NEWBURY PARK : Wife Faces Trial in Car-Ramming Case

A Newbury Park woman was ordered Friday to stand trial on an attempted murder charge even though her husband testified that she could not have seen him underneath a jacked-up car when she rammed it with her vehicle.

Municipal Court Judge Vincent J. O’Neill Jr. said much of the evidence presented at Marcia Burns’ preliminary hearing was subject to two interpretations. But he was unable to “come up with a view of the incident that does not give me a reasonable suspicion that we have an attempted murder.”

A trial date for Burns, 44, will be set Nov. 4. She remains in jail with bail set at $50,000.

Jimmy Lee Burns, 41, testified that he does not want his wife prosecuted for the Sept. 23 incident, which occurred while he was repairing a car at his auto shop in Newbury Park. He suffered minor injuries to his shoulder and chest when the car fell on him.

Detectives testified that witnesses heard Marcia Burns yell, “I hope you die,” before and after the incident.

Jimmy Burns admitted he and the defendant had decided to separate, and had fought for months over which one would move out of their apartment. But in recounting the events before the car incident, he claimed not to remember much of the information he earlier had given to police.

O’Neill said Burns’ lack of recall was unconvincing.

Assistant Public Defender Jean L. Farley said there is no evidence Marcia Burns intended to hurt her husband. But Deputy Dist. Atty. Tom Connors said no evidence was presented to show she had not rammed the car on purpose.