Evening star., 1933-06-30
MISUNDERSTANDING,
ADMITS Staying
Maryland Woman Declares
She Shot Husband in
SeIf-DefenSe.
8y the Associated Press.

BY the Associated Press.
TOWSON, Md, June 30.-Sobbing
Mrs. Janice A. Mick admitted here to-
day she shot her husband after he
threatened her life.
Taking the witness stand in Balti-
more County Circuit Court the 33-year-
old widow, who is on trial for her life,
told of her return to her home In
Darlington after a visit with her
mother in Lancaster. Pa.
Il looked up she said, after tell
ing how her 50-year-old husband Lon
ME had greeted her with curses, and
saw that Mr.. Mick was in a rage.
I started toward the house again and
at the same time he started toward
me. I am going to finish you now
he said
Says She Warned Husband.
The widow said she began to back
away and cried to him not to come
nearer.
Il thought if I fired the gun might
scare him off and keep him from hurt
ing me-
erick Lee Coburn, chief of the defense
counsel.
Il did" responded Mrs. Mick, break
ing into flood of tears. Il didn't try
to aim it and don't know in what di-
rection I fired it. l only wanted to
keep him frcm hurting me-"
Mrs Mick was the first witness for
the defense today in the trial that be-
gan here yesterday on change of
venue from Hartford County, where
Mick was killed. The State completed
its case during the long day and night
sessions and the defense placed two
witnesses en- the stand last night.
Questioned About Shooting.
Questioned further by Coburn if she
knew Mick had been struck after she
fired, she replied:
NO sir Had I known it, would
have been the first one to 60 to his aid
and help him, although we had many
bitter quarrels. I bore him no i'll will
and in many ways he was good to me-"
State Concludes Testimony.
The State concluded presentation OF
its case and the defense called several
of its witnesses before the court ad-
journd at a late hour last night to
convene today.
The first sensation of the opening
day came early when Meyer Getz, Har-
ford County States attorney, direct
ing the prosecution, asserted he would
attempt to prove that intimate rela-
tions had existed between Mrs. Mick
and Carl Thomas, helper on the Mick
farm, and that the defendants hus-
band had secured a signed statement
concerning the alleged intimacy from
Thomas. He said Mrs. Mick found
out about the statement two days be-
fore Mick's death.
Getz's attempt to have the paper
offered in evidence, however, was OBJ
jected to by the defense, and the court
sustained the objection.
Tells Of Threats.
The next surprise was the testimony
of W. L. Burton, Cecil County farmer,
who said he visited the Mick home
about dozen times in the past year.
"She told me-" Burton testified, quot
ing Mrs. Mick, that he (Mick) had
been carrying on around here. and she
was not going to put up with it and
would kill him. She said it three or
four times. She told me this at her
home"
Burton could not remember why he
had visited the Mick home.
Sergt. Talbot Kelly of the Baltimore
County Police Department testified that
Mick had threatened death to his wife.
Kelly, when asked what Mick did when
he approached him at Mick's home,
said:
Il didn't see him do anything. He
was standing with a gun and I tried
to get it away from him. He said he
was going to wipe out everybody and
his wife"
Shot in Leg.
Mick was found dead from loss of
blood with a bullet wound in his leg
on June 10. Police say Mrs. Mick con-
fessed she had shot at him in self-de-
fense the night before, when he ap-
preached her therateningly, but that
She did not intend to shoot him.
The State continually sought yester-
day to prove that Mick was shot In the
back of the leg, and the prosecution
tried to show that Mick was habitual
drunkard, and kept his wife "in mortal
fear of him.