Shooting of Husband Was Manslaughter, Jury Says
Van Nuys Superior Court jurors tried for four days to decide whether Carole Evelyn Mellinger plotted to kill her millionaire husband or shot him accidentally. Monday, they agreed that she had done neither and convicted Mellinger of voluntary manslaughter.
Mellinger, 48, testified during the trial that she thought her 69-year-old husband, Brainerd, was a burglar when she shot him four times in the den of their hillside Tarzana house as he came home in the evening. Prosecutors contended that she killed him for financial reasons and because he was having an affair.
Under the law, voluntary manslaughter means that Mellinger had not planned to kill her husband but had acted in the heat of passion. She faces a maximum sentence of 13 years in prison.
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