Trial: Defendant Says She Shot Parents Over Child Custody Battle

During her second day on the witness stand, Laura Grisel Carsner said she shot and killed her mother and stepfather because she had lost a custody battle with them for her daughter.

Carsner, who claimed she was sexually abused by her stepfather, said she feared her mother and stepfather would harm her daughter.

Carsner, who is standing trial in the 2009 deaths of Irma Quiroz, 68, and Alejandro Quiroz, 66, described the events that led up to the shootings on Aug. 29, 2009.

Carsner said she picked up a gun at a Las Cruces gun shop in the morning because she was concerned about several rapes that had occurred in the Austin neighborhood where she lived. Carsner said she was driving toward Ruidoso, but instead ended up at her parents’ home in Northeast El Paso.

Her nephew testified Wednesday that Carsner entered the back yard through a gate with her hands behind her back. She was smiling, 11-year-old Alex Quiroz said Wednesday.

Defense attorney Joe Spencer asked her what happened.

“(My mother and stepfather) got up and I said, ‘I’ve come to pick up my daughter. I’m going to take her to the police station.'”

Carsner said her mother and stepfather approached her.

“They came at me. He came forward toward me, rushing,” Carsner said.

Spencer asked Carsner what she did next.

“The gun,” Carsner said, adding that she did not remember pointing the gun or how many times she shot.

During cross examination, the prosecution showed pictures of Carsner as an adult with her mother and stepfather that showed her smiling and being affectionate. The prosecution also produced a letter she wrote in the 1980s thanking her stepfather for being there for her.

The prosecution also showed an email written by Carsner to her cousin about a month before the killings, in which she expressed hate for her mother after she filed a case against her with Child Protective Services.

“I don’t want to see that woman again who is called by genetics my mother,” the email read. “I don’t want my child to see my mother again. If you share any part of this email with that woman, tell her I hate her. The goal is not to have any feelings toward her, that she is forgotten.”

The reading of that email prompted a very emotional response from Carsner, who at times cried uncontrollably