Overview
- Downs arrived at an Oregon hospital in 1983 with a gunshot wound and three children shot, initially claiming an unknown attacker ambushed them on a rural road.
- Forensic work contradicted her account, including an absence of expected driver-side blood spatter and gunshot residue, plus a witness who saw her driving slowly to the hospital.
- Investigators tied her to an undisclosed .22-caliber handgun purchase and found unfired ammunition with markings consistent with the murder weapon, though the gun was never recovered.
- Prosecutors argued she sought to remove obstacles to a relationship with a married man, and daughter Christie later testified her mother stopped the car and shot the children before wounding herself.
- A jury convicted Downs in 1984, leading to a life sentence plus 50 years, she escaped prison for 10 days in 1987 before recapture, and her surviving children were later adopted by the lead prosecutor and his wife.