Fergus Falls man sentenced for murder of girlfriend, reporting death as suicide
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ST. PAUL, Minn. (FOX 9) - A Fergus Falls man has been sentenced for the murder of his girlfriend, after initially reporting her death as a suicide.
Matthew Ecker, 45, was sentenced on Wednesday, April 3, to 30 years in prison for the murder, and has credit for 57 days already served, court documents said.
In February, Ecker was found guilty of second-degree murder with intent after a jury trial in Ramsey County.
According to the criminal complaint, Ecker was charged with second-degree murder with intent after the death of his 32-year-old girlfriend in December 2022. Ecker had called 911 and reported that a woman had shot herself in the head at a St. Paul apartment.
Officers found the woman in the bathroom of her apartment with a gunshot wound to the left side of her head, with a firearm lying on her chest and her left hand on top of it, court documents said. Officers noted that the woman had "little to no grip" on the firearm, and there was no blood on the firearm, saying it was "remarkably clean".
Officers also noticed the blood in the bathroom had already dried by the time they had arrived, the charges said. Eckers said he called 911 four minutes after the woman shot herself. The bathroom door also had a split in the wood near the lock.
Ecker told police he was in an open relationship with the woman for two years, and he came to visit her after she called him and told him she was being abused by her other boyfriend, according to court documents.
The couple went to three different bars. At one of the bars, the woman's other boyfriend was there, court documents said. Ecker and the other boyfriend got into an altercation, where the other boyfriend punched Ecker and was kicked out.
The complaint says surveillance footage shows the two returning to the apartment around 2 a.m. and then leaving again 20 minutes later. They came back just a few minutes later and the complaints noted that both of them seemed frustrated.
Ecker said when he and the woman got home, she grabbed his gun from his backpack and ran into the bathroom, according to the complaint. He said he then heard a gunshot from the living room couch and ran to the bathroom.
He told police he had to push the bathroom door open to get in, but wasn't sure if it was locked. Ecker said he performed CPR, which he later changed, saying he didn't perform CPR. He also said he put pressure on the gunshot wound.
According to the charges, Ecker said he didn't have blood on his hands because he washed them in the bathroom sink. The charges note that officers did not see any blood in the bathroom sink. Ecker told police he didn't know why he washed his hands.
Then, according to court documents, Ecker changed his story about what happened when his girlfriend grabbed the gun, saying she grabbed the gun and pointed it at her head, and he asked her what she was doing. Then he reportedly changed it again, saying she ran to the bathroom and closed the door on him.
In an interview with police later on, Ecker said within five minutes of the two returning to the apartment, the woman grabbed Ecker's gun and put it to her head with her left hand, which Ecker said was "weird" since she is right-handed, which the woman's family confirmed later. She then walked backwards to the bathroom and locked herself inside, Ecker told the police.
Ecker said after he heard the gunshot and got into the bathroom, the gun was next to the woman's left shoulder. He said he grabbed the gun and put it on the victim's chest, but then took the gun and put it in his backpack, saying he was "scared of getting in trouble" because it was his gun. He then changed his mind and put the gun back on the victim's chest.
The complaint says Ecker did not recall putting the victim's hand on the gun when he placed it back on her chest.
Ecker will serve his 30-year sentence at the Minnesota Correctional Facility-St. Cloud.