Another fatality
Kimberlee
UNION-TRIBUNE STAFF WRITERS
February 16, 2000
ESCONDIDO -- A divorce attorney suspected of killing a client at her
home
yesterday morning was arrested hours later after a standoff with
sheriff's
deputies miles away in the mountains near Julian.
With a cellular phone to his ear, a gun in one hand and standing alone
on the
edge of Cuyamaca Reservoir, James Candee Bottomley, 51, kept deputies at
a
distance for an hour before surrendering about 2 p.m. yesterday
afternoon.
Bottomley is suspected of shooting Marietta Cordero Birbilis, 46, whom
he was
representing in a divorce case and with whom, according to a colleague,
he
had developed a personal relationship.
Birbilis, a nurse, died of multiple gunshot wounds at her home yesterday
morning after 10.
A colleague of Bottomley's said he and Birbilis met less than a year
ago.
"I do know that they saw one another on more than one occasion outside
of his
office or my office or court. How extensive that was, I don't know,"
said
Roger Keithly, who also worked as a divorce attorney for Birbilis.
Neighbors said they heard three or four gunshots coming from the
Birbilis
home on Verano Place near Gianelli Lane and saw a silver Isuzu Trooper
leaving shortly afterward.
"I just can't understand why people do these types of things," said
neighbor
Laurie Thompson. "That is so sad."
Alina Kuo described Birbilis as friendly.
"She always smiled, and just said hello," Kuo said.
A man believed to be Birbilis' brother called police at 10:32 a.m. and
told
dispatchers there had been a shooting. Escondido police Lt. Jim Maher
said
the man, whose name was not released, was with police during the day and
was
questioned as a witness.
A motive for the shooting was not known last night.
Escondido detectives waited until after 5 p.m. for a search warrant that
would allow them to collect evidence from inside the home and from
Birbilis'
body, which remained inside throughout the day.
It was not known where in the house Birbilis was shot, police said
yesterday.
She reportedly lived alone in the large stucco house, which has a
three-car
garage and is landscaped with palm trees.
Authorities said that once Bottomley was in his car, he made several
calls on
his cellular phone, including to his therapist. Escondido police were
able to
gauge his direction of travel from those calls, the Sheriff's Department
said.
A sheriff's spokesman said that Bottomley was suicidal and that
authorities
believed he planned to either shoot himself with his .357 handgun or
force
deputies to shoot him.
"We dispatched just about every resident deputy we had around and (the)
ASTREA (helicopter)," sheriff's Lt. Duncan Fraser said.
Deputy Keith Dalton found the silver Isuzu parked on the east side of
the
reservoir about 1 p.m. and found Bottomley moments later, talking on his
cell
phone.
Hugh Marx, general manager of Cuyamaca Reservoir, said he watched
through
binoculars from a half-mile away after he noticed sheriff's patrol cars
coming in.
Marx said he saw a man pacing back and forth talking on a cell phone. He
said
he asked the 50 to 75 people at the lake at the time to move out of the
area.
Authorities asked the handful of diners at the Lake Cuyamaca restaurant
to
stay away from the building's deck, which overlooks the lake, said
cashier
Mary Kelly.
Sheriff's deputies coaxed Bottomley to surrender with help from his
therapist.
"We had the therapist's partner on the phone and we were feeding
information
back and forth" from the therapist to the partner to deputies, Fraser
said.
A hostage negotiator and SWAT personnel were called, but Bottomley
surrendered before they arrived.
Last night, Bottomley was questioned at the sheriff's Julian substation,
then
transferred to Escondido police headquarters.
Keithly said Bottomley met Birbilis when she was searching for an
attorney to
help represent her in a real estate dispute with her estranged husband.
Birbilis was trying to sell her house, but her husband had placed a
$50,000
lien on her property. Several lawyers recommended Bottomley, so she
hired him
to help her get rid of the lien, Keithly said.
Keithly said the two developed a relationship that appeared to be closer
than
simply lawyer-client, and she eventually requested that Bottomley become
co-counsel in her divorce case, which was set to go to trial Feb. 23.
Keithly described Bottomley as a "very passive, nonaggressive type of
fellow"
who "seemed very conscientious and well-prepared to do a really good
job."
Birbilis is survived by her mother, Rosario Cordero, who lives in Chula
Vista, according to the Medical Examiner's Office.
Yesterday's shooting was the third homicide in Escondido this year, the
same
as there were in all of 1999. "We have so few homicides every year in
this
city that it's hard to draw a particular trend," said Maher.
KEN
rest of his life soon or on death row. He will not get away with it
like this woman did, (she should have been on death row also as she
murdered her husband while he was sleeping and AFTER she got a large
insurance policy on him which shows planing ahhh but she is a woman
so.....http://www.consumeralert.org/fumento/batter.htm
--
ALL WE ARE ASKING IS FOR FAIR AND EQUAL TREATMENT FOR ALL
WITHOUT THE FEMINST MOVEMENT'S DOUBLE STANDARDS THEY WOULD NOT EXIST!
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