Killer of wife gets 80 years

A Hungry Horse man convicted of murdering his wife after an escalating domestic argument will be incarcerated for the next 80 years.

"I think justice demands that you spend a substantial period of time in the state prison," Flathead County District Judge Stewart E. Stadler told 51-year-old Charles Glenn Smith Jr. after imposing the sentence Thursday.

Smith pleaded no contest in May to deliberate homicide for shooting his wife, Jody, to death.

She was 46.

"It's hard to even talk about her sometimes," testified Diane Milich, Jody's sister.

From the stand, Milich described a relationship that had been abusive for years. Jody was unhappy, she said.

"It wasn't an accident," said Milich, who often shook so hard from sobbing she could barely speak. "He walked in … with a loaded gun … and shot her again, and again, and again, and again."

The shooting occurred just after 7:30 p.m. Dec. 9 at the couple's home in the 100 block of First Avenue West North in Hungry Horse.

Jody had just returned from the Dam Town Tavern when she and Smith got into a heated argument, Flathead County Attorney Ed Corrigan said as he outlined the events of that night. Still yelling, she went into the bedroom where she sat down in a chair and began to sew.

Smith went to a bookshelf to retrieve his 9-mm pistol, walked to the bedroom doorway, and shot Jody at least twice in the chest and abdomen. Then the gun jammed.

As she was dying, Jody asked Smith why he had shot her. Smith replied, "I'm tired of listening to your s-t."

Smith cleared the jam and continued to pull the trigger until the gun was empty, shooting her three more times.

"He murdered this woman, your honor, because he was tired of her," said Corrigan, who asked Stadler to impose the maximum penalty of 110 years in prison.

Defense attorney Glen M. Neier asked Stadler to consider a prison term consistent with a mitigated homicide conviction.

"I don't think Chuck understands why he did what he did," Neier said. "He never wanted her dead."

Because Smith has cancer, any prison term likely would be a death sentence, Neier said.

"He just snapped. He didn't plan this," Neier said. "It doesn't fit his personality."

The couple's landlord, Christie Olson, testified Thursday that Smith was a calm, laid-back and easy-going person. She described his late wife as abrasive, opinionated and vocal.

"When they were drinking, I don't think they got along very well," Olson said. "But I think they both wanted it to work."

After the shooting, Smith called 911. When officers arrived, Smith was out on the front porch, unarmed, and surrendered peacefully. His wife was pronounced dead at the scene.

The Smiths had been married 15 years and had lived in the Flathead Valley for at least 13. By all accounts, their relationship was marked by strife.

Charles Smith previously had been arrested at least twice for assaulting his wife. In 2004 he allegedly hit her in the head and pulled her hair, and in 1998 she accused him of hitting her with a frying pan.

Reporter Nicholas Ledden can be reached at 758-4441 or by e-mail at nledden@dailyinterlake.com