The husband of a local woman accused of killing their
19-month-old daughter in November testified Monday how Cheryl Busch
had threatened to kill their child weeks before she is suspected of
doing so, that they had been in an argument immediately prior to
the crime and how he believed his wife’s jealousy caused tension
and anger before the tragic death.
The husband of a local woman accused of killing their 19-month-old daughter in November testified Monday how Cheryl Busch had threatened to kill their child weeks before she is suspected of doing so, that they had been in an argument immediately prior to the crime and how he believed his wife’s jealousy caused tension and anger before the tragic death.
John Busch, the husband of the accused killer, testified in a preliminary hearing this morning at the San Benito County Courthouse. District Attorney Candice Hooper handled the direct examination, while Public Defender Greg LaForge cross-examined the local resident on the stand. The hearing is a precursor to a possible trial for woman, then age 39, charged by prosecutors on suspicion of homicide in the Nov. 19, 2008 shooting of 19-month-old Donna Busch while the toddler was inside a play pen.
His testimony before questioning from Hooper and LaForge included a recounting of the months, weeks, days and hours leading up to Donna Busch’s shooting death in a ranch home outside Hollister on Shore Road. It focused on what he described as an abusive relationship while recalling several instances in which he alleges Cheryl Busch broke windows during fights and made violent threats.
He estimated between 30 and 60 days before the suspected homicide, there was an argument in which she threatened to kill their daughter and herself, he said in the courtroom, overseen by Judge Steven Sanders.
John Busch said he asked his wife to elaborate after she had told him for the second time she “could do something that would hurt me worse than I could ever imagine.”
“She said, ‘I could kill Donna and kill myself,'” he testified.
The husband described in his testimony the moments before he realized his wife actually had killed their daughter.
He noted that he walked in the house after the two had been in an argument – because he would not allow her to accompany him to a business-related meeting for his massage therapy practice in Gilroy – and that Cheryl Busch had been holding a handgun, threatening to kill herself.
He had approached her in a small room between the kitchen and living room, he said. The play pen had been situated in the living room, where John Busch could not see it, while the husband also noted in his testimony he had not heard any shots, another reason to suspect she potentially was not being truthful about the killing.
“I told her there was not a reason in the world things would be so bad that she would need to do that,” testified John Busch, his wife seated at a courtroom table several feet away dressed in striped jail clothing and continually scribbling notes on a yellow pad near her attorney and prosecutors.
John Busch, wearing a brown suit and tie, occasionally emotional and often peering down during his testimony, said at that point he reiterated she should put down the gun before she replied, “I shot Donna,” causing initial disbelief for the father.
“I said, ‘No, you didn’t,'” he recalled. “I couldn’t believe it. It would be an astonishment to me she would do that.”
He soon would realize the grim truth, he testified, but only after waiting for the right moment while continuing to plead with her and finally rushing to grab the gun from his wife, whom he said offered no struggle and “just stood there.” From there, he immediately walked toward the play pen and could see from a couple of feet away that Donna Busch had been lying on her back, apparently dead.
Following Hooper’s line of questioning, John Busch went on to describe how he hid the handgun in a wood pile on the property before calling the sheriff’s office and telling a dispatcher what had happened.
He testified that while he had been talking to the dispatcher, his wife, who had been on probation, approached him and showed him a sticky note telling him he “should not discuss anything without an attorney.” From there, he recalled, she “drew back” and stuck the note in her mouth, attempting to swallow it.
When Hooper asked whether Cheryl Busch expressed jealousy about their child, John Busch responded, “She would use it as a way to convince me of things she wanted.”
John Busch also testified he believes his wife did not show remorse immediately after the shooting, but how she may have cried when she tried communicating with him from a nearby room at the police station during questioning.
LaForge also questioned John Busch about a gun he had kept in the house, despite her probation terms prohibiting it. The public defender questioned whether his wife had been upset about its presence before their daughter’s death, and John Busch testified it had not occurred to him the gun might be a problem.
During LaForge’s cross-examination before the Free Lance’s press deadline, the public defender asked whether the husband had ever committed an affair, to which he responded, ‘No.'”
At one point, LaForge brought up the notion that Cheryl Busch had, on occasion, run away in the past, and that the husband stopped her. Asked LaForge, “What’s wrong with running away?” Responded the husband: “She had done it so many times (and returned), and it had gotten us nowhere.”
