IDOL PASTOR ON TRIAL: WIFE’S PHONE KEPT HIS FACE. PROSECUTORS SAY HE PUT A BULLET IN HER HEAD.
Weeks before Ashley Flynn was shot to death in her own bed, her iPhone still held a photo of the man now charged with killing her.
At trial in Miami County, Ohio, jurors were shown a crime-scene image of Ashley’s phone on the nightstand beside the marital bed. The lock screen was a kissy-face picture of Ashley and her husband, former American Idol contestant and church music pastor Caleb Flynn, 40 — her lips on his cheek, his smile to the camera. Detectives recovered the phone after she was found shot twice in the head on February 16. Their two daughters, now 10 and 12, were asleep in nearby rooms.
Prosecutors say that photo is the last public face of a marriage Flynn had already discarded. They allege he murdered Ashley, 37, so he could be with his mistress, Alleigha Botner, 24, a church intern he met in 2022. Hours before the 911 call, they say, Flynn texted Botner: “I choose you. I’m free. Actions will come tomorrow.” Investigators pulled more than 100,000 messages between them. Prosecutors highlighted texts about wanting Ashley dead or gone, and Botner later testified: “I believe that he murdered his wife.”
Flynn’s story to police was an intruder. He called 911, claimed a break-in, and said he had been in another room. Prosecutors say he staged the house, that no gun has been recovered, and that his watch and phone data do not match the “I was asleep” account. He has pleaded not guilty to aggravated murder, murder, felonious assault, and tampering with evidence. If convicted of aggravated murder, he faces life in prison without parole.
Crime Vault’s file is simple. A middle-school volleyball coach is dead in her bed. The man who once told America on Idol that he loved his wife more than anything is the defendant. The last picture on her phone is his face. The state says the next thing he did was pull the trigger and invent a burglar.
The jury will decide which version is true. The photo on the nightstand is already in evidence.
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