By Mike Gangloff The Roanoke Times
Glenn William Solomon, who shot his wife during the region's largest snowstorm in years, then sat drinking near her body, was sentenced today to serve 24 years in prison. Solomon, 47, pleaded guilty in November to first-degree murder in an agreement that capped his active prison sentence at 31 years. Today Roanoke Circuit Court Judge William Broadhurst sentenced Solomon to 60 years behind bars, to be suspended after he serves 24 years.
Testimony at today's hearing indicated that Solomon and his wife, Heather Solomon, had long histories of heavy drinking, and that Heather Solomon would often chide her husband for having lost his job about a year and a half before her December 2009 death. She also sometimes hit her husband, he later told investigators. Broadhurst said none of this excused Glenn Solomon's actions. "A lot of people face these ordinary human circumstances" without resorting to deadly violence, the judge said. Physical evidence and Glenn Solomon's statements to investigators indicated that he and his wife spent the Friday night of her death drinking and watching television, and that Heather Solomon began to berate her husband, following him into his bedroom and hitting him in the face. Heather Solomon then went to her own bedroom, where her husband confronted her with a pistol and shot her eight times, including three times in the head.
Assistant Commonwealth's Attorney Alice Ekirch said that later, Glenn Solomon told a jail inmate that his wife died from "lead poisoning" because she "was mouthing off." After her death, Glenn Solomon remained in the couple's home in the 4200 block of Tennessee Avenue Northwest, drinking his wife's vodka. He planned to kill himself, public defender John Varney said, but first wanted to get money from the bank for his daughter-in-law. Before he could do that, the daughter-in-law, who lived with the Solomons, came home. Glenn Solomon showed her his wife's body and she called police.
No comments:
Post a Comment