A Chicago police officer shot and killed her husband while the couple struggled over a gun she had threatened to kill herself with during an argument at their Northwest Side home, Cook County prosecutors said Friday.
When 39-year-old Jacqueline Villasenor pulled out a 9-mm handgun and threatened to shoot herself, her husband, also a Chicago police officer, tried to take the weapon away from her, prosecutors told Judge Susana Ortiz.
As the couple continued to struggle over the gun, 44-year-old German Villasenor was shot in the chest; the bullet pierced his heart and exited his back before lodging in a wall, prosecutors said.
The couple’s 16-year-old son heard the shot and went to his parents’ upstairs bedroom in the 8500 block of West Winona Street. There, the boy saw his father lying on his back and his mother performing CPR on him, prosecutors said.
Jacqueline Villasenor told her son to get her medical kit bag from her car and call 911, which the boy did, prosecutors said.
An off-duty officer, who heard the radio call of the shooting, was the first one on the scene, prosecutors said. Jacqueline Villasenor told that officer about the argument, which was over a previous affair she had, and the struggle over the gun, prosecutors said.
That officer noted that Jacqueline Villasenor’s breath smelled like alcohol, prosecutors said. She allegedly wouldn’t to submit to a CPD-mandated alcohol breath test to determine her level of intoxication.
Because Jacqueline Villasenor threatened suicide, paramedics also called an ambulance to take her to a hospital, but she didn’t want to go, prosecutors said.
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German Villasenor was taken to Lutheran General Hospital, where he was pronounced dead. Both German and Jacqueline Villasenor tested positive for gunshot residue on their hands, but their son did not, prosecutors said.
“Her husband tried to save her life by reaching for that gun and he was killed as a result of that,” Assistant State’s Attorney James Murphy said.
In addition to her son, Jacqueline Villasenor has an adult daughter, her attorney Tim Grace told Ortiz.
The judge first ordered Jacqueline Villasenor’s held at $100,000 bail for involuntary manslaughter, but she then lowered it to $50,000 when Grace said she only had enough money to post bond for the latter amount.
Ortiz told Jacqueline Villasenor she couldn’t consume any intoxicants while on bond and that she had to turn over any firearm licenses and ammunition still in her possession to police.
“Yes, judge,” Jacqueline Villasenor answered quietly.
All firearms were removed from the house by Chicago police after the shooting, Grace said.
If Jacqueline Villasenor is convicted, she can be given probation or 3 to 14 years in prison.
She is expected back in court Nov. 23.
