The prosecution is arguing that when Anna Pehota gunned down her husband John last September in their Hammock home, it was no accident and no crime of passion. It was murder, executed purposefully with a .22-caliber revolver that Pehota, 76, fired in rapid succession four times at her husband of 57 years. He hadn’t hurt her physically. “He pushed her buttons. He made her mad. That’s all it’s going to come back to,” the prosecutor told the jury in her opening argument in Pehota’s trial this morning.
“He was a husband, he was a father, he was a grandfather,” the prosecutor said of John Pehota. “This woman shot him, not once, not twice, not three times, but four times including once in the back, and when she talked to investigators she said, I’m not hurt, nobody touched me, he never hurt me. There was nothing physical, it was a mental thing, and when investigators sat down and explored that with her, they used the word mental abuse, they kind of thought that’s where she was going, and the defendant rejected that. No, he just pushed my button, he made her mad.”
Pehota faces a second-degree murder charge that could most likely result in a life sentence if she is found guilty, even if she were sentenced to less than 15 years in prison. Even if the jury goes with manslaughter, the sentence could make the lesser findings irrelevant. At her age, Pehota doesn’t have time to bargain with. She can only hope for acquittal.
That’s what her attorney, Ray Warren, is aiming for. After Monday’s jury selection, when several prospective jurors had to be excused because they sympathized with her, it’s not a hail Mary strategy: Pehota has none of the motives, demeanor, history, look or sound of an aggressive person, let alone a killer, as she appears publicly: frail, unassuming, a bit irascible at times but candid always, she projects the prototypical image of a grandmother wearied by the years and a not particularly easy life.
Warren is making it central to her defense, because the interview also served as a history of the Pehotas’ relationship. That history had become rife with conflict, caused according to Pehota’s interview by John’s anger, threats, ridicule, mental abuse, and bad health, and resulting in such fears on her part that on occasions she found herself hiding the households’ guns because she worried he’d use one against her. There’d been five 911 calls from her house before the afternoon of the shooting, but spread over a long period. He’d been sent to anger management. He had innumerable health problems, some of them grave. His wife took care of him and worried about his treatment. In one case he told her he could shoot her. In another he told her of a neighbor who had asked her husband to suffocate her, because she was ill with cancer. Anna wondered why her own husband was alluding to a spouse suffocating his wife.
Then there’s Pehota’s own confusion, the afternoon of the shooting and for the duration of the long interview with the detectives. She couldn’t keep much straight. She couldn’t remember basic details about her house, or the sequence of events, or what, even, she had shot her husband.
“At the end of this,” Warren told the jury, “the defense asserts, the defense is confident, that this is nowhere near what the state is telling you happened on that day.” Pehota had at times cried as she heard Warren enumerate over 14 minutes the 50 “points of contention” he wanted the jury to keep in mind. She would cry again when her 911 call was played.
There were no surprises. The witnesses built the prosecution’s technical case against Pehota: where John was found and how, the number of guns in the house (four total), where on his body John was shot—three times in the chest, in close proximity, once in the back), what Anna was drinking that afternoon (a glass of wine, chilled burgundy, as was her habit while preparing dinner), the anti-anxiety medication John had taken. There was no sign of a struggle, no sign of a fight, other than the shattered dish Pehota in her interview with detectives at times did, and at times did not remember smashing in anger before the shooting.
Dunton, the prosecutor, in her opening argument was painting the portrait of an angry woman who was in control of her capacities when she shot her husband. Christopher Ray, the deputy first on scene, described her as “combative” when she was initially taken into custody and handcuffed. But Warren cleverly turned the issue around when he asked the deputy whether in such situations, when cops are responding to a shooting and trying to ensure that the scene is secure so they wouldn’t run the risk of being shot at, they would not immediately “hustle” away those involved—as they did Pehota, possibly aggravating her. And wouldn’t a 75-year-old woman being so hustled have reason to protest or cuss, as she did? “I would believe so,” the cop said, making Warren’s point.
But Warren was also making the prosecution’s point: Pehota has buttons that can be pushed.
As Bulic, the medical examiner, testified, the fourth bullet—the one to the back–took on some significance, as it would suggest that John was trying to get away from Anna. “This is highly suggestive of a person being bent the opposite way from the shooter because the track of the projectile is steeply upward,” Bulic said to a question by the prosecutor.
After court reconvened, and before the jury was called back in, Circuit Judge Matthew Foxman asked Pehota how she was, and whether she needed anything. “I’m dumbfounded. It’s overwhelming,” she told the judge. She was thankful, she told him, that he was allowing her family members to stay in the courtroom throughout the proceedings.
Foxman did not let on about his sense of the proceedings, as he surprisingly did in a recent case that was clearly going terribly for the defendant after barely half a day. Foxman in that case told the defendant it was not going well, essentially urging him, without saying so, to speak with his attorney and perhaps seek a deal. The defendant did not, and was found guilty of the most severe charge.
In Pehota’s case, the day was wearing on as it had started: without too many indications of the trial’s direction. The jury—six women, two men, all white, all middle- to late-middle-age–has been attentive. Each side has made its case efficiently, if more forcefully on Warren’s part (his voice carries, and he uses it to tactical effect). Foxman told Pehota that she should think about whether she wants to testify or not. But he did not venture further than what he told her just after a mid-morning break: “Wish there was a way out of this ma’am. Wish there was a way to get out of this.”
Warren, her attorney, smiled most of the time during breaks, projecting an almost giddy confidence. He may have had reason to: nothing happened today to shake an aura of sympathy–even empathy–around Pehota.
The last witness of the day was Gabe Fuentes, the Flagler County Sheriff’s detective who led the Pehota interview the evening of the shooting. His testimony was to include a replaying of the entire video interview, a nearly four-hour ordeal—for Pehota then, for jurors starting this afternoon—that would inevitably be halted at 5 p.m., to be resumed Thursday morning.
It’s a startling interview, as much for the compassion with which it was conducted as for the statements Pehota made, and often remade: “You can’t take a picture of mental abuse,” she tells a detective talking pictures of her. “And there is a hair between sanity and insanity.” “I have no idea why, he has a way of pushing me mentally.” “It wasn’t even a thought. It was just like one, two, three, done.” “I think more than life, I need to talk to my doctor or a doctor. I don’t think I need to talk to a detective. I need to talk to a doctor because a doctor might understand what’s going on in my mind.” “This medication has been messing him up.” “It’s not a good life to be–I mean, when you try and you try and you try to help somebody all of a sudden you just keep getting–.” “There’s a hair between sanity and insanity.” “I know what I did was wrong. No lawyer can change anything that I did.” “Different things have been happening along the line, but I thought we could keep it under control.”
“My husband kept telling me I was the crazy one. Maybe I am.”
And on it goes for three hours, played on video monitors without interruption. The jury watched, as hypnotized by Pehota’s words as everyone else in the courtroom. It was not to stop until 5 p.m., when Foxman said he would send the jury home until 9 a.m. Thursday. Pehota’s video interview will resume then.
dave says
Disgusting, lock her up! Murderer! She is not insane, she is a cold blooded killer, old white woman gets no pass. Justice knows no age or race. Even physical abuse doesn’t constitute murder and definitely not verbal abuse. If she didn’t like her situation leave. It’s that simple.
Emily says
She should have poisoned the bastard !!!!
YankeeExPat says
Dave You are righter than rain. Where is the Justice for Mr. John Pehota?
Recommission Old Sparky or put this murderer away for life with NO chance of Parole.
TBG says
In the movie, “As good as it gets”, Jack Nicholson, who plays a writer, is just leaving the publisher. The young female receptionist asks Nicholson a question.
“How do you write women so well?”
Nicholson:
“I think of a man and I take away reason and accountability.”
Word.
Sherry says
WOW! Take a look at the first two comments here. . . talk about the difference of perspectives. . . female vs male??? This could end up being a very, very difficult decision for the jury.
Anonymous says
It’s sometimes not a possibility to leave. She was abused and should never had to be subject to live in hell. There’s no telling how long this woman had to live in horror with this monster. There is never an excuse for a man to abuse a woman, physically, mentally, or verbally. Chances are there were people who knew what this man put this woman through and did nothing to help and she felt helpless.
Born and Raised Here says
If it was that bad, she should had left a long time of go. Why live under those conditions, and torture yourself.
tulip says
I agree with anonymous. You people who are condemning her and no nothing about her life so are makeing up your own suppositions. People need to step back and try to get an understanding of Mrs. Pehota and what her husband must have put her through. She, too is older and has had to be the caregiver of her husband who probably harassed her 24/7. He was in bad health and probably didn’t realize how bad he was. Imagine being constantly humiliated, being the victim of someone’s rage, and trying to cope all by yourself with the problem when you have your own health issues and feel all alone with no one to help. There is the final point where a person just can’t take it anymore. Just think, some of you might be in that type of situation some day yourselves and you will have no one. There are many seniors who have lost their friends through death or they moved back to where they came from and are now alone. There are no senior places where they can meet other people to socialize with, neighbors could care less because they are tied up with their own lifestyle. Have a little compassion folks, cause someday you will be older and possibly alone and needing assistance physically or mentally.
I’m not saying Mrs. Pehota had the right to kill her husband and just walk away scott free., being older, she is declining and needs care herself medical and emotional help.
I don’t think jail is the answer, I think if she is found guilty that perhaps some kind of hospitalization or nursing home confinement is a better answer. I doubt very much she is a cold blooded killer or planned to kill him–it was a horrible split second decision.
Prescient33 says
Every sentient human being has a breaking point, i.e, that time when they lose control, and react violently. In some cases it can take years of aggravation by someone, in others it can be measured in milliseconds, as seems to be the case in road rage situations. What is unfolding in the courtroom is a tragedy of epic proportions, the violent end to a 57 plus year relationship. We may never know what led to this tragedy; perhaps the trial may enlighten us, but I doubt it. What is known is this is not an ordinary case, and one in which all but the principals involved (the judge, the lawyers, the defendant, the jury, the witnesses, etc.) should withhold judgment for the simple reason that they do not know enough to exercise it.
Pray for all involved, and that we are spared from being placed in a comparable position to the principals.
dave says
Sorry Tulip but I’m seeing alot of probably coming from you which means you have no idea either, it clearly said he never physical abused her, so yea she could just leave and no she did not have to be his care giver if she didn’t want to, just get a divorce. Not murder someone. Wow people are really sick these days. Kill happy society
Freddy says
Tulip says:
“I don’t think jail is the answer, I think if she is found guilty that perhaps some kind of hospitalization or nursing home confinement is a better answer. I doubt very much she is a cold blooded killer or planned to kill him–it was a horrible split second decision.”
I say “Not on my taxpayer money when there are a lot of empty cells in the new jail.”
tulip says
To DAVE Verbal abuse can be just as, if not more demoralizing and hurtful than physical abuse.
A lot of school children are verbally abused by bullies and look what happens to them.
In her own way, she probably still loved him, that’s why the verbal abuse hurt her so badly mentally. It was mentioned that she could leave. Where does a woman in her 70’s go, unless there is plenty of money, or her children take her in. A younger woman can leave, work and make a new life. An older person has a harder time doing that.
Sherry says
I should not continue to be amazed when men say things like “just leave” to a woman. Women the age of this one cannot just go out there and find a way to support herself. Her generation was raised to find a good man, have a family, clean house and cook.
It very well could be that she never worked outside the home and she lived all those years totally dependent on her husband, both financially and psychologically. She may not even know how their finances were arranged. Women often stay in abusive relationships and situations simply because they have never known any other way of life, and they are too afraid to explore other options. Certainly the state of Florida is not generous in offering assistance to the elderly!
So guys. . . cut it with the “just leave” comments. . . you have no idea of a woman’s life and struggles!
Deborah says
I feel so sorry for this women who indured years of mental abuse by her monster of a husband. I watched my mother go through this. It is almost impossible to leave the relationship due to the Battered Wife Sydrome. Under these circumstances I consider the wife the victim. Mrs. P has served her time in the prison of her own home. Her case, I believe, was self defense. You can’t take pictures of verbal and emotional abuse, but they sure do exist. She needs to be acquitted and if she does have dementia should be placed in a treatment center.
dave says
There are many options, there are woman’s homes, halfway houses and more, help is there if you want it. Murder is not the answer. Murder is worse than abuse. Her age does not give her a pass for murder. And her sex does not provide an excuse, male or female you need to find your way out, not murder in cold blood.
A.S.F. says
Has anyone (ie the defense) even thought about ordering a Brain Scan (MRI) for this woman? She sounds like she might be suffering from Dementia. The signs can be subtle in the beginning, more behavioral than otherwise functional. Add that on top of the constant anxiety, heightened “fight or flight” and depression caused by long-term abuse, and that might have created a “pressure cooker” situation destined to explode.
michael murphy says
Some time ago in Boston there was 7 Women known as the “Framingham 7” they were 7 Minority Women that Killed their Husbands over Abuse, 1- Shot him while he slept, another beat hers on the head while he Slept and so on, the Doctors created whats called Batter Wife Syndrome and these 7 Women walked away with little to no Jail Time.Maybe her Lawyer should check into this Defence.
DaveT says
Hey dave, I guess you never experienced verbal or physical abuse for decades, well this woman did and she got out of it. True murder is not the answer but in todays world, our police really have their hands tied on spousal abuse, in most cases it never is handled and the end story is death to the abuser or to the person doing the abusing. they will find her a nice home where she can get her care for the rest of her life.
Ariana says
The way she is portrayed in this article, she sounds like the beginning stages of dementia–the repeating of certain phrases over and over, periods of seeming to be oriented mixed with periods of being confused, remembering events with clarity and then not remembering them, stating her husband mentally abused her and threatened her, only to say he never hurt her… Having dementia doesn’t give you free license to do whatever n then get away with it… But I don’t think she was in her right mind when she shot him–she needs to be in an institution, not a jail facility. And if this is Alzheimer’s setting in, there are going to be more medical issues to come–a jail is simply not equipped to handle those issues : diapering inmates? Feeding them? Pushing them in wheelchairs when they “forget” how to walk? CO’s don’t have the training, n they certainly don’t have the manpower for that. Just sayin–taking a CO’s attention away to focus it on just one inmate like her, u put that CO’s safety at risk…