colorado man convicted of killing his wife after posing as her ex-boyfriend and stalking her
Jurors reached the verdict against Daniel Krug, 44, a day after beginning deliberations.
The home in which Kristi Krug was found stabbed and beaten to death in Broomfield, Colo. David Zalubowski / AP
April 18, 2025, 3:07 PM GMT+7 / Source: The Associated Press
By The Associated Press
BROOMFIELD, Colo. — A Colorado man was convicted Thursday of killing his wife after stalking her while posing as her ex-boyfriend.
Jurors reached the verdict against Daniel Krug, 44, a day after beginning deliberations. They found him guilty of all four charges he faced — first-degree murder as well as two counts of stalking and one count of criminal impersonation.
As soon as the verdict was read, a police officer put handcuffs on Krug, who was wearing a gray suit and sitting with his lawyers. Krug is scheduled to be sentenced on Friday. He faces a mandatory sentence of life without parole.
Krug’s parents sat behind him as the verdict was read in the quiet courtroom. The family of his wife, Kristil Krug, sat on the other side of the courtroom.
With his marriage to Kristil Krug falling apart, prosecutors said Krug decided to play “puppet master” by scaring his wife and then trying to win her back by protecting her from the fake stalking, uniting them against a common threat.
Kristil Krug, a biochemical engineer, kept a log tracking the increasingly threatening texts and emails that suggested she was being watched. As police investigated the messages, prosecutors said Daniel Krug began to realize that he could face criminal charges and started plotting how to kill his wife to silence her and because she didn’t want to be with him anymore.
Prosecutors said he waited for her to return to their suburban Denver home on Dec. 14, 2023, after taking two of their children to school and then knocked her unconscious and stabbed her in the heart.
“He didn’t love her. He hated her. Think about what he did to her,” Senior Deputy District Attorney Kate Armstrong said during closing arguments Wednesday.
At the time of the killing, the ex-boyfriend was an eight-hour drive away in Utah, where he was living, according to investigators.
The defense stressed there was no physical evidence linking Daniel Krug to the violent killing, noting that there was no blood found in his car or his clothes, which his daughter said were the same he was wearing when he drove her to the bus stop that morning. None of Daniel Krug’s DNA was found at the scene, though partial DNA from an unknown person was found on her neck, the defense said.
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Daniel Krug’s lawyers alleged that sloppy police work had failed to keep Kristil Krug safe before she was killed and then bungled the investigation into her death. The detective who investigated the stalking that Kristil Krug had first reported in October 2023 was lazy and incompetent, they said. The defense also stressed that police failed to test Kristil Krug’s phone for fingerprints even though they alleged Daniel Krug sent texts from it after killing her.
Shortly after the time when authorities said Krug killed his wife, he was at his usual coffee shop buying his morning latte. He complained that he had been given an iced drink instead of a hot one and waited for a replacement. During closing arguments, defense attorney Phillip Geigle questioned whether that is something a “cold-blooded killer” would bother to do.
Prosecutors said that he wanted to be seen as “cool as a cucumber” getting his regular morning coffee before heading to work and also likely planned to wear gloves so he would not leave any DNA linking him to the killing.
According to investigators, the email account that was used to send messages to Kristil Krug was created on the computer network at Daniel Krug’s workplace. A burner phone used to send some of the texts, purchased with a gift card registered to Daniel Krug, was often found to have been in the same general location as his phone, Armstrong said.
Three of the home’s surveillance cameras, which Kristil Krug’s mother said she installed because of the recent stalking, were not recording when she was found, according to Daniel Krug’s arrest affidavit. The one in the garage was covered with tape. The defense said the tape also had DNA from an unknown source.
Prosecutors say Daniel Krug told police that he thought the ex-boyfriend was to blame for her killing. But after police confirmed that man was at home in Utah when his wife was killed, he said maybe Kristil Krug was having affairs, they said.
“It’s always the husband,” Armstrong quoted Daniel Krug as telling detectives as she said he rolled his eyes.
Colorado man convicted of killing his wife after posing as her ex-boyfriend, stalking her
by COLLEEN SLEVIN Associated PressThu, April 17, 2025 at 9:23 PM
An image of the home in which Kristi Krug was found stabbed and beaten to death is seen April 1, 2025, in Broomfield, Colo. (AP Photo/David Zalubowski)
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BROOMFIELD, Colo. (AP) — A Colorado man was convicted Thursday of killing his wife after stalking her while posing as her ex-boyfriend.
Jurors reached the verdict against Daniel Krug, 44, a day after beginning deliberations. They found him guilty of all four charges he faced — first-degree murder as well as two counts of stalking and one count of criminal impersonation.
As soon as the verdict was read, a police officer put handcuffs on Krug, who was wearing a gray suit and sitting with his lawyers. Krug is scheduled to be sentenced on Friday. He faces a mandatory sentence of life without parole.
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Krug’s parents sat behind him as the verdict was read in the quiet courtroom. The family of his wife, Kristil Krug, sat on the other side of the courtroom.
With his marriage to Kristil Krug falling apart, prosecutors said Krug decided to play “puppet master” by scaring his wife and then trying to win her back by protecting her from the fake stalking, uniting them against a common threat.
Kristil Krug, a biochemical engineer, kept a log tracking the increasingly threatening texts and emails that suggested she was being watched. As police investigated the messages, prosecutors said Daniel Krug began to realize that he could face criminal charges and started plotting how to kill his wife to silence her and because she didn’t want to be with him anymore.
Prosecutors said he waited for her to return to their suburban Denver home on Dec. 14, 2023, after taking two of their children to school and then knocked her unconscious and stabbed her in the heart.
“He didn’t love her. He hated her. Think about what he did to her,” Senior Deputy District Attorney Kate Armstrong said during closing arguments Wednesday.
At the time of the killing, the ex-boyfriend was an eight-hour drive away in Utah, where he was living, according to investigators.
The defense stressed there was no physical evidence linking Daniel Krug to the violent killing, noting that there was no blood found in his car or his clothes, which his daughter said were the same he was wearing when he drove her to the bus stop that morning. None of Daniel Krug’s DNA was found at the scene, though partial DNA from an unknown person was found on her neck, the defense said.
Daniel Krug’s lawyers alleged that sloppy police work had failed to keep Kristil Krug safe before she was killed and then bungled the investigation into her death. The detective who investigated the stalking that Kristil Krug had first reported in October 2023 was lazy and incompetent, they said. The defense also stressed that police failed to test Kristil Krug’s phone for fingerprints even though they alleged Daniel Krug sent texts from it after killing her.
Shortly after the time when authorities said Krug killed his wife, he was at his usual coffee shop buying his morning latte. He complained that he had been given an iced drink instead of a hot one and waited for a replacement. During closing arguments, defense attorney Phillip Geigle questioned whether that is something a “cold-blooded killer” would bother to do.
Prosecutors said that he wanted to be seen as “cool as a cucumber” getting his regular morning coffee before heading to work and also likely planned to wear gloves so he would not leave any DNA linking him to the killing.
According to investigators, the email account that was used to send messages to Kristil Krug was created on the computer network at Daniel Krug’s workplace. A burner phone used to send some of the texts, purchased with a gift card registered to Daniel Krug, was often found to have been in the same general location as his phone, Armstrong said.
Three of the home’s surveillance cameras, which Kristil Krug’s mother said she installed because of the recent stalking, were not recording when she was found, according to Daniel Krug’s arrest affidavit. The one in the garage was covered with tape. The defense said the tape also had DNA from an unknown source.
Prosecutors say Daniel Krug told police that he thought the ex-boyfriend was to blame for her killing. But after police confirmed that man was at home in Utah when his wife was killed, he said maybe Kristil Krug was having affairs, they said.
“It’s always the husband,” Armstrong quoted Daniel Krug as telling detectives as she said he rolled his eyes
