Augusta kids
By CAROLYNN BRIGHT, IR Staff Writer - 08/28/02
No death penalty for killings.
As shocking as the crimes Augusta ranch wife Jeannette Swanson stands accused of committing may be, she won’t pay with her life if she’s convicted.
“The circumstances of the crime are still under investigation, but it does not appear at this time that the offense meets the requirements for the state to seek the death penalty,” said Deputy County Attorney Carolyn Clemens Tuesday.
Montana law defines numerous guidelines framing when the death penalty applies to murder cases, she said.
Those include whether an offender has been previously convicted of deliberate homicide, whether torture was involved in the crime and whether the offender was incarcerated when the offense was committed.
Clemens’ announcement comes a day after prosecutors filed two counts of deliberate homicide against the 46-year-old woman for shooting and killing her 10-year-old daughter and 14-year-old son as they slept in their beds in the family’s rural home.
Swanson’s other two sons — ages 16 and 20 — also were at home at the time, but were not harmed. Neither was Swanson’s husband, Gene, who was sleeping in the yard in a camp trailer at the time of the shootings.
Swanson was arrested Monday after calling 911 just before 6 a.m. to report that she had shot her two children.
When authorities arrived at the ranch house located about 15 miles southwest of Augusta, they found Swanson waiting for them at the door and the children in their bedrooms, already dead.
An autopsy conducted on the children’s bodies Monday night confirmed what authorities already knew — the youngsters died from gunshot wounds, according to Clemens.
However, further analysis will be conducted to determine whether the bullets and bullet fragments recovered from the bodies of the victims were fired by a weapon seized at the scene of the crime, she said.
Court documents filed in the case indicated that Swanson’s oldest son reported to authorities that his mother had a .38 Smith and Wesson gun in her possession when she placed the 911 call.
According to Undersheriff Cheryl Liedle, Swanson continues to be held at the Lewis and Clark County Jail under suicide watch.
At an initial appearance before Justice of the Peace Wally Jewell via a video link Monday, Jewell ordered that Swanson be held without bond pending further proceedings in her case.
Court officials indicate that Swanson has the right to ask for a hearing on the bond issue, but Public Defender Randi Hood said Tuesday that her client does not wish to make such a request at this time.
As Augusta area residents continued to ponder the motive for such a brutal crime within their community Tuesday, Clemens declined to offer any more theories as to what drove the woman to allegedly murder her children.
“She is presumed to be innocent, and we do not want to jeopardize the investigation or her right to a fair trial by speculating about the reasons for the crime,” she said.
On Monday, Sheriff Sam McCormack said Swanson and her husband argued recently about her decision to enroll their youngest children in school in Augusta after home schooling the children on the family ranch for several years.
The children attended the school, which serves students from kindergarten through grade 12, for three days last week.
Clemens said she had no information to confirm newspaper reports that Swanson had been prescribed sleeping pills and the anti-depressant Paxil by a Great Falls health care provider in recent weeks.
I would submit, that this angle reclassifies it, as well as the Yates murders, from Homeshooling, to the media blacked out anti-depressant category of assorted murders, school shootings and suicides.........