VOLUSIA COUNTY, Fla. – A judge in Volusia County on Friday denied bond for a woman who is accused of fatally shooting her terminally ill husband last month at AdventHealth Daytona Beach.
Judge Karen Foxman said that even though the circumstances were tragic, the state had proven the presumption was great that Ellen Gilland, 76, should not be allowed out on bond because prosecutors say she engaged in a standoff, threatened hospital staff with a gun and fired toward police after shooting 77-year-old Jerry Gilland.
“I am going to find that she is a danger to the community based on that behavior and I am going to deny the motion, I’m sorry,” Foxman said.
The shooting on Jan. 21 prompted hospital staff and patients to scurry and hide, many of them evacuating the building while some kept quiet in closets and locked rooms as the New Smyrna Beach woman barricaded herself with her husband. She faces charges of premeditated first-degree murder and three counts of aggravated assault with a deadly weapon in the death of Jerry Gilland, who was ill for some time, according to what Ellen Gilland told law enforcement.
Daytona Beach Police Chief Jakari Young said the shooting was planned to be a murder-suicide pact.
“The goal was for him to do it, but he did not have the strength, so she had to carry it out for him,” Young said.
[TRENDING: Become a News 6 Insider]
Tense moments were captured on body-worn camera video as Daytona Beach police officers negotiated with Ellen, reassuring her they had “nothing but time” in their eventually successful efforts to have her drop the gun and come away with them.
Gilland was arrested after SWAT officers used a flashbang; she fired a shot into the ceiling before letting go of the gun, investigators said.
In a motion for bond filed Wednesday, Gilland’s attorneys stated a doctor performed a psychiatric evaluation on her and believes Gilland “does not currently represent a heightened risk of harm to herself or to the community if she were to be released on bond.”
Family members also testified that they would take care of Gilland while preparing for her trial.
But Judge Foxman noted that the doctor did not examine all the evidence in the case, including the police reports, and that the hearing was taking place only three weeks after the shooting.
Foxman said the case was extremely sympathetic, but at the end of the day, she couldn’t question the law or apply it in a special way.
“The state of Florida does not allow for mercy killing,” Karen Foxman said.
Ellen and Jerry Gilland resided together in Central Florida for more than 60 years, according to the motion for bond, which also included photographs of the couple.
Get today’s headlines in minutes with Your Florida Daily: