GUILTY CA - Robert Harris, 72, shot to death in his Placerville home, 5 Jan 2013

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Woman, 70, 'shoots dead her husband - 30 years after killing previous husband in the same house with the same shotgun' (Daily Mail)
A 70-year-old woman has been arrested for shooting dead her husband - the second time in nearly 30 years she's been accused of killing a spouse.

El Dorado County officials say Colleen Ann Harris was arrested last Sunday after deputies were called to her home in rural Placerville and found 72-year-old Robert Harris dead of a gunshot wound.

Sheriff's officials say Robert Harris was Colleen Harris' third husband. They are believed to have divorced in 2004 but later reconciled.

In 1985 Colleen Ann Harris - then known as Colleen Ann Batten - was charged with killing her then-husband, 46-year-old James Batten.
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The 70-year-old was acquitted of murder after claiming the shooting of Batten was self-defense and the jury said there was insufficient evidence she intended to murder her husband.
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more at the links
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She reportedly told police that Batten had been sexually assaulting his teen daughter from her first marriage but declined to press charges after Batten was arrested.

Tuesday, CBS13 spoke with a neighbor and friend of more than 25 years who said the El Dorado County Jail is the last place he’d expect Harris to end up.

“Very friendly. She’s a small woman, soft-spoken. If you met and her and talked to her, you’d be amazed,” Dan McKelvie said.
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The circumstances of the two deaths are eerily similar, including the weapon Harris allegedly used, a shotgun.
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Neighbor Shocked By Arrest Of 70-Year-Old Placerville Woman In Death Of Husband (sacramento.cbslocal.com)
 
Nobody knows how the first marriage ended.

Love the neighbor "small woman, soft spoken, friendly" yeah with a big gun, dude.

Commenting for the heck of it that she looks pretty good for her age.
 
Wife, 72, goes on trial for shooting dead her second husband - nearly 30 years after she was acquitted in the murder of her first husband in the same house

A 72-year-old woman is set to go on trial for shooting dead her second husband, nearly 30 years after she was acquitted of murdering her first husband in eerily similar circumstances.
Colleen Ann Harris, whose case is expected to open on Wednesday, is accused of shooting dead her estranged husband, Robert 'Bob' Harris, in their Placerville, California home in January 2013.
Decades before, in 1985, she shot dead her first husband and the father of her three children, 46-year-old James Batten, after claiming he had been abusive towards her.


Read more: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/art...ars-acquitted-murder-first.html#ixzz3UlIHpd9i
 
http://www.sacbee.com/news/local/crime/article15274619.html

“Oh, I don’t remember,” the prosecutor said she answered. “(Batten) may have been having an affair with the neighbor’s wife and I may have shot him.”

When detectives asked if she had been a suspect in that murder, Alexander said Colleen replied, “Isn’t the wife always a suspect?”

.....

"On Wednesday, Harris was represented in court by the same lawyer, David Weiner, who won her acquittal in the earlier killing"



Lots of info and background in this article. Both husbands shot while in bed. Both shot with a shotgun. Both shot by Harris. Wow! This lady is either the most unfortunate woman in the USA or she is a cold blooded killer! :what:
 
http://www.sacbee.com/news/local/crime/article15208610.html

In the prosecution’s “statement of facts,” Alexander said Colleen Harris caught her husband making a phone call to his overseas love interest on Jan. 5, 2013, when Bob Harris was staying at the Placerville home. He said Colleen Harris went into the bedroom where he was sleeping later that night or early Jan. 6, “and shot him in the head with a 12-gauge short barrel shotgun as he slept. The victim was killed instantly.”

Alexander said Colleen Harris told investigators that she recalled her husband having “a bloody nose” in his sleep. At one point, when told that her husband had been dead for many hours, Alexander said Harris responded: “Oh, my God ... You’re joking right?” He said she described being in “a gray fog” but insisted she would never shoot her husband.



She couldn't remember killing the other husband and a mental health professional testified at that trial that Harris was suffering from amnesia. Now she was in a grey fog and doesn't remember this man dying either? :rolleyes:
 
http://www.inedc.com/1-3475


The 70-year-old woman accused of shooting and killing her husband in their Placerville home on Sunday made her first court appearance Wednesday, with friends and family there in support.Friends of Colleen Harris told CBS13 as they left the courtroom that she killed her husband in self-defense -
 
http://www.laketahoenews.net/2015/03/murder-trial-of-former-ltbmu-chief-begins/

Four years earlier, the grandmother told him, Colleen Ann Batten had been tried for murder in the shotgun killing of her first husband, James Batten. It was a sensational murder mystery, played out in 1986 in a Placerville courtroom as a trial headline in the local Mountain Democrat asked the question, “Colleen Batten – murderess or martyr?”
 
`http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-3000861/Wife-goes-trial-shooting-dead-second-husband-30-years-acquitted-murder-first.html?ITO=1490&ns_campaign=1490&ns_mchannel=rss

Then on January 5, 2013, she overheard her husband making a call to his love interest overseas and later that night or the following morning, she shot him as he slept, prosecutors claim.

She then allegedly drove to San Francisco and stashed her husband's cellphone, a handgun - not the same one used in the murder - and his coin collection, in her son's garage.

After returning home, she called the lawyer who won her previous case and told him that she had shot her husband, prosecutors say. The lawyer then contacted the Sheriff's Office.
 
I would really like to know what is happening with this trial. It seems that any newspaper that I can find that is reporting requires paid subscription in order to read articles.

Does anyone have any news about this trial?
 
http://www.news.com.au/world/north-america/colleen-harris-found-guilty-of-murdering-third-husband-after-acquittal-of-murdering-second/story-fnh81jut-1227307372838

Colleen Harris found guilty of murdering third husband, after acquittal of murdering second

Colleen Harris initially claimed in trial her husband may have committed suicide.

Shen later said in court that he died in a horrible accident as the couple grappled over a 12-gauge shotgun and that her husband’s death was a horrible event shrouded by the “grey fog” of traumatic memory loss.

''''''''''''''''

When Colleen Harris was found guilty of first-degree murder — which provides for a maximum 50 years in jail, she dropped her head and put her hand over her face and began crying as she was led out of the courtroom.
 
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-3041235/Colleen-Harris-guilty-murdering-husband-30-years-accused-killing-second-one-HOUSE.html

In 1990, Bob and Colleen Harris married and had two sons and a daughter. They divorced in 2004 but then married again a year later.

Then in 2012, as Harris took a trip to Mongolia, where he taught environmental conservation to students, he met another woman and began a relationship with her, the Bee reported.

When he returned to California, he and his wife separated and he moved out.

But when Colleen Harris was house-bound following hip-replacement surgery, he returned to the Placerville home to help her.



And on January 5, 2013, she overheard her husband making a call to his love interest overseas and later that night or the following morning, she shot him as he slept, prosecutors said.
 
From June:

http://www.sacbee.com/news/local/crime/article23234667.html

Andy Harris came to the courtroom Friday with a lengthy prepared statement: a tribute to Robert “Bob” Harris, the former U.S. Forest Service supervisor for the Tahoe basin and the father he loved and idolized. In his written text, the son was also going to ask the judge to show no mercy for his stepmother, Colleen Harris, 73, the woman who had “murdered my dad in cold blood.”

But after stepping up to the court lectern, Andy Harris, a Grass Valley attorney, couldn’t compose himself to read. His voice stammered. He began to weep. He junked the script and just started talking.

Colleen Harris would show no emotion minutes later when the judge sent her to prison for 50 years to life.
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