BOSTON — After her boyfriend was arrested for murder, friends of a Duxbury woman are speaking with Boston 25 News about the caring and artistic person she was.
“Brooke was literally the best friend that you could have asked for,” said Emma Gravina, a friend of Murphy’s.
Brooke Murphy, 26, was found dead inside her boyfriend’s Burlington, Connecticut, home on March 29.
According to court documents, Murphy was living at the home on Claire Hill Road in Burlington.
Just this week, Connecticut State Police arrested 28-year-old Cole Werhan, who was Murphy’s relatively new boyfriend.
“The fact that we got this news was a really great start, but we all have to come together even stronger for Brooke and in remembrance of Brooke and remembering who she was,” Matthew Ciocci, another friend of Murphy’s, told Boston 25 News.
Murphy’s friends want her to be remembered as funny, bubbly, and kind.
Gravina and others described Murphy as the person you could always go to.
“She was there at any hour of literally any day for you,” Gravina said. “If you needed her, she was a great support system.”
“She just made you feel so safe and so secure,” a third friend, Nicholas Cole, said.
Werhan was arraigned for murder in Torrington Superior Court on Wednesday, and his bond was set at $5,000,000.
However, it’s not his first run-in with the law.
Werhan has three prior cases involving three different women still making their way through the Connecticut court system.
In each case, the women allege some sort of assault or domestic violence.
According to an arrest warrant affidavit obtained by Boston 25, in November of 2025, one woman told police she was held against her will at Werhan’s home with Werhan threatening, “I am going to kill you”.
Most recently, in early June, Werhan turned himself in for second-degree strangulation, threatening, and disorderly conduct after a woman came forward and told police he slapped her, pulled her hair, and held her down between May and August of 2025.
“You know that this could’ve been prevented, and there are, I’m sure, so many more cases of this that we don’t even know because people haven’t come forward,” Cole said.
In all prior arrests, Werhan’s parents posted the bond.
Murphy’s friends said that while this case now has to play out in court, they want justice, adding that what allegedly happened to Murphy or any victim is never OK.
“Especially not to Brooke, she is the least deserving person on this planet, so yeah, hopefully something in that direction where he doesn’t hurt anyone else ever again,” Gravina said.
Murphy would have turned 27 this month.
Werhan is due back in court on Tuesday, June 30.
Boston 25 reached out to Werhan’s attorney for comment Friday morning, and we have still not heard back.
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