Prosecutor: Elderly Sonoma man killed for the inheritance

<p>A 20-year-old man killed his grandfather with a shotgun blast to the back of the head in Sonoma last year because he wanted his inheritance early, Sonoma County prosecutors said Wednesday in opening statements of the man’s murder trial.</p><p>Sean Mooney, now 21, was unemployed, living rent-free in his parents’ Chico house with a secret, pregnant fiancé and was about to lose his meal ticket, Deputy District Attorney Traci Carrillo told jurors.</p><p>Mooney, who is being held without bail, has pleaded not guilty. He told police two versions of what happened, the final one that he shot his grandfather accidentally. His attorney, Chris Andrian, reserved his opening statements until the start of the defense case.</p><p>“There were no apparent problems” between Mooney and his frail grandfather Robert Deming, Carrillo said in her opening statement.</p><p>Deming had owned five acres of land on Bonneau Road in Sonoma for 34 years. His wife died five years earlier and his daughter, Susan Mooney, and her husband, Patrick, were staying with him to help out.</p><p>Their son drove to Sonoma to visit his grandfather last year and stayed over on May 20, the day before Deming was to celebrate his 78th birthday.</p><p>Mooney bought with him a stolen 12-gauge shotgun and a box of shells his girlfriend purchased at a drug store in Chico, Carrillo said.</p><p>He knew that his parents were going to sell the Chico house, she said, which would force him to find a place to rent. He had already held a garage sale at the house, apparently unbeknownst to his parents, during which he sold “anything people would buy,” including light fixtures and plants from the yard, Carrillo said.</p><p>The family talked openly about Deming’s wishes for his finances after he died. Mooney knew his mother stood to inherit the Sonoma property and a camper he had his eye on, and had heard his grandfather speak of a life insurance policy, according to the prosecution.</p><p>So after 9 p.m. on May 20, as he and his grandfather were home alone, investigators say Mooney positioned himself behind his grandfather as the ailing man sat in his rocking chair watching a big-screen TV in his living room.</p><p>Mooney racked a Winchester shell in the camouflage-decorated Benelli SuperNova shotgun and fired once at point-blank range into his grandfather’s head, Carrillo told jurors.</p><p>“There was a contact to near-contact wound to his head,” she said, repeating the sentence to reinforce it with jurors.</p><p>Photos show Deming with a catastrophic wound to his head, his hands sitting across his lap and his stocking feet apparently at rest at the foot of his cushioned rocker. Blood and tissue from the blast was spattered throughout the living room, a detective testified.</p><p>Mooney called 911 at 9:21 p.m., saying his grandfather had just been shot. He told investigators he was in a camper in the driveway when two men drove up to the house, ran inside, fired a shot and drove away. But the explanation didn’t match the evidence, investigators said, and Mooney became a suspect.</p><p>Mooney then told detectives he accidentally shot his grandfather while he was on a bed that was in the living room.</p><p>Detectives recovered the shotgun, box of shells and a spent shell on the property.</p><p>The trial continues today. Mooney could face a life prison term if convicted of first-degree murder, elder abuse, possessing a stolen gun and various enhancements.</p>