Georgia Man Kills Girlfriend and Says Hed Do It Again
Woman who shot and killed fellow says she didn't know her gun had a bullet in the bedchamber
Mary Katherine Higdon of Griffin, Georgia, was arrested for the murder of her live-in boyfriend, Steven Freeman. Was the shooting an blow, or does the forensic bear witness suggest that she methodically planned to impale him? CBS News correspondent David Begnaud investigates for "48 Hours" in "The Case Confronting Mary Katherine Higdon."
Belatedly on the evening of August ane, 2018, the Griffin Police Department responded to a frantic 911 phone call from 24-year-erstwhile Mary Katherine Higdon. She told the acceleration operator that she had just shot her young man, by blow. During the telephone call, she stated that she didn't know the gun had a bullet in its chamber.
When first responders arrived at the couple'due south habitation, paramedics attended to Steven's life-threatening injuries, while police spoke with the distraught Higdon and secured the scene. Steven Freeman was rushed to the hospital, but the 23-year-erstwhile died just minutes earlier midnight.
At the cluttered scene, Higdon said the gun went off accidentally, as she was handing information technology to Freeman. But investigators noticed food strewn beyond the kitchen floor, which pb them to believe that there may have been an atmospherics before the shooting. Police began to suspect that this was more than than just an unfortunate accident.
Mary Katherine Higdon was escorted to police force headquarters to be interviewed.
At that place she told investigators a dissimilar story, saying the gun went off when she was tossing it to Freeman. The interview chop-chop turned into an interrogation, and investigators say Higdon of a sudden confessed to murder, admitting she shot Freeman in anger.
Believing they had an ironclad confession on tape detectives arrested Mary Katherine Higdon for the murder of Steven Freeman.
Simply at that place was a big problem. There was nothing but feedback on most of the recording. Prosecutors would have to try to make their case without it.
At her June 2022 trial, prosecution witness Thomas Skinner testified that Higdon sold guns at the aforementioned sporting appurtenances store where he also worked for a time. "I know she knows how to handle a gun very well," Steven'southward friend told the court. Thomas Skinner went on to say that Higdon was raised around guns and bragged about her knowledge of firearms to Freeman and his friends.
Mary Katherine Higdon took the stand in her ain defence force. She tearfully testified that Steven Freeman was the love of her life and that she never wanted to hurt him. Higdon was emphatic that the shooting was an accident and that she didn't know that the gun had a bullet in its chamber and was primed to burn.
The prosecution showed the jury ii exhibit photos that revealed close-upward details of the weapon used to shoot Freeman. A Griffin constabulary sergeant also testified that the gun looked wet when he examined it, and that in that location also appeared to exist cooking grease on the gun.
During her interview with CBS News correspondent David Begnaud, prosecutor Kate Lenhard summarized her case for how and why she believes Higdon killed Freeman. Lenhard told the jury that the human relationship betwixt Freeman and Higdon had been unraveling and that an enraged Mary Katherine shot Freeman when he finally came home afterward ignoring her texts all day, and then refused to eat the dinner she had cooked for him.
"She took the magazine out of the gun with the hands that had been preparing this food and was angry that he didn't want to swallow it. She put bullets in that mag. She put the magazine in the gun. She pulled the meridian of that gun back. She chambered a round into it, and she exerted five and 3 quarters pounds pressure on that trigger. And she pulled the trigger considering she was angry." Lenhard told "48 Hours" the grease on the within of the gun was evidence that the shooting of Steven Freeman was not an accident, but murder.
In an interview with Begnaud, Griffin police detective Adam Trammell used the same type of firearm Higdon used, a Glock 42, to bear witness how to load the magazine and so pull back the slide to chamber a bullet. Detective Trammel's on-camera sit-in illustrated investigators' theory of how that grease concluded upward on both the peak of the gun, and more importantly, on the magazine inside the weapon.
In his interview with "48 Hours," defense attorney Jorge Carabajal challenged the state'southward prove: "They took a squeamish close-up picture show of the gun. I didn't meet that level of grease or annihilation on that gun other than possibly -- what you would take on your fingers. …"
Just the trial would be about much more than grease on a gun. Higdon testified that although she didn't know the gun was chambered, she had held the gun up that dark because she was scared of Freeman. To the surprise of many in the courtroom, Higdon painted a picture of escalating abuse at the hands of Freeman. She read the jury multiple ugly, threatening text letters that Freeman sent to her a year prior to his death. Higdon also testified that Freeman striking her, and on two occasions, that he raped her.
The prosecution was non ownership it. In her cross-examination, Kate Lenhard confronted Higdon about never having complained about Steven's alleged abuse.
In the end, it was up to the jury to decide if the defendant was guilty of any of the charges confronting her. The verdict: not guilty.
Many in the court were stunned by the jury's determination to acquit Mary Katherine Higdon of all charges: malice murder, felony murder, aggravated assault and possession of a firearm during the commission of a felony.
"48 Hours" spoke to some of the jurors to find out exactly what happened while they deliberated backside closed doors. Hear what they accept to say on "The Case Against Mary Katherine Higdon" airing Saturday, July 24 at ix/8c on CBS and Paramount +.
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Source: https://www.cbsnews.com/news/mary-katherine-higdon-georgia-shooting-case/
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