Woman Charged After 'Sugar Daddy' Shot in Head

Prosecutors say Jennifer Morrissey tried to make murder look like a robbery
By Michael Harthorne,  Newser Staff
Posted Nov 8, 2017 1:05 PM CST
Woman Killed 'Sugar Daddy' Who Tried to Dump Her: DA
Jennifer Morrissey   (Mugshot)

"Get the gun ready cause I'm coming. ... I'm gonna stab ya," prosecutors say Jennifer Morrissey texted Michael McNew on the day he died. She added: "I'll gut you like I'm field dressing a [expletive] deer." NBC Philadelphia reports the 33-year-old Morrissey was charged with homicide and burglary in the Aug. 6 death of the 64-year-old McNew, a Pennsylvania pharmaceutical executive with whom she'd been living for two years. Bucks County prosecutors say Morrissey called McNew, who gave her presents and paid her bills and court fees for various legal issues, her "sugar daddy." But things between the two apparently soured, and he told her to move out, according to Lehigh Valley Live.

When McNew's body was found two days after he was shot in the head, the DA's office says Morrissey originally blamed her new boyfriend and said she hadn't been at McNew's home for a week, NJ.com reports. But prosecutors say her cellphone auto-connected to McNew's WiFi the night he was killed. Morrissey's lawyer says Morrissey, arrested on an unrelated matter, confessed to a cellmate that she went to McNew's house that night to confront him—another source says McNew had threatened to go to the FBI about her boyfriend, but it's unclear why—struggled with him over a gun, and accidentally shot him. Her lawyer says it was a "kill or be killed moment." Prosecutors say Morrissey didn't call for help, instead making it look like a robbery and burying McNew's phone and laptop in her boyfriend's backyard. Her boyfriend allegedly peed on her hand to "eliminate any gunshot residue." (Japan's "black widow" has been sentenced to death.)

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