Trial begins for Whitefish shooting suspect

County Attorney Travis Ahner opened his case against accused killer Steven Hedrick on Tuesday by asking jurors to hold the 33-year-old responsible for turning an argument over noise with a neighbor in a Whitefish extended stay hotel last year into a deadly shooting.

“You can't bring a gun to a fistfight,” Ahner said in his opening statement in Flathead County District Court on Jan. 16. “And even more so you can’t bring a gun to a verbal argument. You can’t bring a gun in order to shut somebody up, and you can’t bring a loaded and cocked gun and point it at a hopelessly intoxicated man, inches from his face, without addressing and facing the consequence of that action.”

Hedrick faces one count of felony deliberate homicide for the shooting death of neighbor Jeffery Brookshire in the early morning hours of Jan. 24, 2023. He pleaded not guilty before Judge Amy Eddy at his arraignment last year and plans to mount an affirmative defense — arguing that the shooting was justified — according to documents filed in district court. 

Defense attorney Amanda Gordon elected to hold off on delivering her opening statement until after the prosecution rested its case.

Ahner, who is prosecuting the case alone, told jurors that there was no bad blood between Hedrick and the victim. Brookshire had even intervened to help Hedrick during a disagreement with another resident not long before his death, Ahner said. 

But when Hedrick pulled out a .44 Magnum while confronting a belligerent Brookshire, who was banging on the door of his former home, trying to talk to his ex-girlfriend, he committed felony assault with a weapon, Ahner said. That Brookshire died as a result meant Hedrick had committed deliberate homicide under state law, he said. 

Brookshire, just recently separated from his girlfriend, was “drunk and obnoxious and loud,” in Ahner’s retelling. Having moved upstairs in the extended stay hotel, Brookshire had headed back to his former home armed with a pillow after midnight, Ahner said.

Slumping against the door of his ex-girlfriend’s apartment, he slid to the floor. Then he started kicking at it, in Ahner’s account. 

Neighbors, Hedrick among them, were not pleased with the display, Ahner said. Eventually, they convinced Brookshire to head back upstairs. Awake, Hedrick ducked outside for a cigarette before returning to his apartment, not far from Brookshire’s ex-girlfriend’s home. 

Brookshire also returned, this time knocking at the door, according to Ahner. Neighbors again came out into the hallway to ask that he stop. Hedrick, Ahner said, grabbed the .44 Magnum and put it on his kitchen counter before joining them. 

Surveillance footage shows Hedrick poke his head into the hallway, Ahner said. He and Brookshire exchange words, and Brookshire moves closer to Hedrick. At some point, Hedrick backs into his room and retrieves his gun, Ahner said. 

“As [Brookshire] is stepping toward him, Mr Hedrick levels that gun right at [Brookshire’s] head — inches away,” Ahner told the jury. “The first thing that [Brookshire] does is he points at himself … and he’s yelling and he grabs the barrel of that gun and down he goes instantly.”

AHNER PLAYED portions of that surveillance video for the jury later in the day while property manager Jennie Payne took the stand for the prosecution. 

Payne described Brookshire as distraught after the breakup with his girlfriend. She found him a room upstairs in the hopes of putting distance between the pair, she said. 

“He seemed very agitated,” Payne said of her impression of Brookshire’s behavior on the surveillance footage she later turned over to investigators. “Irrational and angry.”

The courtroom grew quiet as Ahner played the audioless clips, the silence broken only by his occasional question for Payne. On the monitor, jurors watched as Brookshire wandered around the hallway in a checkered shirt. They saw him stomp away after neighbors intervened and they watched as Hedrick left his room with a cigarette in his mouth. They also saw him return and the eventual confrontation. 

The footage of the final moments of Brookshire’s life captures an arm extending from Hedrick’s apartment, a handgun at the end of it. Walking toward it, Brookshire grabs at the weapon with both hands. His head jerks back and he collapses in a heap. 

“Oh,” said a juror, breaking the silence. 

Hedrick, mustachioed and with slicked back hair, watched the video footage alongside the jury. He spent most of the afternoon hunched over the defendant’s table, occasionally whispering with Gordon. He moved out of view of the screen as Ahner showed the shooting a second time for the courtroom. 

Jurors on Tuesday also heard from the two Whitefish Police officers who arrived at the hotel minutes after dispatchers began receiving 911 calls. Officer Tessa Cowan testified that Hedrick cooperated with authorities and recalled him saying, “He came at me and literally grabbed [the gun].”

She also remembered Brookshire’s ex-girlfriend telling Hedrick she wasn’t mad as the two stood outside the extended stay hotel after the shooting. 

“I’m so sorry this happened,” Hedrick replied, according to Cowan’s recollection. 

In her cross-examination, Gordon asked Cowan whether she would consider someone charging at her when she had a gun drawn as a threat. 

“It’s a very vague statement, but, yeah, I would say that’s a concern,” Cowan said.

News Editor Derrick Perkins can be reached at 758-4430 or dperkins@dailyinterlake.com. 

    Steven Justin Hedrick is shown during his trial for deliberate homicide at Flathead County District Court on Tuesday, Jan. 16. (Casey Kreider/Daily Inter Lake)
 Casey Kreider