Walter Blakeslee got tired of his wife nagging him over a motor vehicle ticket he'd gotten weeks earlier. His wife of 29 years would not drop the matter, so he got in his truck to leave.
But his wife followed him and climbed up on the running board on the driver's side of his truck - big mistake:
He put the truck in reverse and hit the gas, causing his wife to fall to the ground.
“I stopped the truck and looked out in front of me,” Blakeslee said in his statement. “My wife was there in the headlights. She was kneeling with her hands in front of her. ... I stepped on the gas.
“She never looked up. I just wanted to make her stop. I didn't think about the consequences. I heard a thud and then I thought I heard her scream. I didn't stop right away. ... I stopped when it came to me that I had hit her.”
Blakeslee told police that after he ran over his wife he saw her lying on the ground. He parked the truck in its usual spot, walked over to her and knew that she was dead:
“I kept thinking, ‘Oh my God, I just killed my wife,'”
Blakeslee went back in the house and went to sleep. When he woke up he checked the driveway, saw that his wife was still there, and called 911.
“I didn't want to face what had happened,” he said. “I was hoping it was all a bad dream.”
Blakeslee later recanted:
“I am sorry,” he said. “I didn't want to kill her. I just wanted her to stop.”
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