Wife Accused in Slaying Used 2nd Gun, Police Say

A prosecutor said Friday that a Tarzana woman who claimed to have mistaken her husband for a burglar before shooting and killing him attempted to “finish him off” with a second gun.

Carole Evelyn Mellinger was charged Friday in the death of her millionaire husband in the couple’s exclusive hillside home.

James A. Baker, assistant head deputy in the Van Nuys branch of the district attorney’s office, said Carole Mellinger allegedly shot her husband, Brainerd Lee Mellinger, four times with a handgun in the den of their home and then apparently attempted to use a shotgun to “finish him off.”

Three unfired shotgun rounds were found near Mellinger’s body, and a shotgun was found nearby with one round in the chamber, Baker said.

“She probably tried to finish him off with a shotgun but did not know you had to take the safety off,” Baker theorized.

Another shot was fired into the ceiling of the home in the 19700 block of Komar Drive, Baker said.

Carole Mellinger then called a relative who called police, Baker said. Her husband was dead by the time police arrived.

“Physical evidence at the scene” and “inconsistencies in her statements” prompted detectives to arrest her, said Los Angeles Police Detective Rick Swanston.

Both guns were recovered at the home and there was no sign of forced entry, he said.

Mellinger, 48, pleaded not guilty to the charges Friday in Van Nuys Municipal Court. Her preliminary hearing was set for Feb. 6. She was being held without bail.

Although there was no immediate motive for the murder, police said Carole Mellinger had been drinking before the shooting and the couple, married for 23 years, apparently had marital problems.

Her husband, owner of a Woodland Hills import-export firm, had appeared in several cable TV commercials for establishing a similar business.