Woman accused in shooting death of backyard pot thief dies
A woman who was facing an involuntary manslaughter trial in the shooting death of a backyard pot robber she caught stealing her plants has died.
The Sacramento County Coroner's Office said the cause of death is pending on Vanna Nomesiri, who died Nov. 24.
Prosecutors are expected to move to formally dismiss charges Thursday against Nomesiri, who was 52 years old.
Charges still are pending against her son, Chinda Nomesiri, 33.
According to police and prosecutors, Vanna Nomesiri shot and killed Vue Cheng, 29, at 3:30 a.m. on Sept. 22, 2011, while he and a group of other pot thieves were raiding her backyard grow at her residence in the 600 block of Morey Avenue in Del Paso Heights.
According to her lawyer, Nomesiri had a medical marijuana certificate.
The DA's office offered her a deal in which she would have served no more than a year in county jail, but she rejected it at a Sept. 14 hearing in Sacramento Superior Court.
Her attorney, Brad Holmes, said nobody in the family informed him of Nomesiri's death.
"I learned it by way of the grapevine," Holmes said.
Holmes said the family thinks Nomesiri died of a stroke.
"She had some heart problems," he said.
A woman who was facing an involuntary manslaughter trial in the shooting death of a backyard pot robber she caught stealing her plants has died.
The Sacramento County Coroner's Office said the cause of death is pending on Vanna Nomesiri, who died Nov. 24.
Prosecutors are expected to move to formally dismiss charges Thursday against Nomesiri, who was 52 years old.
Charges still are pending against her son, Chinda Nomesiri, 33.
According to police and prosecutors, Vanna Nomesiri shot and killed Vue Cheng, 29, at 3:30 a.m. on Sept. 22, 2011, while he and a group of other pot thieves were raiding her backyard grow at her residence in the 600 block of Morey Avenue in Del Paso Heights.
According to her lawyer, Nomesiri had a medical marijuana certificate.
The DA's office offered her a deal in which she would have served no more than a year in county jail, but she rejected it at a Sept. 14 hearing in Sacramento Superior Court.
Her attorney, Brad Holmes, said nobody in the family informed him of Nomesiri's death.
"I learned it by way of the grapevine," Holmes said.
Holmes said the family thinks Nomesiri died of a stroke.
"She had some heart problems," he said.
