Husband who had affair with au pair testifies on killings of wife, another man: “Hoping to de-escalate the situation”
In the cold formality of a northern Virginia courtroom, Brendan Banfield gave dramatic testimony on Thursday that prosecutors got it wrong, saying he did not fatally stab his wife in 2023, but instead shot the man who did.
The former IRS law enforcement officer-turned-defendant in an aggravated murder trial continued his testimony about what happened the day his wife, Christine Banfield, and Joseph Ryan were killed. Banfield recounted the terror he said he felt while seeing Ryan, his wife, a knife and blood in his bedroom.
“I don’t know that I’ve ever been more panicked in my life,” Banfield testified. “I was hoping to de-escalate the situation. I did not want to shoot him. I wanted him to let her go.”
Banfield fired a single shot at Ryan, who he had said was holding a knife while standing over his wife. And Juliana Peres Magalhães, the family’s au pair and his romantic partner, also shot the man moments later, he testified.
Tom Brenner / AP
Magalhães previously testified that she crouched behind the bed and covered her eyes and ears while Brendan Banfield repeatedly stabbed his wife, CBS affiliate WUSA-TV reported.
His statements come as Fairfax County prosecutors have been telling a different story: that the husband stabbed his wife and lured Ryan to the house as a way to frame him in the case. Magalhães has testified that she and Brendan Banfield created an account in Christine Banfield’s name on a social media platform for people interested in sexual fetishes.
There, Ryan linked up with the account and planned to meet for a sexual encounter involving a knife on the day of the killings.
John Carroll, Banfield’s attorney, spent hours scrutinizing Magalhães’ motives in testifying against Banfield, identifying notes she had written in jail about negotiating payment with a true-crime author and producers after pleading guilty to manslaughter in the case.
Officials also heavily questioned Banfield’s statements on Thursday, particularly in light of his romantic affair with Magalhães that began in the months before his wife’s death and continued afterward. On Wednesday, Banfield described the relationship as casual while his wife was alive.
Chief Deputy Commonwealth’s Attorney Jenna Sands presented letters and messages Banfield sent to Magalhães before and after the killings, where they discussed baby names for their future children and love for each other.
“You are contending, again, these feelings – these very strong feelings, these ‘let’s be together for the rest of our lives’ feelings – did not exist when your wife was alive, correct?” Sands asked. “And they certainly did not motivate you to kill your wife?”
“Juliana and I weren’t even together when Christine died,” he said, acknowledging their volatile affair.
Tom Brenner / AP
“You had broken up, is that correct?” Sands followed, then asking: “Did you need to kill your wife to get her back?”
“Definitely not,” he replied.
Banfield’s at-times tense testimony comes after his attorney scrutinized the county’s investigation into the defendant, arguing that officials, almost since the beginning, forced a theory that the husband had catfished and killed his wife, and ignored evidence that undermined that conclusion.
“We had a briefing within the first week of the incident where we were discussing everything everybody had done and the information that was collected,” Leah Smith, a homicide detective, testified in the defense’s case. “Our supervisor at the time told us that there were two theories in the case and we needed to get behind the right one.”
Carroll, Banfield’s attorney, presented witness after witness, revealing tensions in the county’s police department regarding whether Ryan was catfished. One of those witnesses included Brendan Miller, a digital forensics examiner at the department who concluded that there was no indication that Christine Banfield lost control of her devices before the slayings.
His attorney also submitted a video of Banfield learning of his wife’s death, crying at times into his bloodied hands while a doctor patted his back.
Banfield took the stand after the jurors watched the video, and described in detail his actions earlier that morning: waking up, taking a shower, saying goodbye to his wife before leaving his house extra early for an important work meeting with other agents and his manager.
“This was a particularly important meeting for me, as it had been indicated that success in this case may lead to me getting a promotion to a senior special agent,” Banfield said.
His boss at the time said otherwise, testifying afterward that there was no such meeting on the calendar.
WUSA-TV reported that at an April 2024 hearing for Magalhães, prosecutors showed records that two months before the shooting, Magalhaes and Brendan Banfield visited the Silver Eagle Group Shooting Range. A few weeks later, Brendan Banfield also purchased a gun, which was eventually used to shoot Ryan, Senior Assistant Commonwealth’s Attorney Eric Clingan said.
Before the trial, Ryan’s mother, Deirdre Fisher, told WUSA-TV that her son had talked to her about consensual role play but said he was not a violent person. Fisher told the station she remembers every detail of learning about her son’s death.
“I remember when I got the call from the detective … I could hear my own voice screaming,” she said. “It was almost like it was outside of my body hearing that he had been killed.”
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