Sunday, July 4, 2010

Montgomery, AL: Domestic violence victim's family recalls struggle that led up to shooting

By Scott Johnson
sjohnson3@gannett.com

To her sister, she was Patty. To Brandon and Stephanie, she was Mom.

Patricia Lynn Hester, 42, was laid to rest Friday afternoon, the latest victim in a wave of deadly domestic violence.

Patricia had been trying to separate herself from her estranged husband, William Larry Hester, since March or April, her family said. The two married in December, about a month after they started dating, according to her relatives.

She had been married several times, and it was not the first time she had married a man shortly after meeting him, they said.

"Patty was like a lot of people. She just wanted somebody to love her, somebody to care for her," said Mike Gunn, her brother-in-law.

Hester, 61, was no stranger to violence. He was convicted of killing his second wife, Patricia Nelson, in 1987.

Family members of both victims said he also shot and wounded his first wife in Troy in the mid-1970s. The charge was thrown out, and he was never convicted, they said. The Troy Police Department was unable to find a record of the arrest, which predates digital files.

On Monday, Hester met Patricia outside her house with a shotgun, police and family members said. She recently had changed the locks on her house and filed for divorce.

"I wouldn't be surprised if the day that he killed her was the day he got the divorce papers," said her 18-year-old son, Brandon Cogan.

Hester shot his estranged wife in the side, police said. Officers confronted him a few blocks away near Pennsylvania and Madison avenues.

Hester stepped out of his blue Jeep SUV wielding the shotgun, police said, and he ended up at Jackson Hospital in critical condition after being shot by police. His condition had improved to stable by the end of the week, police said.

Because Hester remains hospitalized and is not formally in police custody, a police spokesman said he did not know whether Hester is represented by an attorney at this point.

Patricia's sister, Donna Gunn, and Cogan were at the same hospital Monday when a nurse, doctor and chaplain pulled them aside to tell them that Patricia did not make it.

Approaching storm

Patricia and Larry Hester started dating in October or November of 2009 after chatting on the Internet, Cogan said. Hester was living in Wetumpka with his mother at the time, he added.

He told Patricia shortly after they met about killing his second wife, Cogan said, claiming it was because he had caught her cheating.

Her daughter, Stephanie Hanvey, 22, said she didn't like Hester from the beginning and told her mother not to marry him. But Patricia was determined to stay with him.

"She said he made her happy," Hanvey said.

Other family members initially were not as wary of Hester.

"He seemed like a nice guy when they came over for Thanksgiving," Mike Gunn said. "He put up a good front."

It was not too long, though, before other family members began telling Patricia the same thing as Hanvey, that she should not marry Hester.

But she had been told many times before that the man she was with was not right for her, and she refused to leave him. She had built up a resistance to criticisms about her partner, Cogan said.

Patricia and Hester were married Dec. 23, 2009, and the relationship soured fast, Cogan said.

"My mom said he was wonderful until he got married," he said.

Cogan lived with the two of them at Patricia's house, and he said he soon saw that Hester drank heavily and often acted irrationally.

Cogan said Hester tried to stab him once with a 3- or 4-inch blade, but Cogan only ended up with minor cuts on his finger. The incident is recorded in court documents.

Most of the time, Cogan said, Hester would not confront him physically. "He never did half the stuff (to me that) he did to her," he said.

Sometimes, Cogan had to come to his mother's defense, Donna Gunn said.

"Brandon pulled him off of her more than one time," she said.

Hester also was verbally abusive, family members said.

"When she came in from work, he would always accuse her of cheating on him," Donna Gunn said.

Hanvey said Hester also would get suspicious when her mother would visit her.

"She would come visit me, but she wouldn't stay long because she knew she would be questioned when she got back," Hanvey said.

There were stretches when the two of them would argue every day, Cogan said.

"They would fight so often, I would just shut the door and try to tune out the argument," he said.

The situation escalated in late February or early March, when Hester bought a shotgun, Cogan said.

"Once she knew he had a shotgun, it got more real for her," Hanvey said.

Separation

Patricia started to separate herself from Hester as she became more concerned about what he might do. She would ask him to leave, but he wouldn't go peacefully, Cogan said.

Then one day Hester allegedly pointed the shotgun at her and threatened to shoot her. Hester was arrested, according to court documents, and Patricia was free from him -- at least for a while.

"That was the only way she could get him out of the house, basically, was to have him arrested," Cogan said.

When he was released from jail, though, Patricia invited him back. "She wanted to make things work," Cogan said.

Donna Gunn said her sister also needed help with the rent. Either way, the reunion did not last long. "After a month or so, she realized he wasn't going to change," Cogan said.

After continually fighting with Hester and trying to convince him to leave, Patricia finally decided to change the locks. She had told him to leave many times, which would lead to a fight, Cogan said.

"He would just shout at the top of his lungs, 'Make me leave,'" Cogan said. "So she made him leave."

Patricia filed for a restraining order against Hester and also filed for divorce. Those things did not put her mind at ease. She knew that her husband would be angry and frustrated.

"She was very paranoid. She couldn't sit still. Every noise she heard, she thought it was him," Hanvey said.

She even warned other people, including neighbors, about her husband. "She told everybody in case anything happened that he had threatened to kill her," Donna Gunn said.

Patricia had received counseling recently, but she declined to go to a shelter for battered women, Gunn said.

"She said that she would have a better chance on her own," Hanvey said.

After awhile, though, she could see how dangerous the situation had become.

"She knew something was going to happen," Hanvey said.

Catastrophe

Cogan was lying in bed Monday morning when he awoke to the sound of his mother locking the front door on her way to work at Advance Auto Parts. The next thing he heard was a loud bang, but it didn't register in Cogan's mind that the noise he had heard was a gunshot.

Then someone started knocking and trying to open the door. Cogan said he thought maybe his mother was trying to get back inside the house. He said that he looked through the curtains on the door, and it was not his mother he saw but Hester, who began screaming at Cogan to let him in the house.

"I could tell that he was drunk because he had those red circles around his eyes," Cogan said. "He was drunk so (often), I could tell when he was drunk."

Cogan ran to his room, where he called 911. Neighbors apparently had called as well, and it wasn't long before police were on the scene.

First, though, one neighbor intervened in the situation, Cogan said. The neighbor stepped out onto his porch with a gun. Hester turned and shot at him, and the neighbor shot back, Cogan said. That drove Hester off, he said.

"I'm pretty much convinced that neighbor saved my life," Cogan said.

Hester drove off, and it wasn't long before he was exchanging gunfire with police officers.

Other officers led Cogan out of his house in handcuffs, a precaution Cogan said he understood.

He said it did not even occur to him at the time that his mother might not survive.

"Mom had been fighting for so long, I thought she was just going to fight through it," Cogan said.

Aftermath

Patricia had been in abusive relationships before, her relatives said.

She had sought help from an area family assistance agency once before, in 2002 or 2003, Cogan said. In most of her other relationships, however, there had been more emotional than physical abuse, Cogan said.

Patricia had gotten caught up in a "circle of violence" with her relationships, Donna Gunn said. "She marries these guys as soon as they are ready to get married," she said.

She had never dealt with the kind of situation she was in with her most recent marriage, however.

Her family members agreed that there needs to be more help for domestic violence victims. "(Domestic violence) happens so much that people don't take it seriously," Hanvey said.

The One Place Family Justice Center will be a new resource for women in abusive relationships. The center will have all the resources a victim needs under one roof, said Steve Searcy, the center's director.

The optimistic opening date for the center is October, Searcy said.

Donna Gunn said that it is difficult for domestic violence victims to know what to do when they find themselves trapped in an abusive relationship.

Gunn became emotional as she talked about the dilemmas victims often face.

"(Domestic violence victims) are embarrassed, like Patty was embarrassed, because she had been married so many times, and she just wanted somebody to love her, and she just wanted it to work out," Gunn said.

"And that is what (victims) are feeling. They are scared, but they want their family to work, so they stay, and they think it will get better, but it doesn't. It just keeps getting worse."

Gunn said victims should turn to family and friends for help before trying to handle things on their own.

Whether it is through a shelter or other means, the victim needs to find a safe place away from the abuser, she said.

"There are worse things than being alone," she said.

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