BELLINGHAM, Wash. -- Whatcom County authorities and Prosecuting Attorney David McEachran are accusing the estranged husband of Kriston Peterman-Dunya, formerly of Cape Girardeau, as the trigger man in her July 3 death.

After missing a day of work, Peterman-Dunya, 32, was found dead in her Bellingham apartment after a concerned co-worker went to check on her July 5.

McEachran charged Keayn Dunya with first-degree murder Wednesday. Keayn Dunya's girlfriend, Kara Buchanan -- who earlier confessed to the crime in a voice mail to police -- is charged as an accomplice. In court documents, McEachran alleges Dunya asked Buchanan to help him kill his wife because of their pending divorce and a child custody dispute.

"As the investigation increased the pressures on both of them, she admitted to the murder and tried to take her own life," McEachran wrote in the charging documents.

Kriston Peterman-Dunya and Keayn Dunya shared a 7-year-old son, who is now in custody of Washington child protective services. In her voice mail to police, Buchanan claimed Peterman-Dunya threatened to take the boy away from Keayn Dunya and that she wanted a family of her own. She also said that he wasn't old enough "to get along without his dad."

According to court documents filed in the case, surveillance video taken from Peterman-Dunya's apartment shows a man of Keayn Dunya's size and race exiting a Toyota Avalon just before 5 a.m. July 3. The security tapes show a man wearing a coat and carrying a long-barreled shotgun in his right hand. In the affidavit, McEachran said the man is out of sight of the camera for seven minutes but reappears with the shotgun in his left hand. No one else appeared to be in the car, according to McEachran's charging documents.

After serving a search warrant at Buchanan's home, police found a 20-gauge shotgun, ammunition and a spot in her yard where items had been burned.

Police found wadding from a 20-gauge shotgun shell and the shell casing itself beside Peterman-Dunya's body. Twenty-six hydrocodone pills were also found near her body.

In the court documents, authorities say the shotgun and the Avalon seen in the surveillance video belonged to Buchanan.

In an interview with police, Keayn Dunya said he had burned his son's pet rabbit in the backyard after it recently died, which was the burned material they found. Keayn Dunya also said he was with Buchanan at her home in Oak Harbor, Wash., until 5 a.m. on July 4.

In the same interview, he said Buchanan could have left her residence while he was sleeping and he wouldn't have noticed.

Keayn Dunya and Buchanan are both being held on a $1 million bond.

ehevern@semissourian.com

388-3635

Pertinent address:

601 E. Holly St., Bellingham, Wash.