RAPID CITY, S.D. (AP) - Jurors in a Rapid City federal courtroom will decide whether a woman accused of fatally stabbing her boyfriend with a screwdriver was acting in self-defense or committed murder.
Prosecutors say Doreen Brown may have been in an abusive relationship with Donald “Donnie”McMillan, but had no reason to kill him.
The defense has countered that McMillian was attacking Brown with a tree branch and that she was defending herself at her home in Pine Ridge last June.
Assistant U.S. Attorney Heather Sazama told jurors Wednesday the couple argued and physically abused each other nearly every day when they drank alcohol, the Rapid City Journal reported.
June 27 was “just another ordinary day for these two” but this time Brown, who had been drinking, “took it too far,’” Sazama said.
McMillan was attacking Brown on her front porch with a tree branch that day, said Jennifer Albertson, assistant federal public defender.
Brown “doesn’t want to kill him,” but she did want to make McMillan stop so she grabbed a screwdriver from the ground, Albertson said.
Brown nicked her boyfriend in the back several times but that didn’t stop McMillan, Albertson said. Brown then stabbed McMillan in the chest but wasn’t aiming for his heart.
The trial continues Thursday.
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