Dustin Kjersem Murder Case: Trial, Verdict, and Sentencing

The Dustin Kjersem murder case ended on February 3, 2026, when a Montana judge sentenced 41-year-old Daren Christopher Abbey to 100 years in state prison for the October 2024 axe-and-screwdriver killing of Kjersem, a 35-year-old contractor and father, at a remote campsite near Big Sky. Abbey, a stranger to Kjersem, attacked him in his tent, staged the scene to look like a bear mauling, and stole his belongings. A jury convicted him of deliberate homicide and two counts of tampering with evidence on November 10, 2025.¹

What Happened at the Campsite

On the evening of Thursday, October 10, 2024, Kjersem was camping alone along Moose Creek Road, about two and a half miles east of Big Sky on U.S. Forest Service land. He had set up a wall tent for a planned trip. Abbey arrived at the campground that night intending to spend the night. The two men had never met.²

By Abbey’s own later account, Kjersem welcomed him and shared his beer. Gallatin County Sheriff Dan Springer confirmed Kjersem had invited Abbey to stay.¹ At some point Abbey attacked him. He struck Kjersem in the head with a block of firewood, hit him in the face with the blunt side of an axe, and stabbed him repeatedly in the neck with a screwdriver. An autopsy later found “multiple chop wounds” and significant damage to Kjersem’s skull.³

Abbey then mutilated the body and arranged the scene to look like a bear attack.² He washed the axe and screwdriver in a nearby creek and took several of Kjersem’s belongings from his truck, including two cellphones, a Yeti cooler, a Remington shotgun, a Ruger Blackhawk revolver, and beer. He returned to the campsite the next day to grab more items and further conceal what he had done.⁴

The Body Was Found on Saturday Morning

When Kjersem failed to pick her up as planned, his girlfriend Natalie Holloway drove into the mountains with a friend on the morning of Saturday, October 12, 2024. They spotted his black Ford F-150 at the campsite. Holloway found his body inside the tent around 10:00 a.m. Given the state of the injuries, she assumed a bear had killed him. The two used an emergency call box on Highway 191 to reach 911.⁵

Personnel from Montana Fish, Wildlife and Parks, the Big Sky Fire Department, the U.S. Forest Service, and the Montana Highway Patrol converged on the scene, and Moose Creek Road was closed to the public.⁶ The bear theory did not last. Wildlife experts examining the site found no evidence at all of animal activity, and when the autopsy showed the wounds were “chop-like” and made by weapons, the case was reclassified as a homicide.¹

How Investigators Identified Daren Christopher Abbey

The break came from a beer can inside the tent. It carried what investigators called a “minuscule amount” of saliva.² On October 25, 2024, the Montana State Crime Lab matched the DNA to two people: Daren Christopher Abbey and his twin brother, Dustin Abbey.⁷

Detectives ruled out Dustin Abbey because he had been held at the Crossroads Correctional Facility in Shelby, Montana, since September 17, 2024. They then compared surveillance footage from nearby Big Sky Resort with Daren Abbey’s driver’s license photograph to confirm the identification. Authorities had also received a tip that a man described as a “skinhead” had been unnerving employees at Big Sky Resort and a local tasting room by discussing his prison time and making white supremacist remarks while mentioning that he was camping in the Moose Creek area.⁴

Abbey was located in the Butte area and arrested on October 26, 2024, initially on a probation violation. Confronted with the DNA evidence, he confessed to killing Kjersem but claimed self-defense. He was charged with one count of deliberate homicide and two counts of tampering with or fabricating evidence, and was denied bond.⁷

The Self-Defense Claim

Abbey told investigators that Kjersem had threatened him and his dog with a gun. “Dustin Kjersem tried to kill me,” he told authorities.⁸ He said the two had argued over the campfire, or over his muddy dog, before the confrontation escalated.²

Investigators identified what they called “numerous inconsistencies” in the account.⁹ Court records showed Abbey initially failed to disclose that he had used an axe. Prosecutors argued the brutality of the killing, with three separate weapons and what they called “excessive force,” was incompatible with self-defense. Abbey had also stolen Kjersem’s firearms, cooler, cellphones, and other belongings, cleaned the weapons, and gone back the next day to hide more evidence. He told investigators he had not reported the killing because of his felony record, and he has never offered a motive beyond the self-defense claim.²

Trial and Guilty Verdict

The six-day trial took place in November 2025 before State District Judge Peter Ohman. Prosecutors put in the DNA from the beer can, the autopsy findings, and Abbey’s own admissions about stealing Kjersem’s property and concealing evidence. They also showed photographs of Abbey posing with the firearms he had taken from Kjersem’s truck.²

Defense attorney Sarah Kottke argued Abbey had been “scared for his life when a gun was pointed at him by the decedent.”¹⁰ She acknowledged the difficulty of the defense, noting the killing happened “in such a remote area with no witnesses.”¹ Abbey did not testify. On November 10, 2025, the jury found him guilty of deliberate homicide and two counts of tampering with evidence.

Sentencing

At the two-hour sentencing hearing on February 3, 2026, eight of Kjersem’s loved ones spoke. His mother, Janet Weyer, told the court her son “was a wonderful person, loved helping others.” Natalie Holloway described what discovering the body did to her: “Seeing first hand what happened to him was my undoing. My heart was broken. My sense of safety evaporated.” She asked for the maximum sentence, calling it “the only option to protect others and to honor the life that he stole.”¹¹

Kjersem’s sister referenced a video shown in court of Abbey dancing with items he had stolen from Kjersem days after the murder. She said Abbey “exuded more joy in that minute and 30 seconds than I have been able to muster since the coroner knocked on my door.” His aunt, Cathy Turnquist, said the family had stopped celebrating holidays and birthdays and called the crime “unimaginable and evil.”²

Abbey addressed the court, saying, “I ask for you to see the truth and I ask for your leniency in this matter,” and telling Kjersem’s family to “find it in your hearts to forgive me, if not today then in time.”¹² The defense asked for 60 years.¹³ The prosecution asked for life without parole, citing Abbey’s “lengthy criminal history” and the brutality of the killing.¹⁴

Judge Ohman sentenced Abbey to 100 years in Montana State Prison on the deliberate homicide count and 10 years on each of the two tampering counts. He ruled Abbey would not be eligible for parole for 80 years, effectively ensuring he will die in prison. The judge said Abbey poses “a serious concern and threat to the public.”¹² After the sentence was handed down, Abbey turned to the judge and said, “Well, I’ll be appealing your crooked ass court system.”¹¹ As of the sentencing date, no formal appeal had been filed.

Who Dustin Kjersem Was

Dustin Mitchell Kjersem was born on November 10, 1988, in Bozeman, Montana, and grew up in Three Forks before moving back to Bozeman as a teenager. He worked as a self-employed contractor and had a reputation as a skilled builder who could pour foundations, frame houses, and install countertops.³ As a teenager he joined the Big Sky Youth Empowerment Project and later served as an instructor for a season. He was an avid hunter, fisherman, and camper. He was the father of a daughter, Addy Mae, born in December 2014, and a stepfather to a boy named Zeb. His sister Jillian Price described him as a “loving, helpful and adoring father” and, in a statement after his death, said, “This weekend, we lost our brother, our son, our uncle, our best friend and our dad in the most unimaginable way.”¹⁵

1
CBS News. Daren Christopher Abbey Convicted Dustin Kjersem Campsite Killing
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A&E. Daren Christopher Abbey Montana Camping Murder Dustin Kjersem
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CNN. Dustin Kjersem Death Big Sky Montana
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KBZK. New Details in Moose Creek Murder Investigation
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Montana Right Now. Opening Arguments and Witness Testimony in Daren Abbey Trial Begins
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Explore Big Sky. Sheriff Investigates Suspected Homicide Near Big Sky
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Good Morning America. Suspect Identified Homicide Initially Reported Bear Attack Montana
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Halifax CityNews. Montana Man Pleads Not Guilty and Claims Self Defense
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Fox 9. Montana Man Found Guilty Grisly Campsite Murder
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NBC News. Montana Man Convicted Killing Initially Reported Possible Bear Attack
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KBZK. Daren Abbey Sentenced to 100 Years in Prison for Killing Camper Near Big Sky
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NBC Montana. Man Sentenced to 100 Years for Brutal Campsite Murder Near Big Sky
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Montana Right Now. Daren Abbey Sentenced for 2024 Big Sky Homicide
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Bozeman Daily Chronicle. Daren Christopher Abbey Sentenced to 100 Years in Prison for Murder of Dustin Kjersem
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Dahl Funeral & Cremation Service. Dustin Kjersem Obituary