They had dated 10 months, Osman said, and in that time he beat her and her young son. She tried to break it off, but Lowery wouldn't accept that, Osman said. He went to her house to talk with her, took a rifle with him and cut the telephone lines, Osman said. Then he went to the door. The threat of the rifle persuaded Shelly to come outside with him, and that constituted kidnapping under the law, Osman said.
Kidnapping is a felony.
Under state law, if a person kills someone while committing a felony, he can be convicted of first-degree murder. When Janice Chavis came to the door to ask what was wrong with her telephone, Lowery took the rifle, went inside with her and shot her once in the head, Osman said. He argued that the position of her body and the location of the bullet fragments in the wall show that Lowery raised the rifle and intentionally shot her. Defense lawyers Hugh Rogers and John Wishart Campbell disputed this. They said the gun accidentally went off as he was entering the house.