Brooke Crews Is Serving a Life Sentence in Prison for Murdering a Pregnant Woman

In April 2023, Mona Gable, the author of Searching for Savanna: The Murder of One Native American Woman and the Violence Against the Many, spoke with A&E about the 2017 murder of Savanna Greywind. The conversation centered around the fact that as an indigenous woman, Greywind's death was likely fueled by bigotry and hate. Although the press heavily covered Greywind's story, that's not always the case for Native American women.

What made this horrific crime even more tragic, was the fact that Greywind was pregnant at the time of her death. Her killer, Brooke Crews, was obsessed with having a baby and did the unthinkable in order to make that fantasy a reality. Where is Brooke Crews now? Here's what we know.

Crews is serving a life sentence at the Dakota Women's Correctional and Rehabilitation Center in New England, N.D. Her estimated release date is Jan. 1, 2100, at which point, Crews would be 121 years old. It stands to reason, she's not going anywhere. When Crews was arrested by police and questioned about her motive for killing Greywind, she told them a devastating yet harrowing story.

In interrogation video footage obtained by Oxygen, Crews said that in January or February 2017, Crews believed she was pregnant. According to High Plains Reader Magazine, this would be her fourth child. As of June 2014, Crews owed nearly $14,000 in child support to the father of her first child. Her other two children lived with their father, Carl Crews, after Crews repeatedly abandoned them. She was also physically violent towards her ex-husband.

In the video, Crews said, "It must have been one of those situations where you believe it, you want it so bad that you ... I don't know, my body started responding like I was pregnant. I was measuring myself. I was listening to a baby's heartbeat." She also admitted to herself that this was "insane" behavior. The father of this baby would have been 32 year old William Hoehn.

One day while arguing with Hoehn, he screamed, "You know, you're not pregnant." At that point Crews said a switch was flipped. That's when she realized that the pregnancy wasn't real. "I made this whole d--k thing up in my head," she told police. Later while searching he resident, police would find a "five feet four inch stack of hard cover psychology books, ranging from clinical, criminal, forensic, and legal psychology to midwifery," reported the High Plains Reader. This spoke to how meticulous she was when it came to Greywind.

Greywind's parents told Oxygen that they had never spoken to Crews and Hoehn, which is why it was strange for Crews to ask Greywind to come down to her apartment so she could try on a dress. Evidently, Crews claimed she needed someone to model a new frock she was sewing. She even offered Greywind $20 but the mother-to-be wouldn't take. Her parents said it was because she was so nice.

On Aug. 19, 2017, Greywind went to her neighbor's apartment which ended up being the last time anyone saw her alive. A few hours later, her mother reported Greywind missing because both her wallet and car were at the house. Four days later, police were told by some of Hoenn's co-workers that he claimed they had a new baby at home. After obtaining a search warrant, they found Greywind's baby alive and healthy in Crews and Hoehn's apartment, per Valley News Live. The baby now lives with her father.

Greywind's body was located eight days after she disappeared. It was wrapped in plastic and "hung up on a log on the Red River near Harwood." Initially, Crews claimed that Greywind gave her the baby, but in court the grizzly details were laid out in full. "I did cut her, and then I took her baby out of her. She was not dead when I cut her and took her baby out of her," Crews testified.

While being sentenced, Crews cried and said, "I am guilty and I deserve every year I get. I just wanted them to know that I am sorry for what I did." Hoehn was "originally ordered to serve a life sentence for his role in the kidnapping of Savanna’s baby, but was resentenced in 2019 to spend 20 years behind bars." Despite her emotional apology in court, Crews was pretty clear during her conversation with police. "I was gonna take her baby," she said. "I guess that was the ultimate goal."