A social media model accused of murdering her boyfriend in their luxury Miami apartment was behind bars in South Florida after she was extradited from Hawaii. NBC 6’s Jamie Guirola reports
A social media model accused of murdering her boyfriend in their luxury Miami apartment was behind bars in South Florida Friday after she was extradited from Hawaii.
Courtney Clenney, 26, was booked into the Miami-Dade County jail Friday afternoon on a second-degree murder charge, records showed.
She was being held without bond.
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Clenney was arrested in Hawaii earlier this month to face the murder charge in the April 3 killing of her boyfriend, 27-year-old Christian Toby Obumseli.
Authorities said Clenney - who went by the name Courtney Tailor on social media including OnlyFans and Instagram, where she has more than 2 million followers - fatally stabbed Obumseli in the apartment they shared in the luxury One Paraiso condo building in Edgewater.
The couple, who had moved to South Florida from Texas in January 2022, had been "involved in an extremely tempestuous and combative relationship" since November 2020, Miami-Dade State Attorney Katherine Fernandez Rundle said at a news conference earlier this month.
Fernandez Rundle said Obumseli had been a victim of domestic violence before Clenney fatally stabbed him.
But Clenney's attorney said she was the victim of abuse and said the stabbing was an act of self-defense.
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Shortly after they moved in to One Paraiso, security and building staff began documenting several incidents of loud arguments between the couple, with other tenants complaining about the noises, including some two floors above them, Fernandez Rundle said.
Fernandez Rundle showed surveillance footage of the couple engaged in a violent encounter in the building's elevator on Feb. 21, about a month after they moved in.
"It certainly appears that the defendant was aggressively attacking Christian," Fernandez Rundle said.
But Prieto said the video doesn't depict the events leading up to what happened in the elevator.
"It is a shame that the State Attorney’s Office is seeking to win this case in the court of public opinion by showing an irrelevant and likely inadmissible video of Courtney in an elevator getting physical with Obumseli," his statement said.
Prieto said an initial investigation by Miami Police "uncovered an independent witness who saw Obumseli hitting Courtney in the head while he thought he was in the privacy of Courtney’s apartment."
The couple had apparently broken up the last week of March, when Clenney kicked Obumseli out of the apartment they shared at the Miami high-rise, prosecutors said.
But the two rekindled their relationship and Obumseli moved back in on April 1, two days before the killing, Fernandez Rundle said.
Almost immediately there were more arguments, leading to police responding to their apartment that same day, April 1, Fernandez Rundle said.
The fighting came to an end the afternoon of April 3, when Clenney called 911 to report that Obumseli had been stabbed and needed help. He later died from his injury.
Fernandez Rundle said Clenney admitted to police to having caused the three-inch stab wound to Obumseli's chest, but gave inconsistent accounts about the incident.
Clenney told investigators that Obumseli shoved her against a wall by her neck, then threw her to the ground and when he allowed her to get up, she grabbed a knife from a kitchen, Fernandez Rundle said.
She said that as Obumseli started coming toward her, she threw the knife at him from about 10 feet, Fernandez Rundle said.
But the Miami-Dade Medical Examiner determined that the knife came at a downward angle, and said that throwing it wouldn't have caused the fatal wound, Fernandez Rundle said.
In his statement, Prieto said the medical examiner "has formulated conclusory opinions that will not stand up to scientific scrutiny," and said the arrest warrant "contains deceptive and incomplete statements."
Prieto said it's a self-defense case and a trial will prove it.
"Unfortunately, it appears that the prosecutors have taken 'the easy way out' by charging Courtney; effectively placing the decision to clear Courtney of these charges in the hands of the judge and jury," Prieto said. "We are confident she will be exonerated, and Courtney will be seen for what she is: a victim of domestic abuse that survived her abuser."
