Score Card Needed To Determine the Alleged Roles of Shawna Nelson, Ken Nelson and Michelle Moore In The Death of Heather Garraus?

Rather than focus on the six people shot in Memphis, our attention turns to Shawna Nelson. (Photo at left courtesy of A.P.) Judge Roger Klein told her that she carried out the murder of Heather Garraus "... with great planning and deliberation... You deserve to serve every day of the sentence I will impose." Nelson shot Heather Garraus, 37, on January 23, 2007. Heather was a Weld County sheriff's dispatcher. Nelson apparenlty had an affair with Garraus' husband, Ignacio Garraus, who was a Greeley police officer. Ignacio and Nelson apparently had a son together, but Ignacio Garraus ended the relationship a month before the shooting.

Apparently, a masked killer, dressed in black, confronted Heather Garraus in the parking lot of the Greeley credit union. The masked gunman said, "You ruined my life. Get on the ground." Garraus knelt down and was shot twice. Nelson denied that she was the shooter and claimed that she was on her way to a liquor store at the time. Was she, as she claims, just in the wrong place at the wrong time or was she a jealous, vindictive person capable of murder?

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Nelson was apparently pulled over shorly after the shooting by her husband, Kenneth Nelson. Later, she was arrested by Greeley police.Nelson claims when Ignacio broke up with her on Dec. 16, 2006, she told Ignacio Garraus she was “done with the drama” of their affair. She claims
she was fine with the breakup. But Shawna apparently sent angry text messages and e-mails to the Garrauses. Nelson claimed she was angry Ignacio Garraus had no intention to raise Christian, his son with Nelson. Text messages allegedly labeled Heather Garraus a “psycho (@@@@@)” and challenging her to a fight. Nelson claimed these were sent in response to a voice mail from Heather Garraus. Nelson claims when she first got pregnant by Ignacio Garraus in 2004, he suggested an abortion. On the night of the murder, Nelson said she decided to go to the liquor store and that she didn’t know why her husband stopped her just short of their house a few minutes after the murder.

Michelle Moore, entered a plea last week concerning a charge of being an accessory to crime. Moore testified that she and Nelson had discussed how to kill Heather Garraus. Shawna Nelson suggested that she and Moore had a romantic relationship. Moore denied the relationship. Shawna Nelson suggested that Moore was not accurate.

Apparently, Shawna's husband, Ken Nelson, was a Weld County sheriff's deputy at the time of the shooting. He was apparently accused of evidence tampering for allegedly handling the gun believed to be the murder weapon. (He had nothing to do with the murder itself.) Both Ignacio Garraus and Ken Nelson have resigned from their law enforcement jobs.