FORT COLLINS — Jurors will return Monday to continue deliberations in the first-degree murder trial of Shawna Nelson, who was portrayed by prosecutors as an obsessed woman who killed Heather Garraus to get the one thing she wanted — Garraus’ husband.
Jurors got the case early this afternoon.
“In her last second on Earth, Heather Garraus knew the defendant was her murderer,” said Larimer County assistant district attorney Cliff Riedel. “She was the messenger of death. …”
Nelson is accused of shooting Garraus execution-style on Jan. 23, 2007, outside the Greeley credit union where Garraus was a branch manager. Nelson had a three-year affair with Garraus’ husband — Greeley Police Officer Ignacio Garraus — which produced a child.
But Nelson apparently grew enraged when Ignacio Garraus refused to claim the boy. Nelson was already married to Ken Nelson, a Weld County sheriff’s deputy.
“This case is about greed, and Heather Garraus had something the defendant wanted,” Riedel said. “And that something she wanted was Ignacio Garraus.”
Nelson plotted with her best friend and female lover, former Weld sheriff’s deputy Michelle Moore, to kill Garraus, Riedel said.
Nelson testified earlier this week that Moore lied about the conspiracy because she was angry that Nelson wanted to end their sexual relationship.
Riedel scoffed that Moore would implicate herself only because she was jilted by Nelson. “The defendant,” Riedel said, “must be the greatest lesbian lover to walk the Earth.”
Defense attorney Kevin Strobel argued there was no solid physical evidence that linked Nelson to the crime. He also said that Nelson and Ignacio Garraus had a long-term relationship with its ups and downs, which never led to murder.
Nelson also had grown tired of the “drama” in her relationship with Garraus and wanted to move on with her life, which included raising their son, Strobel said.
“Did she try and destroy their marriage? No,” Strobel said.
“This just doesn’t make sense. There was nothing like this in the history of their relationship,” he added.
Greeley police also didn’t do any investigation into other possible killers, he said. “They decided within four minutes that Shawna Nelson did it.”
The jury will resume deliberations at 8 a.m. Monday.
