When Donald Trump first won a presidential election in 2016, Corey Burke and her trans wife considered leaving the country.
Instead, they decided to stay and ‘dig their heels in’, according to her wife’s book about their relationship and their life.
Eight years on, Burke, 33, is now behind bars after allegedly hacking her father to death with an ice axe in an election night meltdown.
It was a stunning development for Burke.
Burke had a high-flying job with Jeff Bezos‘ space exploration company Blue Origin. The company is yet to comment on the allegations against her. Her wife, Samantha Leigh Allen, has enjoyed a glittering career as a Conde Nast editor.
In her best-selling book, Real Queer America: LGBT Stories From Red States, Allen writes about how the couple struggled to deal with the 2016 presidential election.
‘After [Trump] won… my wife, Corey, raised the possibility of leaving the country,’ Allen shared. However, she added the couple decided to stay in the US – ‘to buckle down and just see this thing through.’
‘I wanted to be a part of that red-state resistance. I wanted to stay in the “real” America—and so did Corey, once the initial shock wore off,’ Allen wrote.
The Blue Origin employee allegedly killed her father during a mental health crisis
Burke’s $800,000 home is pictured. Police say she shattered the windows in an ‘act of liberation’ after killing her father
The alleged killer and her wife, trans author Samantha Leigh Allen
Burke and Allen married just months before the election – in Coral Gables, a Miami suburb. They met in Indiana in 2013 shortly before Burke moved to Atlanta to be with Allen.
‘We laughed about our officiant, Mario, who accidentally referred to Corey as my “husband” when he recited the heterosexual ceremony script out of habit,’ Allen wrote of the wedding.
The author referred to Burke as her ‘Big Boo, one true love, and the brains behind this whole operation.’ She said Burke was half Puerto Rican and half-Irish, adding that she was ‘white-passing.’
‘The hardest part of writing this book was being away from her. I can’t wait until we can pack up a kid-filled van of our own one day and hit the road. That would be a “Nightmare” come true,’ she added.
The prominent lesbian couple was also featured in the 2014 documentary Inside her Sex, which explores ‘female sexuality and shame through the eyes and experiences of three women from different walks of life.’
The two shared Allen’s gender-transition journey, which saw them raise thousands of dollars in donations for her sex-reassignment surgery and drive from Atlanta to San Francisco for the procedure.
‘This is Corey, perched on our kitchen table,’ Allen said as she introduced the alleged killer to the camera.
Allen shared the pair met in Indiana at the Kinsey Institute for Research and Sex Gender and Reproduction.
The couple is seen above in a promotional image for the 2014 documentary Inside her Sex
Allen raised thousands of dollars in donations in order to receive the procedure
‘We met on a Wednesday and we had sex for the first time on Thursday night,’ Allen said.
‘The amazing thing about the sexual dynamic that I have with Corey is that everything is just totally open and totally honest and having a conversation about what we wanna do sexually is as simple as having a conversation about where we wanna go for dinner,’ she added.
By 2016 they appeared to have moved to Miami, where Burke worked for in Human Relations for the Fox Networks, per her Linked In.
Allen also spoke about still wanting sex-reassignment surgery despite the fact she was ‘still having better orgasms than’ she ever had before.
‘But my feelings about what’s there aesthetically have really shifted,’ she explained.
‘Having a vagina means being able to receive something in a way that mechanically and aesthetically lines up with my experience of my own sexuality,’ Allen told the camera as she unwrapped a box of female sanitary pads.
‘Are you happy I got you that?’ Burke asked Allen.
In one scene, the alleged killer is seen topless as she fixes her hair in front of a mirror.
When asked what part of Allen’s transition she was excited about, Burke replied, ‘sex.’
‘I’m also excited for you to be happy and feel more comfortable… it’s not fun to watch you be unhappy about your appearance or clothing.’
In one scene of the doc, the alleged killer is seen topless in front of a mirror
Allen is seen on the documentary as she is about to receive gender-reassignment surgery
After Allen’s surgery, the couple are seen happily frolicking in Miami, with Allen wearing a smart blue bathing suit.
A decade later Burke has been accused of killing her dad after he supposedly refused to turn off the lights in the home they shared, which she purchased in 2023.
Burke appears to have moved to Washington state in 2019, and began working at Blue Origin in 2022 as a training coordinator, according to her LinkedIn.
She allegedly told police she had to bite her father while choking him because ‘he was too strong.’ Burke added that she felt better once her father ‘went limp.’
Police say Burke confessed to police that she ‘freaked out,’ claiming there was ‘something important about Election Day.’
Investigators say Burke came out of the Rainier Valley home with a bloody face and appeared to be having a mental health crisis.
Burke reportedly told detectives that ‘she knew that she could not convince her father to keep the lights off’, so went upstairs and retrieved the murder weapon.
She then tripped her father and strangled him before attacking him with the ice axe.
Burke then bit him and hit him several times in the head and side with the blunt and sharp ends of the ice axe, cops say. His body was found in the basement.
The Blue Origin project manager told police she wanted to help people ‘change their attachment to their parents’
She had apparently smashed several windows and later told police she did so in an ‘act of liberation’ after she killed her father. She had reportedly been ‘clapping inside her home’ when cops arrived.
A neighbor first dialed 911 after spotting her smashing picture windows. The officer who responded to that call discovered the horror she’d unleashed inside.
Police say they recovered a bloody silver-and-blue ice climbing pick at the crime scene.
The day after the murder she reportedly whispered to one police officer, ‘I killed him.’
Burke added that she had a strained relationship with her father and said she had been ‘overwhelmed’ on election day.
She added that she wanted to help people ‘change their attachment to their parents.’
According to police documents, Burke allegedly described how she killed her father, saying ‘it was really hard, really fu****g hard’ and ‘there were points where she felt she wasn’t going to be able to.’
Burke was charged with first-degree murder on Friday and is being held on $2million bail.
She is due in court on November 21.
Neighbors told police the father and daughter lived in the home together, and that Timothy was mostly home-bound because of health issues.
DailyMail.com has reached out to Blue Origin for comment on this story.