37 years ago, a Rochester area woman killed her sleeping husband; she pleaded self-defense

Oct. 31—HAMMOND, Minn. — On Nov. 29, 1986, Jo Ann Hennum of Hammond, Minnesota, took a high-powered deer rifle from a closet, loaded it with one shell, went into the bedroom and shot her husband Bob Hennum in the head while he slept.

The murder would touch off a courtroom drama and legal appeals for the better part of three years — until

Jo Ann walked out of prison a free woman.

Murder cases in Wabasha County were a relatively rare phenomenon. Still are.

When spectators ascended to the top floor of the Wabasha County Courthouse in March 1987, it was more than a murder trial they witnessed. The details were spectacularly lurid. And Jo Ann's defense would seize headlines.

The case, while local, held broader implications for criminal jurisprudence, because of the then-relatively new legal theory that Jo Ann used to defend her actions. Even though her husband had been defenseless and asleep when killed, Jo Ann was a victim in the case, her attorney James Nordstrom argued, acting in self-defense because she suffered from "battered woman syndrome."

In the 1970s, the phrase began being used as a legal defense to explain the mental state of women who kill their abusers. Coined by psychologist Lenore Walker, the term described the psychological condition of women who endured repeated traumas at the hands of an intimate partner.

It can cause a person living with battered woman syndrome to feel helpless. This can cause them to wrongly believe they deserve the abuse and that they can't get away from it. In many cases, this is why people don't report their abuse to police or loved ones.

So the lurid details that spilled forth added another layer of voyeuristic fascination, because Bob Hennum, if Jo Ann's self-defense claims were to be believed, was a brutal and sadistic man.

It was a marriage out of the medieval ages. A June 25, 1989, feature article in the Rochester Post Bulletin opened a window into her domestic life "where the price of disobedience" was severe.

"Once, when she threatened to leave, he came down on her bare foot with the full force of his steel-toed work boot and broke her toes. During a fight at a barbecue in 1982, he split open her nose with a beer bottle. She mopped up his vomit after drinking binges; he tore the telephone out of the wall when she threatened to call the police at the height of their fights," the article said.

In the course of these beatings over a period of years, Bob broke her ribs, ruptured her spleen and shattered her nose, among other injuries.

Bob Hennum's hair-trigger wrath could be triggered by the seemingly inconsequential. He was cruel to animals. One day, outside their trailer home, the dog disobeyed him, running down the road after another dog and didn't stop when Bob called it back.

In a fury, Bob Hennum yanked the door open and grabbed the 12-gauge shotgun from the closet.

"I'll teach that son of a b— a lesson," he said.

According to the PB: "Bob stormed back out, and the dog was there, cowering against the trailer, tail between its legs. Jo Ann got to the door, poised to protest, just as Bob blew that mangy dog's head off."

"Blood and brains splattered in the dirt, on the trailer, on the steps. Instinctively, Jo Ann ran for the rag to clean up."

"Don't touch it," he snarled. "It's a lesson. That dog didn't come when I called it. Let that be a lesson to you."

The two had met in a Rochester bar, Roxie's, in 1973. Jo Ann had previously been married, was divorced and had five children. All five children were living with her at the time she met Bob.

Bob wasn't devoid of sweet, romantic gestures. At least early on, he courted her like any suitor. Bob picked a bunch of wildflowers from a field one time and gave them to her with an, "I love you." He delivered a set of Corning Ware one Mother's Day.

He also projected strength. Her first husband menaced her after their divorce, following her to work and threatening her at home. He would sometimes show up at the same bar Jo Ann patronized, and Bob would step in between the two to offer protection.

Several months after they met, Bob moved in with Jo Ann and her family in her Rochester apartment. They were married in 1976 and eventually settled with four of Jo Ann's children in a trailer home near Hammond.

The day of the murder, Bob left the trailer and went to Freddie's Bar where he bought two 12-packs of beer. He returned home near midnight, blind-drunk and angry. At the time, Jo Ann was babysitting four neighborhood children and her 6-month-old grandson, Robert.

It was the worst fight they had ever had, and Jo Ann worried that the children were in danger.

Bob broke a rocking chair and threw pieces at Jo Ann. He pulled hanks of hair from her head, then tore her flannel shirt in shreds from her body. He picked up a pan of oatmeal on the stove, smashed it against her head and dumped the oatmeal on top of her.

The fighting woke up Jo Ann's 6-month-old grandson, who was sleeping on the couch in the living room. The baby started to cry. Robert pulled the child up by the arm, yelling at him to be quiet. "Shut this little bastard up, or I'll kill him."

Jo Ann told him to put the child down and accused him of beating up on women and children.

"You could never hold your own with another man," she said.

Bob retreated to the bathroom, then staggered to the bedroom, stripped to his underwear and passed out on the bed.

Jo Ann later told deputies that she did not mean to (kill him), but only wanted to scare him."

She described the moment before shooting her husband as an out-of-body experience.

"Like I was on the floor and yet I seen me walking."

Experts with the Bureau of Criminal Apprehension testified that the rifle used to shoot Bob Hennum was about 15 inches from his head and that the blast severed his brain stem.

Jo Ann was arrested and charged with two counts of second-degree murder. On April 3, 1987, a jury convicted her of one count of second-degree murder. She was sentenced to eight-and-a-half years at the Minnesota Correctional Facility in Shakopee.

Her legal journey wasn't nearly over. The state Court of Appeals overturned her conviction. It ruled that a court-ordered mental examination by an expert for the prosecution violated her constitutional right against self-incrimination.

The state appealed the decision to the Minnesota Supreme Court, which upheld her conviction but

reduced her sentence by half.

But the decision held larger significance, giving its blessing to testimony from experts on battered woman's syndrome in similar trials in the future.

Yet the case opened up questions about what battered woman's syndrome was. And how did it apply in a case where the abusive husband was asleep? In Minnesota, running away from a fight was a key part of a self-defense claim. Women advocates argued for a more subjective reading of the law.

"From Jo Ann Hennum's perspective, the violence had escalated that night to the point of 'It's him or me,'" said Susan MacPerson of the National Jury Project.

While in prison, Jo Ann defended her actions, saying she had no options.

"It was dark. It was cold. I had five kids with me. No car. No. I couldn't run."

Jo Ann

became something of a hero at the Rochester Women's Shelter.

She later counseled women who suffered from domestic abuse. She vowed that she was through with men.

"No more men. I can't be walked on again," she said.

When she died at 54, her brother, Merrill Lewis, remembered her as someone who wanted to "help people in trouble like she was."

"She was one of the strongest people I ever met," said Norstrom, her attorney.