Tiede v. State

Appellant became a companion to the elderly and recently widowed Mrs. Marjorie Nugent of Carthage, Texas, in 1990. In 1993, the forty-year-old appellant left his job at the Hawthorn Funeral Home to work full-time for Mrs. Nugent. Appellant attended to Mrs. Nugents personal needs and they shopped and traveled together extensively. In November 1996, Mrs. Nugent was reported missing. In the course of investigating her disappearance, the Panola County Sheriff talked to appellant on several occasions. Appellant first said that Mrs. Nugent was visiting a relative. Later he told officers that Mrs. Nugent had suffered a stroke and was recovering in a Temple, Texas, hospital. On August 18, 1997, however, sheriffs officers found Mrs. Nugents body in her own freezer. She had been shot four times in the back. Captain David Jeter questioned appellant, who ultimately confessed to shooting Mrs. Nugent. A jury convicted appellant of murder.