Marlene Warren opens her front door to flowers and balloons. No one expects the gunshots that follows. Now, the woman who investigators say dressed as that clown, killing her lover's wife, is out of jail.

Prosecutors say that Sheila Keen-Warren, knocked on Marlene Warren’s door dressed as a clown, holding flowers and balloons, and shot Warren in the face. Marlene Warren's husband was Shelia Keen's lover. In fact, Keen later marries the used car dealer and moves with him to Virginia

During the investigation, police found red wig fibers and DNA in the getaway car, a white Chrysler LeBaron. It has been reported stolen for Michael Warren’s used car lot a month earlier. Employees at a Publix supermarket — the only store in the area that sold the “You’re the Greatest” balloon the killer gave to Marlene Warren — said a person matching Keen-Warren’s description bought such a balloon from him. And employees at a store that sold clown costumes tentatively identified Keen-Warren as the woman who bought a clown outfit and a wig from their store.

it was years before an arrest was made. Now Assistant State Attorney Reid Scott tells a judge that Keen-Warren, 59, pleaded guilty “because she is guilty,” but her attorney, Greg Rosenfeld, disputed that after the sentencing hearing, which was squeezed in during a lunch break of another murder trial. Rosenfeld said plenty of innocent people plead guilty.

Circuit Judge Scott Suskauer accepted Sheila Keen-Warren’s plea in exchange for a 12 year prison sentence — with credit for the five and a half years she’s been jailed since her 2017 arrest. Keen-Warren has maintained her innocence even after her plea,

Joining Nancy Grace today:

Kirk Nurmi - Jodi Arias former attorney & author of "Trapped with Ms. Arias"
Dr. Angela Arnold - Psychiatrist, Atlanta Ga
Jeff Cortese - Former FBI Special Agent
Dr. Katherine Maloney - Deputy Chief Medical Examiner, Erie County Medical Examiners office, Buffalo, New York
Levi Page - Investigative reporter, CrimeOnline
George Schiro - Lab director at Scales Biological Laboratory Inc.

Learn more about your ad-choices at https://www.iheartpodcastnetwork.com

See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Futureproof Extra: A New Habitat in the Pacific Garbage Patch