Shootings Suspect Claimed Stress : Slayings: In her divorce papers, Kristine Marie Cushing, who is accused of killing her two young daughters, told of constant arguments with her husband and a debilitating heart ailment.

A Laguna Niguel woman accused of fatally shooting her two young daughters claimed in divorce papers that she was under “extreme mental stress” because of constant arguments with her husband and an ongoing heart ailment that caused her to be hospitalized twice last year.

In court documents in which she asked for exclusive use of the family’s Laguna Niguel home, Kristine Marie Cushing alleged that her husband “frequently yells at me and calls me names. He provokes arguments constantly.”

“I experience extreme tension and emotional stress whenever we are together,” she said.

Cushing’s husband, Marine Lt. Col. John P. Cushing, has declined to discuss the deaths of his children and the attempted suicide of his wife. Police said that Kristine Cushing had called 911 Sunday night to report that she had just shot her children and had tried to take her own life but failed. Only minutes earlier, police said she had called her sister in Boston and told her that she had planned a murder-suicide.

John Cushing could not be reached to comment on the divorce allegations, and neighbors said he left the house carrying suitcases with two other people Tuesday afternoon.

Kristine Cushing, 39, was scheduled to be arraigned in Municipal Court in Laguna Niguel today on charges that she fatally shot her two children--Amy Elizabeth, 8, and Stephanie Marie, 4--in their Niguel Summit home late Sunday night. Her attorney, Michael J. Cassidy of Santa Ana, described her as being “very sad, very depressed and very distraught.”

Police say Cushing shot her daughters in the head in the upstairs master bedroom with a handgun late Sunday night and then turned the gun on herself. But her wound was not fatal. She suffered only a graze wound to the head, and later called 911 to report what she had done, authorities said.

Her husband learned of his daughters’ deaths when he returned home from a fishing trip Monday morning. Lt. Col. Cushing, 38, is a decorated Gulf War veteran and the leader of Marine Fighter Attack Squadron 314, an El Toro-based fighter jet unit nicknamed the “Black Knights.”

Friends have depicted Kristine Cushing as a devoted mother who did not appear to be overly traumatized by her pending divorce.

But court documents appeared to show a woman under great stress because of a heart condition and the breakup of her 17-year marriage. According to the divorce papers, the couple separated Aug. 9 but continued to share the same Laguna Niguel home.

“We have tried staying in different parts of the home, but this is not working at all,” Kristine Cushing said in the papers, which were filed Sept. 18 in Orange County Superior Court. “. . . I do not believe it is good for the children to witness the arguments.”

A Nov. 14 hearing had been set in which Kristine Cushing was to ask the court not only to grant her exclusive use of the home, but also to restrain her husband from coming near her residence or the children’s school.

In addition, she cited her heart condition--reportedly brought on by a virus--and daughter Amy’s asthma and dental work as reasons why she and her children should remain covered under her husband’s health insurance policy. She claimed she already had paid $1,700 for orthodontia work for 8-year-old Amy and that her husband refused to contribute toward the expense.

The heart ailment, according to the court documents, led to Kristine Cushing’s hospitalization in June and November of last year.

At least two family friends said that John Cushing rushed home from the Gulf when his wife’s condition worsened.

“I suffer from a virus that attacked my heart, and I am under a cardiologist’s care after two hospital stays,” Kristine Cushing said. “I am still under that doctor’s care from that illness. It is causing me extreme mental stress, to have my husband in the same residence with me.”

Further details about the heart ailment weren’t specified, and the attorney representing Kristine Cushing in the divorce, Lisa Staight of Irvine, declined to discuss the case.

The couple married Dec. 28, 1974, and Kristine Cushing said she had not worked outside the home since August, 1982, several months before the birth of their first child. She had requested physical custody of both children along with an unspecified child support.

In the divorce papers, Kristine Cushing had agreed that “reasonable visitation” rights should be granted to her husband under a joint custody agreement.

The Cushing family home had been recently put up for sale. Friends said that Kristine Cushing planned to move into a condominium in the area so that her children could remain in the same schools.

Despite the tragedy, friends and neighbors of Kristine Cushing came to her defense Tuesday, noting that there were no signs--at least openly--that she was unstable or that she was traumatized by the divorce proceedings.

Many of her friends, who would speak only on the condition of anonymity, described her as a “very private person” but said she was surprisingly open about her pending divorce.

“I said, ‘Kristine, I’m so sorry,’ ” said one friend. “But (Cushing) said, ‘Don’t be. This has been coming a long time.’ ”

Other acquaintances described her as a typical military spouse who shouldered most of the burdens of parenthood while her husband was away on military missions as a Marine pilot. She was a volunteer in Amy’s third-grade class at Moulton Elementary School, a Brownie troop leader and a team mother with youth soccer.

“You name it, and she was doing it for those girls,” said one woman who worked with the same Brownie troop. “She was a caring, loving mother.”

“We have no reason to believe she was anything other than she was a caring mother and an involved leader,” added Patricia Griggs, principal of Moulton Elementary School, where Amy was enrolled in a program for gifted students.

On Tuesday, residents of the quiet Niguel Summit community remained stunned by the shooting.

Some residents said Cushing would greet new neighbors with trays of cookies and friendly words of welcome. Cushing was “the only one who came over when we arrived,” said Julie Manion, the Cushing’s next-door neighbor who moved in last June.

Times staff writers Matt Lait and Leslie Berkman contributed to this story.