A state appellate court panel Thursday dismissed the latest appeal from a woman who claimed she accidentally shot her husband while handling a gun in their Whittier-area home in 2007.
The three-justice panel from California’s 2nd District Court of Appeal noted that it lacked jurisdiction to consider Linda Doreen Gwozdz’s appeal from an order denying her request for re-sentencing under a state law that affects defendants in some murder cases.
The defendant’s bid for re-sentencing was denied in July 2024, with a judge ruling that the case was final and that there were no legal grounds for re-sentencing.
Gwozdz, now 67, was convicted in January 2015 of second-degree murder for the April 26, 2007, shooting death of her husband, Patrick Duffey.
The first jury to hear the case against her deadlocked on the murder charge.
Gwozdz — who was known at the time of the shooting as Linda Duffey — insisted the gun went off accidentally while she was handling her husband’s .38-caliber revolver in their home in the 15800 block of Sharon Hill Drive.
Her 50-year-old husband was shot twice in the top of the head.
Los Angeles County sheriff’s detectives investigated the case for five years, during which the defendant moved to Mississippi and remarried.
She was charged with murder in May 2012, brought back to Los Angeles and has remained behind bars since then.
Just before being sentenced in April 2015 to 40 years to life in prison, she said, “This was a horrible accident, and I’ve been aware of everyone’s pain from day one.”
The woman’s new husband and the couple’s two sons also spoke on her behalf, with Thomas Duffey describing his mother as a person who scoops crickets up and takes them outside and “won’t even kill a spider.”
“I believe she’s innocent,” he said then.
Outside court after the sentencing, Patrick Duffey’s sister, Kathy Hunt, said, “I think I’m 100-percent sure she did it. I have no qualms or no questions about that. I don’t know why she did it and that will probably bother me for a long time.”
She said of the guilty verdict, “It was a real bittersweet feeling. I really felt good about it, but I felt sad about it at the same time. I was really hoping that that’s what they would say and was happy they said it, but on the other hand, it was final.”
A state appeals court panel subsequently upheld Gwozdz’s conviction, with the California Supreme Court later refusing to review the case.