Page 14 - Flathead Beacon // 3.18.15

14 | MARCH 18, 2015 NEWS FLATHEADBEACON.COM Woman Denies Tampering with Evidence in Libby Murder Case
By JUSTIN FRANZ of the Beacon
A Libby woman has pleaded not
guilty to tampering with evidence and tampering with witnesses following the January shooting death of her ex-boy- friend.
Kimberlee Ann Patterson, 43, ap- peared in Lincoln County District Court on Monday, March 16 for charg- es stemming from the Jan. 31 death of Thomas Lawrence Veloz, who was al- legedly shot and killed by Patterson’s friend, Henry Carl Schroeder.
According to court documents, Pat- terson and Veloz were dating but the couple had a falling out in late January. On the evening of Jan. 31, Patterson was at Schroeder’s house and said her rela- tionship with Veloz was over. She asked if it was OK if she stayed there because her ex-boyfriend was on a “warpath.”
At about 8 p.m., Veloz allegedly barged into Schroeder’s house and told him, “I’m going to kill you for messing around with my girlfriend.” Veloz then grabbed Patterson by the arm and told her to get in the car. Patterson pulled away and Schroeder ran into his bedroom to get a .380-caliber pistol. Schroeder then shot Veloz from about six feet away, according to court records. After Veloz went down, Schroeder walked over to him and shot him a few more times, emptying the clip after firing a total of five bullets.
After the shooting, Schroeder and Patterson picked up some of the shells and covered Veloz’s body with a blue blanket, according to court records. Later, a friend who had spent time with Schroeder, Patterson and Veloz earlier in the evening, stopped over to check on them. The man did not go inside and
said that Patterson and Schroeder only opened the door a little bit but noted that Schroeder’s face was “pale white.”
The following morning, the friend returned to the house and was let inside, where he saw Veloz’s body under the blue blanket. The man told Schroeder and Patterson that they needed to call the police and then he left. At approximately 3:30 p.m., Feb. 1, after driving by Schroeder’s house twice and not seeing any police activity, the man decided to go the authorities himself.
Not long after, officers from the Libby Police Department and Lincoln County Sheriff’s Office went to Schroeder’s home at 1305 Washington Ave. Police called Schroeder and demanded that he come outside. When Schroeder exited the house, officers asked him if there was anyone inside and he said “there is but I shot him.” Police then entered the
home and found Veloz’s body covered under a blue blanket with a large pool of blood near his head. He was pronounced dead at the scene.
Schroeder was taken to the Lincoln County Detention Facility where he allegedly admitted to police that he had shot Veloz. He also said that Patterson was inside the home at the time of the shooting. She was arrested later that afternoon after her car slid into a ditch just south of Libby.
Schroeder pleaded not guilty to charges of deliberate homicide and tampering with evidence on March 2.
If convicted of tampering with evidence, Patterson could face up to 10 years in prison and fines up to $50,000. The same potential maximum penalties apply to the tampering with witness charge.
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Ames and Gordon had a long and troubled history. Gordon had filed a restraining order against Ames, but Ames was still living in the duplex apartment that Gordon owned.
In a plea deal from Sept. 6, 2014, prosecutors agreed to amend the charge from deliberate homicide to mitigated deliberate homicide and recommend to the court that Ames be sentenced to 40 years in Montana State Prison with 20 years suspended.
Marion Murder Suspect Withdraws Plea
A Marion man accused of shooting and killing his neighbor in January 2014 has filed a motion to withdraw his Alford plea and is asking that the matter go to trial.
Mark Bolton Ames, 53, made the motion on Feb. 25, a month after he filed a motion to dismiss his council because one of his public defenders,
Nick Aemisegger Jr., “became visibly angry with me and raised his voice toward me while I was attempting to discuss important details of my case,” Ames asserted in the motion. Ames, who is accused of deliberate homicide, had reached a plea deal in the case in September 2014.
According to court records, Ames
lived in a duplex apartment next to Harold Gordon in Marion. Just after midnight on Jan. 12, 2014, Ames fired several rounds from an AK-47 into Gordon’s apartment. Gordon grabbed a shotgun and was about to confront his neighbor when Ames allegedly shot and killed him with a .32-caliber semi- automatic pistol.
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