An Arizona woman who was arrested and charged for attempting to kill her husband agreed to a plea deal on Monday.
Melody Felicano Johnson, who was arrested in July, pleaded guilty to two charges of poisoning food or drink and admitted to putting trace amounts of bleach into her husband’s coffee.
Arizona Woman Charged with Trying to Kill Husband with Poisoned Coffee https://t.co/hk46m2XLWz
— People (@people) August 7, 2023
Johnson agreed to plead guilty to pouring the poisonous chemical into Robie Johnson’s coffee twice, once on July 11 and again on July 18, according to KOLD-TV in Tucson.
The two class six felony charges each hold a sentence of between four months and two years in jail, meaning Johnson could be handed a four-year sentence.
The woman was arrested after her husband became suspicious of her actions and set up a hidden camera to see if she was doing something to his coffee. The footage his camera took seemed to show his wife pouring something from a white bottle into his drink.
The husband, Robie Johnson, is an airman in the Air Force, according to the New York Post. He first noticed his coffee had a strange taste in March when the couple was living in Germany, where he was stationed at the time.
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He said that he would set up his coffee maker the night before and simply turn it on each morning, the Post reported.
“He stated she knew that he would prep his coffee pot to be ready at night so that in the morning he just needed to turn it on to make his coffee,” a court transcript reads, according to the Post. “At that time he stopped drinking the coffee but continued to pretend to drink.”
The couple moved to base housing on David Monthan Air Force Base in Tucson in early July.
Robie took the footage from his hidden cameras to the police on July 6 and filed a report with the Tucson Police Department.
Investigators, though, initially said that the first footage supplied did not clearly show that Melody was poisoning the coffee.
Robie continued his recordings and on July 16 he caught was appeared to be a more clear-cut case of what he was alleging.
The later series of videos appeared to show Melody Johnson transferring liquid from a bleach bottle to a small cup and then taking that cup to the coffee maker where should poured the contents into the machine’s water receptacle.
The husband reportedly told investigators that his wife was trying to murder him to collect U.S. military death benefits.
With the second series of videos in hand, the police arrested Melody on July 18. A judge asked for a very high bond because the suspect is a Philippine national and therefore a flight risk.
According to the National Capital Poison Center, an independent not-for-profit group in Washington, bleach swalled in a low concentrations can cause “irritation of the mouth, throat, and gastrointestinal tract” that can lead to “nausea, vomiting, and abdominal pain.”
“Consumption of concentrated bleach products can lead to permanent gastrointestinal damage and may result in death.”
Melody Johnson is scheduled to be sentenced May 10, according to KOLD.
