Stacy Feldman Case: Conviction, Appeal, and Joanna’s Law

The Stacy Feldman case is the 2015 death of a 44-year-old Denver mother that was first classified as undetermined and, nearly three years later, prosecuted as a homicide after an independent forensic review concluded she had been strangled and suffocated. Her husband, Robert Feldman, was arrested in February 2018, convicted of first-degree murder in April 2022, and sentenced to life in prison without the possibility of parole.¹ The case is now cited as a leading example of a “hidden homicide” and helped drive the country’s first state statute on suspicious domestic violence deaths.

The Day Stacy Died and the Undetermined Ruling

On the afternoon of March 1, 2015, Robert Feldman called 911 to report finding Stacy unresponsive in the master bathroom shower of their Denver home. He told police she had dropped dead from a medical condition and suggested she may have eaten edible marijuana.²

The autopsy was performed by Dr. Kelly Kobylanski under the supervision of Dr. Meredith Frank at the Denver medical examiner’s office. Stacy had an enlarged heart and chronic conditions including kidney disease and obesity, but the pathologists could not identify a cause or manner of death, and the case was closed as “undetermined.”³ Toxicology found no THC or cannabinoids in her system, contradicting Robert’s account.⁴

The Affair Stacy Discovered That Morning

Prosecutors would later place the motive in the hours just before her death. On February 23, 2015, Robert had met a woman on Tinder using the alias “Wolfe” and telling her he was divorced. They went on a date on February 26 and were intimate at her home.⁴

After learning Robert was still married, the woman emailed Stacy on the morning of March 1 and forwarded her exchanges with him. Phone records show Stacy and the woman spoke at 8:52 a.m. According to the woman’s later testimony, Stacy said Robert had cheated before and that she was “done with him.”⁴ Stacy was dead by that afternoon.

How the Case Was Reopened

For nearly three years, the death sat as undetermined. Stacy’s sister, Susan Malman Altman, said she suspected Robert from the start. “It was at that very minute I knew that he killed her,” she recalled.⁵ Working with the Alliance for HOPE International and Dr. Bill Smock, a forensic strangulation specialist, Susan pressed for a second look at the autopsy file.

In October 2017, Dr. Smock reviewed the autopsy findings and photographs and concluded Stacy had died from “asphyxia from the combination of strangulation and suffocation,” citing bruising patterns consistent with an assault involving blunt force trauma.⁶ The original supervising pathologist, Dr. Meredith Frank, agreed, concluding Stacy “more likely died from suffocation and strangulation than from cardiac arrest.”⁷ Robert Feldman was arrested and charged with first-degree murder on February 13, 2018.

The Trial and Conviction

The trial opened on April 6, 2022, in Denver District Court and ran about three weeks. Prosecutors argued Robert killed Stacy after she confronted him about the affair, then staged the scene. On their timeline, he picked the couple’s two children up from school an hour late, took them to a church carnival to establish an alibi, returned home around 3:00 p.m., and called 911.⁸

Central to the state’s case was Dr. Smock’s testimony that Stacy died from asphyxia caused by strangulation and suffocation. Though not a forensic pathologist, he was qualified by the court as an expert in clinical forensic medicine and strangulation.⁷ The Tinder witness described Stacy’s confrontation with Robert on the morning she died. First responders testified there was no water on the bathroom floor, undercutting Robert’s account of finding her in a running shower.⁸ A friend and neighbor, Ben Smith, testified that Robert had feigned tearful concern about Stacy’s health, which the state framed as an effort to build a cover story.³ Prosecutors also pointed to a $750,000 life insurance policy Robert had taken out on Stacy as financial motive.

The defense argued Stacy died of natural causes tied to her documented health problems, including her enlarged heart, and stressed that the original medical examiner had never called it a homicide.⁸

After roughly three hours of deliberation on April 19, 2022, the jury found Robert Feldman guilty of first-degree murder. Judge Edward Bronfin sentenced him to life without the possibility of parole.¹

The Appeal Over the Coroner’s Ruling

Feldman’s appeal raised a novel argument: that the medical examiner’s “undetermined” classification barred prosecutors from presenting contradictory homicide evidence at trial. On November 7, 2024, the Colorado Court of Appeals unanimously rejected that theory, holding that a coroner’s determination does not preempt other evidence of murder and that the state was free to present its own expert conclusions.⁹

The Colorado Supreme Court denied review on September 2, 2025.¹⁰ Feldman then sought more time to file a federal certiorari petition, and Justice Gorsuch granted an extension on October 31, 2025, setting a January 1, 2026 deadline.¹¹ As of mid-2026, no further action appears in the public record. He is incarcerated at the Sterling Correctional Facility in Sterling, Colorado.¹²

The Life Insurance Payout and the Fight Over Defense Funds

Robert had taken out the $750,000 policy on Stacy in October 2010 and collected roughly $751,910 as sole beneficiary about three months after her death.¹³ After his arrest, he retained the firm Haddon, Morgan and Foreman and planned to use about $550,000 of the proceeds for his defense.

Elizabeth Greenberg, guardian of the Feldmans’ two minor children, asked the Denver probate court to freeze those funds under Colorado’s slayer statute, which bars a killer from profiting from a victim’s death. In June 2019, the Colorado Supreme Court ruled that the statute protects third parties like the law firm who receive insurance money in satisfaction of a legally enforceable obligation, meaning the firm could keep its fees regardless of the outcome of the criminal case.¹³ Robert ultimately spent more than two-thirds of the insurance payout on his defense.²

Susan Altman’s Advocacy and Joanna’s Law

After the conviction, Susan Malman Altman became a founding member of VOICES for Victims of Hidden Homicides, a group of family members whose loved ones’ deaths were misclassified or inadequately investigated.⁵ She also partnered with the Domestic Violence Services Network in Massachusetts to launch Stacy’s Fund in October 2022, which supports legal assistance for survivors, including Limited Assistance Representation in custody and immigration hearings.¹⁴

The most concrete legislative result came in California. Governor Gavin Newsom signed Senate Bill 989, known as Joanna’s Law, on September 27, 2024, and it took effect on January 1, 2025 as the first state statute in the country specifically addressing suspicious deaths in domestic violence cases.¹⁵ The law incorporates the Alliance for HOPE International’s “Ten Red Flag Factors” for staged scenes, gives family members the right to access investigation records and request independent case reviews, and requires investigators to assess a decedent’s history of domestic violence when suspicious factors are present.¹⁶ The bill’s legislative analysis cited Stacy Feldman’s case as a primary example of a death initially misclassified as undetermined and later proven to be a homicide through independent expert review.¹⁷

1
People. Colorado Wife Murdered by Husband Hours After She Confronted Him About Affair
2
New York Post. Robert Feldman Guilty of Killing Wife Stacy in Shower After Staging Accident
3
Colorado Court of Appeals. People v. Feldman, 22CA0792
4
New York Daily News. Man Accused of Killing Wife After She Discovered His Tinder Affair
5
Alliance for HOPE International. Voices for Victims of Hidden Homicides Family Impact Statements
6
People. Colorado Wife Murdered by Husband Hours After She Confronted Him About Affair
7
FindLaw. People v. Feldman, Colorado Court of Appeals
8
Denver Post. Robert Feldman Guilty in 2015 Denver Murder
9
Colorado Politics. Appeals Court Rejects Notion That Coroner’s Conclusions Preempt Other Evidence of Murder
10
Colorado Judicial Branch. Colorado Supreme Court Case Announcements
11
U.S. Supreme Court. Docket 25A496, Feldman v. Colorado
12
Yahoo Entertainment. Dateline NBC: Where Is Robert Feldman Now
13
FindLaw. In Re Estate of Stacy Feldman, Colorado Supreme Court
14
DVSN. Stacy’s Story: Shedding Light on Concealed Homicides
15
Center for Family Justice. CA Governor Gavin Newsom Just Signed the First Suspicious Death Statute in the Country: Joanna’s Law
16
Police1. California’s Senate Bill 989 Tackles Hidden Homicides: Implications for Law Enforcement
17
California Legislature. SB 989 Bill Analysis