The upcoming episode of Prosecuting Evil With Kelly Siegler will showcase the case against a former Texas minister named Matt Baker.
In the year 2010, the court sentenced Baker to 65 years in prison for the murder of his wife. For a long time, it was believed that Matt’s wife, Kari, had committed suicide. NBC News reported the discovery of sleeping pills and a suicide note beside her bed. Furthermore, according to Baker, his wife had depression because the couple lost their 16-month-old daughter to cancer in 1999.
The case was briefly closed. However, soon, Kari’s parents approached officials with the evidence that their daughter was murdered. At Baker’s trial, one of the key witnesses was his ex-mistress, Vanessa Bulls. Bulls revealed to the jurors that Baker gave her deceased wife, a sleeping aid called Ambien. Baker wanted to make his wife believe that they were spicing up their marriage. Hence, he handcuffed her to the bed and covered her face with a pillow after she went to sleep.
Furthermore, Bulls also said that the suicide note was typed by none other than Matt Baker himself. After typing it, he rubbed his dead wife’s hands on it. According to CBS News, he killed Kari because he wanted to be with Vanessa. Baker is currently held in a prison in Texas.
To learn intricate details about this tragic case, tune in to the upcoming episode of Prosecuting Evil With Kelly Siegler. Titled The Mask of God, this episode will air on Saturday, December 23, at 8 p.m. ET.
Its synopsis reads, “A grieving mother takes her own life, or so it seems. Her parents start an investigation, and secrets emerge about the Baptist minister and husband that leaves friends and family wondering if there’s more to the story.”
Did Matt Baker commit sexual assault?
According to NBC News, several women came forward to testify that the disgraced Baptist minister made sexual advancements toward them. In addition, one woman complained to the police that Matt Baker attempted to sexually assault her. One report even said that he used his church-issued laptop and a computer to visit pornographic websites. He intended to visit websites where married people were looking for affairs.
At Matt Baker’s trial, prosecutor Crawford Long stated that Baker’s actions were inhumane. Furthermore, he even said that the Baptist minister took pride in the fact that he was getting away with murder.
Crawford Long said, “Folks, I can look every one of you in the eye and say Matt Baker deserves the maximum sentence, and Matt Baker, I can look you in the eye and say because of your heartless, soulless conduct, you do deserve a maximum sentence.”
Prosecutor Susan Shafer stated that Baker’s cunningness made people believe that he was an upstanding citizen. She told the jurors, “He thought no more of them than to murder their mother and then erase her legacy with them by convincing them that she didn’t love them enough to stay and raise them, that she committed suicide.”
Matt and Kari met when they were students at Baylor University in Waco.
