Kelsey Davis

Montgomery Advertiser

On a muggy, August day in 1998, Helen Crossley was lining her students up for the bus when she felt a sharp pain sear through her head. She couldn’t figure out why. The headaches usually didn’t start until later in the school year when her stamina waned.

She had no idea her only child had been shot and killed. She wouldn’t until it was mentioned that night on the 10 o’clock news.





For the past 18 years and six months, nearly as long as she had with her son alive, Helen has clung to the hope that someone, anyone will come forward with a tip, a clue, just a sliver of a memory that will lead to finding Brett Crossley’s killer.

Brett was an All-American kid. Born and raised Louisville - a town of about 600 not known for much more than getting mixed up with the Kentucky metropolis.

He played shortstop and second base on the same field where his dad once pitched. Sang in the choir at church. Made his parents proud when he earned a scholarship to play baseball at Alabama State University.

But now the hometown field where he once played has since been deserted; the batting cage overgrown with vines, the grass given way to dry dirt. And the only physical reminders his parents have left of him are photos, trophies, awards - evidence of his excellence.

Perhaps it was this track record, this genuine goodness he seems to have had, that made his murder that much more shocking.

The night before his death, Brett went with a group of friends to an Atlanta Braves game, then rode back with them to Montgomery that night. The next day he talked on the phone with his dad; they made plans to move him out of his apartment and into an honors dorm that weekend.

When Brett’s friends called the next day though, he didn’t answer. They started to worry.

“The next day when we were calling and looking for him he never answered his phone. So me and a couple other guys went over to his girlfriend’s apartment where he was. That’s when we found the body,” said Ellis Appling, a good friend and teammate of Brett’s.

He had been shot once in the head, likely by somebody he knew who was already in the apartment at 265 Park Towne Way, an investigator said.

Disbelief rippled through the team. They started showing up at the apartment where Brett’s body was. By the end of the night all of them were gathered at the police department.

After hearing rumor of their son’s death, Brett’s parents rushed up to Montgomery.

“We just jumped in our car and ran straight to Montgomery as fast as we could to the police department ... And when we got there the whole baseball team was already there, too. And it was true. It was a miserable night for us,” Helen Crossley said.

They were taken into an office and talked with detectives. For months they regularly made the 75-mile drive back and forth, having interviews and talking with police. Despite their cooperation, investigators ran into dead end after dead end.

Keith Barnett, a retired homicide detective for MPD, remembers it as one of the quietest cases he’s ever worked. Neighbors didn’t hear or see any gunshots. DNA evidence brought back nothing. The bullet casing didn’t match weapons in the database that had been used in other crimes. Nobody could think of anyone who might possibly have a grudge against Brett.

It was unusual. Even more unusual — Brett’s teammates really had nothing to say. They were a tight-knit group. One of them had to know something, or could at least drop a hint, Sheriff Derrick Cunningham thought. That wasn’t what happened once he started interviewing Brett’s friends.

“Everybody pretty much got hush lipped. A lot of them didn’t want to tell you anything. It was hard to find out who his close associates were because you just had a lot of people that just really didn’t talk,” said Cunningham, who was an MPD homicide investigator at the time.

But none of them knew anything, Appling said. “And if they did, they didn’t say anything.”

Rumors swirled about the murderer.

They got scared thinking it was maybe someone they knew. Or maybe it was that guy who showed up at Brett’s cookout and was never seen again after he died. Either way, the rumors led investigators nowhere.

Nearly two decades after Brett’s murder, his old teammates still sound genuinely confused about how it happened.

“I think a lot of people were truly left baffled to be honest with you. It was just absolutely ridiculous. Nobody knew. Coach (Larry) Watkins didn’t know. It’s just like there was really no explanation about what happened,” said Will Sillmon, who played baseball with Brett at ASU.

Cunningham and Barnett kept interviewing people, kept eliminating suspects, until finally the case just went cold. The hope for timely justice was now gone. And with it went an integral piece of Helen Crossley.

“I felt just like something had just been taken out of me,” she said about when she heard the case had gone cold. “I just kept praying and asking God to give me strength each and every day … But it was a struggle so I just constantly stayed in prayer.” That struggle is something her and her husband, Thomas, have dealt with day in and day out. Their faith has strengthened, but sadness is now their norm.

It’s the empty seat at Thanksgiving. The call that doesn’t come. The grandchildren that never were.

“We live, but it’s not easy no days. Because, see, we walk over the house and we look at his picture and everything just reminds us of him when he was here with us. But now we think how he’s not here with us, and he won’t be coming back. So that’s not really easy,” Helen said, in a living room filled with memories of Brett.

Throughout the years, Helen and Thomas have never given up on finding Brett’s killer. They’ve posted fliers asking for information. They’ve promised a $15,000 reward to anyone who can help solve the case. They’ve sent letters to surrounding newspapers, hoping to jog someone’s memory. An excerpt of one reads:

“This is a cold case but we pray that when this [letter] gets read by many, it will truly touch the heart of someone who might know something. Or that it will lead to information from someone who is willing to hear our plea. Our plea is for the people in the Montgomery Area and abroad to give information about this murder … After eighteen years and six months, we still find it especially difficult to move on many days. With our family, friends and our strong faith in God, we continue to keep moving. The pain is going to be with us no matter what but we truly thank God for strength every day. Our continued plea is that justice will be served for Brett one day.” (Click here to read full letter)

They’ve also never given up on God. Resilience has been born from trial. In their deepest suffering, they remain tethered to him.

“There’s a lot of pressure on us, you know. We get up in the morning, look around. No Brett. No phone calls. Just miss all of that,” Thomas Crossley said. “[It’s] made me a lot stronger. That’s why I’m still trusting in God. Stay prayed up. That’s what I tell everybody. Stay prayed up and keep trusting in God. God will answer prayer. I know He will.”