By Jennifer Emily
Dallas Morning News
DALLAS — A Dallas County jury did not buy the claims of a woman who said she thought she was shooting at robbers when she shot a Dallas SWAT team lieutenant.
The jury on Tuesday found Marisela Villa guilty of aggravated assault of a peace officer and two counts of drug possession with the intent to deliver. Jurors deliberated for a little over two hours.
Villa, now 21, shot Carlton Marshall in the neck during an Oct. 17, 2007, raid as Dallas police helped federal authorities serve a warrant at the home of Villa’s boyfriend, a drug dealer now serving 20 years in a federal prison.
Marshall, who uses a motorized wheelchair,
Woman guilty in shooting of SWAT officer
held hands with his wife, Susan Marshall, an Irving police detective, as State District Judge Tracy Holmes read the jury’s verdicts.
Villa’s reaction to the jury’s decision was not visible because her face was hidden by her wavy, waist-length hair.
Marshall contracted meningitis after he was shot and then suffered a stroke. The high dosage of antibiotics used to treat the meningitis caused deafness. He now has cochlear implants to hear.
Susan Marshall later testified during the punishment phase of the trial, saying that she has no explanation for her husband’s survival after being grievously wounded.
“The grace of God is the only explanation I can think of,” she said, telling jurors that at one point as he was in the hospital, “I didn’t think he was going to make it.”
She recalled the day he began the road to recovery. Susan Marshall was pulling medical tape off his skin. He yelled, “Stop it.” Before that, he had been unresponsive. She said that since then, it has been “a slow progression to what we have now.”
The couple will celebrate their 10th wedding anniversary this month.
‘Boots back on’
Life since Carlton Marshall was shot has been hard on the family. There has been a change in the couple’s partnership, in their household and how they care for their children, Susan Marshall said.
“When bad things happen, you just put your boots back on and keep going,” Susan Marshall said.
Carlton Marshall sat in the courtroom as his wife testified tearfully. Most of the time, he looked down at his lap without showing much expression.
But he smiled frequently as she talked about their children, now ages 3 and 5, and about how he reads to the kids and is teaching their oldest to play T-ball. She told jurors that the children don’t understand why he can’t play with them like other fathers.
Susan Marshall told the jury that their oldest child now dresses in SWAT clothes and talks about how he wants to “put the bad guys in jail.”
‘Open season’
Earlier, prosecutors Andrea Handley, Justin Lord and Stephanie Fargo told jurors that Villa was a partner in her boyfriend’s drug dealing and she knew it was the police – not robbers – breaking the windows and storming into the house on the day of the shooting.
“If you find her not guilty, then you might as well declare May 4, 2010, open season on police officers,” Handley told jurors in closing arguments.
Defense attorneys Paul Johnson and Chris Knox told jurors that the evidence showed Villa did not know Marshall was a police officer. Villa told jurors she did not have her glasses on the night she shot Marshall, and never heard the SWAT team shout “police” as they entered the house.
They also urged the jury to find Villa guilty of lesser crimes on the drug charges.
“She believed she was under attack, and she reacted in a matter of seconds in the only way she knew how,” Johnson said during closing arguments. “My client is not just not guilty – my client is innocent.”
The same jurors who found her guilty will hear more testimony today before determining how much time she will serve in prison.
Copyright 2010 Dallas Morning News