The prosecution continued to call witnesses Wednesday in the trial of Steve Lawson, who is before a jury in Bowling Green and facing charges related to the disappearance and presumed death of young Bardstown mother Crystal Rogers in 2015.
One of those witnesses was a former employee of Brooks Houck, Crystal Rogers’ ex-boyfriend and father of one of her children.
He testified that Steve Lawson’s son, Joseph Lawson, talked about “burying her with a skid steer and they’d never find her."
The former employee, Charlie Girdley, said he saw Houck hand Joseph Lawson the keys to Crystal’s car, which was found abandoned on the Bluegrass Parkway in Nelson County. Steve Lawson is accused of moving the car at the request of his son.
Girdley also testified that Steve Lawson told him Houck wanted to get rid of Rogers and that Lawson told Houck that he was “not the man.”
Steve Lawson is charged with complicity to commit murder and tampering with evidence.
Also on the witness stand Wednesday was Lauren Hardin, the daughter of Lawson’s now-deceased ex-wife, Tammy Lawson.
Lawson originally told investigators he made a July 4, 2015, call to Houck's phone to inquire about a rental property for Hardin. But prosecutors played audio from grand jury testimony Lawson gave on three different occasions in 2023.
During his first appearance, he told jurors the phone call was to tell Houck he had finished a job at a worksite. At a subsequent appearance, he said the call was to inform Houck that the job of moving Rogers’ car was done.
Hardin testified that she wasn't looking for a place to rent at the time, adding that she had previously rented from Houck and could have contacted him herself.
Another witnesses was Elizabeth Chesser whose mom was in a relationship with Steve Lawson. Chesser also has a child by Lawson’s son Joseph who is a co-defendant in the case.
Chesser testified Steve Lawson told her he left her mother because she knew he had committed murder and was "going to tell on me."
Under cross-examination, the defense asked why she didn’t immediately go to the police. Chesser said she didn’t know Steve Lawson was involved in Roger’s murder specifically until she watched a docuseries in which she heard a phone call between Lawson and Houck during a police interview. She testified that she recognized Lawson’s voice on the call.
Lawson’s defense attorneys questioned the credibility of many of the prosecution’s witnesses, noting their past drug use and questioning the accuracy of their recollections ten years after Rogers’ disappearance.
Perhaps the biggest bombshell of the day was delivered by now-retired detective Jon Snow of the Nelson County Sheriff's Office who was the lead investigator on the Rogers case until the FBI took over the case in 2020. Snow said under cross-examination that Brooks Houck's brother, Nick Houck, and his mother, Rosemary Houck, are still being investigated as co-conspirators.
The prosecution plans to finish calling witnesses Thursday morning with the defense expected to begin presenting witnesses in the afternoon.
Judge Charles Simms told jurors the trial is moving faster than expected and could wrap up on Friday.
Brooks Houck and Joseph Lawson are scheduled to face a jury in late June.
