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strange if he’d wanted her to survive her wound.
Furthermore, when he was first questioned, Gaston said that Alicia was halfway up the stairs when he’d pulled the trigger – making her close to him. But then he changed his account and said that she’d only climbed a couple of stairs at the bottom so was further away. That would make a big difference in his ability to make out who he was looking at.
Gaston said he hadn’t been wearing his glasses, which didn’t help his vision when he fired his 12-gauge shotgun, but he wasn’t required to wear glasses while driving so should have been able to see his wife clearly.
BEFORE THE SHOTS
The biggest issue investigators had was Gaston’s movements before he fired the gun. When he’d heard noises downstairs, why hadn’t he looked in the bed next to him and seen his wife wasn’t there? The bedroom was well lit, and it would have been an obvious first move to make. It wasn’t unusual for Alicia to wake early and get ready for the day before the kids awoke, so there was always a chance that any movement downstairs could have been his wife. When gently questioned, Alicia’s two oldest children told police they had heard their parents arguing before the shooting. They said they had listened to them
The Gaston family home in Maine fighting before. A week after Alicia’s death, Gaston was charged with both manslaughter and murder. It would be left to a jury to decide whether Gaston had intentionally killed his wife, or whether he had acted recklessly, leading to her death. Gaston pleaded not guilty to both charges and insisted it had been a terrible accident.
COURT CASE
In February last year, Gaston faced a court, but it was quickly declared a mistrial after just one day because a medical examiner who was scheduled to testify said he needed to change a phrase in his report. A new trial was started in November.
With a new jury, the case was brought to life with a full-size replica of the top five steps of the Gastons’ staircase so jury members could climb it to give them an impression of what happened that fateful morning. As the jury listened to the
911 call and the counting of
CPR, Gaston, who was wearing his wedding ring, started to cry.
The prosecution said Gaston wanted his wife to die and it was ‘practically certain’ that she would die from a shotgun blast at close range. ‘He saw in the illuminated bedroom that she wasn’t in the bed,’ they said. ‘He didn’t hear walkie-talkies or multiple intruders. He saw her as she entered the stairway, and he saw her when she was no more than 18 inches from the muzzle of his shotgun. This was a killing without justification.’
They didn’t offer a motive as to why Gaston wanted his wife dead, although Alicia’s sister testified about their money worries and how Alicia had suggested a divorce.
Gaston’s defence said his client had been ‘defending his family’ from an assumed intruder. ‘He made a terrible mistake,’ they said. ‘He caused a terrible accident and there is no way that this is anything other than a tragedy. But it’s not a crime.’ The prosecution said that Alicia was close to Gaston when she was shot because of a black mark found on Alicia’s ring finger, which was soot expelled from the shotgun. They said it illustrated that Alicia could have been no more than 18 inches away from the barrel. But the defence said Alicia was further away, more like one to two yards, when she was shot.
The fact that Gaston had changed his story about where Alicia was on the stairs made the jury suspicious.
The children heard their parents arguing before the shooting
THE MURDERER Gaston was sentenced to 40 years in prison
THE VERDICT
The trial lasted five days and Gaston didn’t testify. The jury deliberated for 12 hours over three days before finding Gaston, now 37, guilty of murdering his wife. When he heard the verdict he slumped forward with his head in his hands. Alicia’s family were heard sighing with relief.
‘I was trying to protect my family,’ Gaston said, as he was taken away. In June this year, Gaston was sentenced to 40 years in prison. The jury didn’t believe that he killed his wife by accident. They concluded that he’d looked down the stairs knowing it was Alicia and fired his gun. Gaston said that he believed there was an intruder in his house, but he was the only one who didn’t belong in that family home.
THE FAMILY Alicia’s loved ones were relieved to finally get justice