Trial underway: Husband shooter says she was whipped

Jan. 31– Just before George Edward Baugus was killed by his wife at their Olive Hill home, she had complained about not getting to watch what she wanted on the television, according to a Tennessee Bureau of Investigation agent.

Shannon Baugus, 40, is on trial today in Hardin County Circuit Court for first degree murder in the March 21, 2010 death of "Eddie," who was perhaps best known as "Bad Egg."

Shannon’s attorney, Curt Hopper of Savannah, contended in his opening statement that the "facts are going to show that this was clearly self-defense–unbelievably self-defense."

Part of the courtroom defense, he indicated, will also include testimony on battered woman syndrome.

Hardin County Assistant District Attorney Ed McDaniel told the eight-woman, four-man jury they will come to the conclusion the "killing was a murder...acted out and prepared by this defendant."

TBI Agent Terry Dicus testified he interviewed Shannon, who allegedly sustained bruises and cuts at her 47-year-old husband’s hands moments before she shot him with a .357 revolver, at the hospital shortly following the incident.

Reading from Shannon’s statement, he said Shannon told him she left the living room where a Star Wars cartoon was on the TV and went into the kitchen. Eddie came in the kitchen and "started kissing on me," but got mad when she said she did not want to see "Clone Wars."

Eddie went into the bedroom "huffing and puffing," and Shannon went back to the living room, where her daughter Lauren Tyler, 14, Eddie’s son Augustus Baugus, 18, and Justin Hamm, 17, were on the couch.

Dicus said Shannon related that Eddie told her he would hurt her if she did not come into the bedroom, and that when she did, he began striking her with his hands, along with either a short riding crop made of rope or a plastic coat hanger.

That’s when Shannon reached over to a nightstand, picked up the gun, "pulled the hammer back and pulled the trigger," firing repeatedly, Dicus continued. "I knew if I only wounded him that he would kill me."

Shannon then left the bedroom and called 911.

The agent testified Shannon also claimed Eddie had repeatedly abused her over the years, but that she had never filed a complaint with law enforcement authorities.

"He would try to drown me in the bath tub. That was before we even got married," Dicus said, citing the statement.

Under cross examination by Hopper, Dicus said neither the TBI or any other law enforcement agency had filed criminal charges against Shannon Baugus regarding the shooting.

Instead, District Attorney Hansel McCadams took the case to the Hardin County grand jury and obtained an indictment.

"I have no evidence whatsoever whether it was premeditated murder," said Dicus.