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PASCAGOULA — Murder suspect Jennifer Benton picked up a .9-mm handgun used to kill her husband the same day she’s accused of shooting him to death in May 2005, a Lucedale pawn shop employee said Wednesday.
Curtis Hyatt said Benton had pawned the gun for $35 on Jan. 26, 2005, and returned to his Lucedale store on May 12, 2005, to get the gun back and buy 50 rounds of ammunition.
Benton, 43, is on trial for murder this week before Senior Circuit Court Judge Kathy King Jackson. She’s accused of fatally wounding her husband, James Benton, 47, while the two were riding along Mcphelia Street in Moss Point in their white Chrysler New Yorker.
James Benton’s body was found in the front seat of the couple’s vehicle at Lucedale City Park. A forensic pathologist said James Benton died of a single shot to the head at close range.
In testimony early Wednesday morning, witnesses recalled seeing the couple’s car swerving on McPhelia Street the day of the killing with two people inside. Earlier witnesses had identified those inside the vehicle as the suspect and murder victim.
Benton told police in taped interviews that she had been the victim of her husband’s alleged physical abuse for 21 years, during which she said he’d beat her, put a pillow over her head and poured hot grease over her shoes.
On the day of the shooting, she said that she and her husband got into a fight after he saw a man ask her for directions outside a Pascagoula convenience store. She said her husband pulled the murder weapon, the .9-mm handgun out of the glove compartment, and a shot fired, the first of which she said she thought hit her because her ear was ringing.
She said the two were tussling over the gun when it went off the second time near the Wal-Mart entrance in Lucedale, something that prosecuting attorneys Tanya Hasbrouck and Bobby Knochel questioned with witness testimony that indicated otherwise.
Defense attorneys George Shaddock and Calvin Taylor allege that their client didn’t intentionally shoot her husband, saying instead she was acting in self-defense when she tussled with her husband over the gun and it went off, killing James Benton.
Two of the victim’s sisters testified Wednesday afternoon, telling jurors that they never knew their brother to be a “violent” man.
In addition, they said they never saw any bruises or scratches on their sister-in-law to indicate any type of abuse.
The sisters also confirmed Jennifer Benton’s handwriting in a letter she allegedly sent to James Benton’s family claiming that she planned to kill her husband and herself. A forensic document examiner said he was unable to make a conclusive ruling about whether Jennifer Benton had in fact written that letter.
After prosecutors rested their case, the defense put on several witnesses, including Jennifer Benton’s daughter, Candace Benton, and Benton’s sister, Sharlau Blackston, both of whom testified to seeing James Benton’s alleged abusive behavior firsthand.
Closing arguments begin this morning.
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