Woman found guilty of murdering husband after her defense accuses son of the crime

A Leavenworth County jury found a woman guilty on Friday of killing her estranged husband.

Barbara Frantz was convicted of first-degree murder. Her defense made the case during the trial that her son was actually the shooter in the January 2017 incident that left Gary Frantz gasping for air and answering questions about the culprit.

As he lay dying of six gunshot wounds in the parking lot of his apartment complex in Leavenworth, Gary Frantz was recorded by an officer saying, "My wife: Barbara Frantz."

Leavenworth Prosecutor Katie Devlin, in her closing argument, dismissed the defense's accusation against the son and outlined evidence that she said proved Barbara Frantz, 52, was the shooter.

"(With) his last words, Gary told us who shot him. 'My wife: Barbara Frantz,'" Devlin said to the 12 jurors.

Witnesses described the shooter in sworn testimony and to police in the shooting's aftermath: short hair, about 115 pounds, roughly 5 feet, 6 inches tall, no facial hair.

"That matches the defendant," Devlin said.

Police also found a spent shell casing in Barbara Frantz's Kansas City, Kan., apartment that matches those recovered from the scene. (The defense said the son had access to his mother's apartment and knew about the murder weapon.)

Frantz's defense team, which included attorneys Stacey Schlimmer and Angela Keck, maintained the wrong person was put on trial.

"We believe (Barbara Frantz's son) did it," Schlimmer said in her closing argument.

She also argued that witnesses' descriptions of the shooter could describe the defendant's son.

And she played about a dozen 911 recordings from the night of the shooting in which witnesses either did not mention gender or specifically indicated the shooter was a man.

Schlimmer said Gary Frantz's final words were misconstrued by Leavenworth police, who she said set out to prove Barbara Frantz's guilt too quickly without fully investigating alternative theories.

"What (the prosecution) is ignoring is Mr. Frantz made another statement before he said, 'My wife,'" Schlimmer said before pausing. "(Gary Frantz said), 'My boy.'"

Those words were discernible on the police recording, Schlimmer said, but police didn't catch it on the scene. Schlimmer said the son had been in an argument with his father before the shooting.

"The only investigation was to try to confirm what the state had already believed, based on one statement," she said.

Devlin also presented Facebook posts in which Barbara Frantz laments about her suspicions that her estranged husband had a mistress, that he had pornography on his phone, that he was poisoning her.

Hours before the shooting, Barbara Frantz wrote about Gary Frantz, "I hope you rot in hell. If not, I hope you rot in prison," Devlin said.

She added that witnesses described the shooter leaving in a silver, sporty two-door vehicle. Barbara Frantz was arrested several hours after the shooting in a silver two-door Hyundai.

The jury was composed of 10 men and two women.

Leavenworth County Prosecutor Todd Thompson said that after two full weeks, it was the "longest jury trial that we've had in Leavenworth County history that we know of."

Barbara Frantz is scheduled to be sentenced July 25.

"We are relieved to have this case over," Thompson said.