Judge Amanda Hopkins adjusted Morphew's $3 million cash-only bond, changing it to a cash, surety or property bond during a status conference in Alamosa County Court on Tuesday, September 2. This modification allows Morphew to post bail via a bondsman or by using the equity of his in-state real estate.
Hopkins denied the defense's request to reduce Morphew's bond to $500,000 cash-only; however, via a surety bond, Morphew should be able to post bail by paying up to $300,000 out-of-pocket — even less than the $500,000 his defense team said Morphew can afford.
"The reason why is because if Mr. Morphew posts bond through a surety and then absconds, he not only has $300,000 on the line, but there's also a bail bonds person who would be tracking him down," Hopkins said during Tuesday's conference.
Morphew has been held in the Alamosa County Jail since late June, after he was extradited from his home in Arizona. He is facing a first-degree murder charge for Suzanne's death, more than five years after the 49-year-old mother of two vanished from Chaffee County in May 2020.
He was initially arrested for Suzanne's murder in 2021, but a messy legal battle culminated in the charges being dropped in April 2022, days before the case was set to go to trial. After Suzanne's remains were found in September 2023, authorities say the discovery once again points to Morphew as the prime suspect.
Morphew appeared calm and casual in court on Tuesday, wearing a plaid collared shirt and flashing a bright smile while speaking with his legal team. Judge Hopkins approved a request allowing Morphew to wear plain clothes without visible shackles; his defense argued the orange-and-white-striped prison jumpsuit "portrayed [him] as a guilty criminal."
If Morphew posts bond, he will be required to wear a GPS monitor and remain in the state of Colorado, Hopkins ruled. He will only be permitted to leave home for medical or court-related reasons.
Hopkins also issued a protection order prohibiting Morphew from harassing any of the witnesses or victims in the case following his release. However, she stopped short of prohibiting Morphew from contacting the victims, noting that he enjoys the continuous support of his and Suzanne’s two adult daughters. The women sat in the pews, directly behind Morphew on Tuesday.
"The two, what I would consider, most significant victims of this matter are strongly supportive of Mr. Morphew's innocence and are strongly supportive of his release, and I do take that very seriously. Your opinion matters a great deal to me," Hopkins said to the daughters, who appeared in court to support the lower bond request.
Suzanne's sister and brother asked the court not to change Morphew's bond. In a victim impact statement, her brother, David Moorman, asked that Morphew be kept in custody throughout the entirety of the legal proceedings and that Morphew receive a life sentence without the possibility of parole.
"Barry Morphew is a soulless, sadistic, amoral predator that has hunted or used those around him his entire life. There is no redemption here," Moorman wrote. "We have all finally arrived at the point where Suzanne can receive justice. ...But we now must march forward to finish the journey which should never have begun."
In requesting a lower bond, Morphew's defense team maintained his innocence and noted that he did not attempt to flee when he was originally charged in 2021, when he was released on a $500,000 bond.
Prosecutors disagreed, asking the court to deny the bond reduction request. They argued that the evidence against Morphew this time around is "more robust" and Morphew has the means to flee, pointing to his finances, residence in Arizona, frequent out-of-state travel and continued use of the alias "Lee Moore."
Morphew is due back in court on November 3 for another status conference. Though trial has not yet been scheduled, prosecutors said they estimate it will occur sometime in the summer of 2026.
Death of Suzanne Morphew
Suzanne was reported missing by her neighbor on the evening of May 10, 2020; it was Mother's Day. Morphew told police he was in Broomfield for a work trip at the time she disappeared, claiming to have left home at 5 a.m. that morning while Suzanne was still asleep, according to his arrest affidavit.Prosecutors allege that Morphew killed Suzanne the day prior, using an animal tranquilizer to subdue her beforehand. Suzanne's bone marrow contained a tranquilizer chemical mixture known as BAM, an autopsy discovered. Investigators say that Morphew was the only private citizen or business within the county or adjacent counties that had purchased BAM prescriptions in the years before her murder.
Providing a preview of the defense strategy, Morphew's attorney David Beller disputed the BAM evidence on Tuesday, noting that his prescription was from 2018 and claiming that Morphew no longer had access to BAM at the time of Suzanne's death.
"That is a cherry-picked piece of narrative that has been created exclusively by the district attorney using agents by the district attorney," Beller said during the conference.
The Morphew marriage was rife with conflict leading up to Suzanne's disappearance, according to affidavits and hearings from the first murder case. Suzanne had been having an affair for two years and suspected her husband was as well.
Evidence previously provided in court indicated that Suzanne told Morphew she intended to end their marriage just four days before she was reported missing, texting her husband on May 6: "I'm done. I could care less what you're up to and have been for years. We just need to figure this out civilly." On May 8, Suzanne texted her sister, claiming that Morphew was "abusive, emotionally and physically."
The initial murder case crumbled amid misconduct from the prosecutors, including repeated failures to follow rules for turning over evidence in Morphew's favor and secretly conducting an investigation into the judge overseeing the case based on an unfounded online conspiracy theory that he abused his ex-wife. District Attorney Linda Stanley was disbarred as a result of the misconduct.
"The case in 2021 was arguably entirely circumstantial with no body. This case is very different," District Attorney Anne Kelly said on Tuesday. "The defendant is under very different peril than he was in 2021."
