Woman charged in murder of husband after he discovered her affair

A Utah woman has been charged in the disappearance and murder of her husband after a man she was having an extramarital affair with turned her in to the police. The man — who is an unnamed informant — told police she said she killed her husband after he found out that she was sleeping with someone else.
Jennifer Gledhill, 41, is accused of shooting her “estranged” husband — National Guardsman Matthew Johnson — in the head while he was sleeping in their Salt Lake City home last month. She then allegedly disposed of the body in a shallow grave, replaced the mattress and attempted to clean blood off the carpet and bed frame using bleach, according to court documents.
Gledhill is facing nine charges including one count of first degree murder, five counts of felony obstruction of justice, one count of tampering with a witness and one count of abuse or desecration of a dead human body, according to court records.
Gledhill is facing obstruction of justice charges for deleting WhatsApp messages, disposing of a mattress, cleaning the house, disposing of a gun, moving a truck and disposed of or removed a dead body, court records show.
Gledhill had also allegedly arranged for her parents to care for the couple’s children the night the murder was allegedly committed, and then asked them to continue caring for them another day “presumably while she was cleaning up the crime scene and disposing of Matthew’s body,” prosecutors alleged in charging documents.
Investigators also found records of Gledhill making unsuccessful attempts to obtain protective orders against Johnson during their marriage. She was found by the court investigator to be “an instigator and one to goad Matthew into a response in order to get him in trouble,” court records show.
“The State believes that defendant was very calculating in her crimes,” court records said.
Police first started searching for Johnson on Sept. 25 after one of his coworkers contacted them, requesting assistance in locating him after he had not returned to work and his phone was going straight to voicemail, court documents show.
When contacted by police on Sept. 28, Gledhill said she wanted to report her husband missing and said he hadn’t been seen or heard from since Sept. 20 when they had an argument at their home, according to court documents.
Gledhill told police Johnson told her “he was going to be gone for a week and not to call him,” according to court documents. Police said that she seemed distracted and at times “nervous” during her initial call with an officer, records show.
An unidentified man who was allegedly having an extramarital affair with Gledhill told police that she called him on Sept. 22 and asked to come over to his house just before midnight. Gledhill allegedly told him she was “likely going away for a long time” and wanted to give him some prints so someone could enjoy them, according to court records.
She then allegedly showed up at his house and was “visibly distraught,” records show. Gledhill told the informant details about the murder in several subsequent conversations, according to court records.
The informant told police Johnson came home on Sept. 20 and started yelling at her because he knew she had been sleeping with someone else. Gledhill allegedly told her affair partner that she “shot Mathew in the head” as he slept in their shared bed on Sept. 21, court records show.
She then smashed his cell phone and hid his vehicle in a neighborhood near their house. She then told the informant that she loaded her husband’s body into a rooftop storage container, slid him down the stairs and loaded him into the back of her minivan, according to court documents.
Gledhill then allegedly took his body to an unspecified location, dug a hole and buried him in a shallow grave. She also told the informant she was “very likely going to kill herself that very night or eventually if the police figured out she killed Matthew as she refused to spend her life in prison,” court records show.
In addition to his testimony, Gledhill’s affair partner gave police messages that they exchanged and phone conversations he had recorded with Gledhill alluding to her actions.
A neighbor also told police that she heard Gledhill and Johnson fighting on Sept. 21 and into Sept. 22. The neighbor told police that she later saw Gledhill’s parents at the home “cleaning” on Sept. 24.
On Sept. 30, detectives found Johnson’s vehicle with his phone inside it 0.3 miles away from the couple’s home. Doorbell cam footage showed the truck being parked where it was found on Sept. 21 and Gledhill’s cell phone data shows it traveled near the area where the vehicle was later found.
Johnson’s body has not yet been found by investigators, but stains obtained from the couple’s home tested positive for human blood belonging to a male. A DNA test is being run to determine if the blood belongs to Johnson, according to court records.
Gledhill did not try and contact Johnson at any point after Sept. 21, according to court records.
Gledhill is being held without bail and could face up to life in prison, according to court records.