Jul. 30—The daughter of a Winchester man who killed her ex-husband took the witness stand Tuesday during the second day of a wrongful death civil trial.
With Judge Mark Monson’s permission to treat Rebecca Brashear-Mast as a hostile witness, attorney Joseph Miller, of Boise, said Brashear-Mast knew the shooting was going to happen because her father, James Brashear, 71, admitted to police that he “probably” told Rebecca on that day he would kill John Mast.
Brashear-Mast denied it.
“Who are you going to believe? A convict or me?” Brashear-Mast asked.
“Good question,” Miller said.
Brashear-Mast contradicted some statements she made the day of the killing 4 1/2 years ago. In one interview with detectives, Brashear-Mast said her father “hugged her” and told her “she wouldn’t have to worry about anything anymore” before driving away to kill Mast.
“Absolutely not,” she said, when asked if she’d said that.
Miller replayed a clip of her saying those words. Brashear-Mast said that she meant that she was talking about her father driving away in her Suburban to get the brakes fixed — not killing her ex-husband.
Brashear-Mast told the jury of five men and eight women that she was deeply traumatized that day and so were her two young children. Had she known her father intended to kill John Mast, she’d have called police, she said.
“I would have cared about him killing someone,” she said, adding later, “I really don’t believe in gun violence. I don’t shoot people.”
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The plaintiffs — Robert Mast, who is John Mast’s father, and two of John Mast’s siblings — are also accusing Brashear-Mast of lying about her ex-husband molesting their children. They are seeking unspecified damages from her and her father, as well as funeral costs.
Three of Tuesday’s witnesses were adamant that John Mast was a good father.
Ashlynn Weza, whose company provided supervisors for Mast’s supervised family visits, described Mast as a “loving” father who drove 13 hours one way every other weekend just to visit his kids for a few hours.
Williston, N.D., Police Detective Danielle Hendricks investigated Brashear’s allegations of sexual abuse from February 2018 to August 2019. The case took so long to close because Rebecca Breshear-Mast kept sending complaints and allegations, she said. She told the jury she found “zero” evidence of child abuse.
Robert Mast, gave an emotional defense of his son, saying he could not be a child molester.
“I understand that as a parent we don’t want to believe that, but this isn’t who John was, ever,” Mast said.
He recalled when his daughter, Betty Troyer, who was beside John Mast when he was shot, called the elder Masts in Sweet, Idaho, and put the phone to John Mast’s ear.
“Betty was on the phone saying ‘Jim shot John,’ ” he recalled. “She (Robert Mast’s wife) was able to say, ‘I love you,’ to John, then I did too and then Betty had to take the phone away because there was so much going on.”
The trial is expected to end today with one more witness for the plaintiffs and then the defense will present.
Ferguson can be reached at dferguson@lmtribune.com.