Her trial began the following February. It was not only shocking but IMO, really sad. Clara was first eligible for parole in 2012, but she was turned down. Paul May Other occupants: Paul May View 2 Lindsey A Harris ER 2002 Cambridge, Cambridgeshire, CB3. 2023 The Arena Media Brands, LLC and respective content providers on this website. Its too bad if they do, said Detoto, who has kept in touch with Harris since her conviction. When Harris suddenly accelerated, Lindsey was thrown against her seat and saw her father put his hands on the hood of the car, shouting, Stop! she said. Originally sentenced to twenty years for first-degree murder, the former Houston dentist has been paroled. Once she discovered the couple's whereabouts, Clara Harris called the family's nanny at home and told her to put some of her husband's business clothes on the porch and to throw everything else away, Lindsey said. Facebook gives people the power to share and makes the world more open and connected. Murdaughs fall from grace ends in a life sentence for murder, CPAC shows the GOP has deep divisions that may prove impossible to repair, Abortion clinics crossing state borders not always welcome, Black Vietnam veteran finally awarded Medal of Honor, Toxic forever chemicals about to get their first U.S. limits, Hidden, illegal casinos are booming in L.A., with organized crime reaping big profits, Best coffee city in the world? Dr. Harris pushed Ms. Bridges out of the way before he was hit, his daughter said. In 2005, Oprah arrived at the prison in the town of Gatesville (near Waco), where Clara was incarcerated, to interview her for her talk show. Bridges then walked to her car with David following. Contact. Probation and therapy would have been the better option because she has no history of this behavior and no criminal behavior on her record prior to this. Im going to hit him, Harris told the teenager. When I went to her first court appearance, nearly a dozen photographers were there to capture her every move. Forrest Wilder writes about politics and the outdoors. You may occasionally receive promotional content from the Los Angeles Times. Send the woman home for crying out loud. All the while, Lindsey sat screaming at her stepmother from the Mercedes passenger side; begging Clara to stop. Refine Your Search Results All Filters 1 Lindsey Fore Harris, 53 Resides in Collierville, TN Lived In Marietta GA, Newnan GA, Fairhope AL, Huntington Woods MI In the heat of the moment, she went on to say, she didnt even know she had run over David. Enraged, Clara ordered her teenage stepdaughter into her Mercedes-Benz and headed for the hotel; the very same hotel in which she and David had promised to love one another only 10 short years ago. ''But there is no problem with me getting to see those children.''. Garza asked. This post has been updated since publication to correct an error: the minimum punishment for intentional murder is five years, not twenty years. '', Youth Who Saw Killing Says Stepmother 'Stomped' Accelerator and 'Went for' Father, https://www.nytimes.com/2003/01/30/us/youth-who-saw-killing-says-stepmother-stomped-accelerator-and-went-for-father.html. His body then fell to the ground and the Mercedes ran over him once. Elliott: Kings use their heads over hearts in trading Jonathan Quick, A $150,000 executive protection dog? The thing that made me upset about this case, is that no one ever touched on the fact that David caused his own death due to his own foul behavior. Before long, however, she and David began having an affair. In 2007, Clara was brought back to Houston for a civil trial to defend herself in a wrongful-death lawsuit filed by Davids parents. This time, a jury had little sympathy for Claras story, and it ordered her to pay $3.75 million in damages. The settlement terms are confidential, said attorney John A. Davis Jr., who represented Lindsey Harris. Patricia Sharpe writes a regular restaurant column, Pats Pick, for Texas Monthly. She said she remembered driving around in circles, "confused," with no conscious thoughts going through her mind. On the evening of July 24, 2002, Harris received a devastating call from the investigator. Do you miss David?, At her trial, in February 2003, she testified before a packed courtroom that she did not mean to kill her husband but was only trying to wreck Gails SUV. I pray for her continuously and I am glad she will have something to come home to, her twin boys. David Harris was run over shortly afterward. ''She's really more like a daughter.''. All she wants to do is make up for lost time with her boys., Clara is now sixty years old, and her hair is getting gray. Clara suffered from a temporary moment of insanity brought on by sudden passion. She said she tried to save their 10-year marriage by quitting her job, cooking her husband's favorite meals and promising to please him sexually, and that he promised to break up with Bridges over dinner. When Lindsey learned that her father and Bridges were meeting at a steakhouse on July 24, I figured he was breaking up with her, Lindsey said. Parnham was relieved; he believed the jury would recommend something close to the two-year minimum. The mock trial suggested that Harris' account was convincing. Back then she declined. As a subscriber, you have 10 gift articles to give each month. Then she did another 180 and ran over him a third time. But last year, she got a new parole attorney, Kevin Stouwie of San Antonio. Facebook gives people the power to share and makes the world more open and connected. And I went to look at the direction, and then we saw her," Bridges said. David was dead at the scene and Clara was charged with first-degree murder. Although Texas law does not allow temporary insanity defenses, Parnham believed he could show that Harris acted under "sudden passion" rather than with intent to kill. In 2002 Lindsey Harris, daughter of David Harris filed a Federal lawsuit against Clara Harris. A few books have been written about Clara Harris, but the best one is Steven Long's Out of Control, published in 2004. They then walked around the parking lot looking for Ms. Bridges's Lincoln Navigator. Clara Harris tried to control the damage by making herself real pretty so Dad would want her and not Gail, said Lindsey. ''She just had this evil look on her face,'' Lindsey, now 17, said, describing how her stepmother appeared as they drove around for several hours trying to find David Harris, 44, an orthodontist who had told his wife several days earlier that he was having an affair with Gail Bridges, 38, who worked in his office. If jurors find she acted under the legal definition of sudden passion, she could receive a two-to-20-year sentence. In short time, the Harrises were showing signs of success, with an expensive home and high-dollar import vehicles. You b, hes my husband! Harris shouted before slapping Bridges. Through it all, however, Clara Harris only wanted people to know the truth about what really happened the night she murdered her husband. David Harris primary office was in Clear Lake, while he worked from the office shared with Clara in Lake Jackson only two days each week. The attorneys said that Blue Moon. Instead of driving out of the parking lot, Harris drove toward Bridges' Lincoln Navigator. Read More . Join Facebook to connect with Lynsey Harris and others you may know. Prosecutors say Harris, bent on avenging her husbands adultery, used her car as a murder weapon. "This is going to be a hard case," Parnham told Primetime 2 months before the trial. Harris cried through much of the testimony, and the defense team assured Primetime her emotions had not been rehearsed. She and Lindsey got into Harris silver S-Class 430 Mercedes-Benz and waited. She admitted grabbing Bridges' hair when she saw her come out of the elevator with her husband, and said hotel employees broke up the fight and steered her toward her car in the parking lot. And so Clara, heartbroken and dreading confirmation of suspicions, tried to carry on with business as usual. When they arrived at the hotel, she said, they went to the front desk, where they were told that neither Dr. Harris nor Ms. Bridges was registered. The Arena Media Brands, LLC and respective content providers to this website may receive compensation for some links to products and services on this website. View the profiles of professionals named "Lindsay Harris" on LinkedIn. During hearings on the matter, Lindsey Harris testified she was severely traumatized from her stepmother's actions. With all hes done to me, I could kill him and get away with it, Harris had allegedly stated. According to her testimony on Jan. 29, she screamed. In his cross-examination, Parnham did not question her account, but mentioned that Lindsey was suing her stepmother for a share of her father's multimillion-dollar estate. Lindsey Harris, 17, David Harris's daughter by his first marriage, was in the passenger seat of the car that killed her father. The hotel's attorney, Ervin Apffel Jr., confirmed that the lawsuit had been settled but declined to comment further. I hate you! Lindsey was with Harris when she sped off in the direction of the hotel on July 24 to confront her husband. They seemed like the perfect family but on July 24, 2002, Harris fatally ran over her husband with her car. Local radio talk shows were jammed with callers debating whether Clara was a cold-blooded murderer or a good woman who simply did what every woman secretly wants to do when she finds out her husband is cheating. David was consciously and purposely careless with his family. The Mercedes glanced off Gails SUV and hit David before he could get out of the way, propelling him 25 feet across the lot. The Shocking Story Of Clara Harris, The Woman Who Killed Her Cheating Husband With Her Mercedes. Join Facebook to connect with David Harris and others you may know. March 6, 2003 -- From the moment he took on the case, defense attorney George Parnham knew that defending Clara Harris would be uphill work. Lindsey was already crying when she reached her dying father, and Harris soon joined in. Nevertheless, Claras attorneys persuaded the jurors that Clara had acted under sudden passion rather than with intent to kill, and they gave her a twenty-year sentence. ''I thought it was maybe a duffle bag or something like that,'' Mr. Moza added. Find Lindsey Harris's phone number, address, and email on Spokeo, the leading people search directory for contact information and public records. When she saw the car, she said, she decided to ram it with her Mercedes. Things spun out of control for Joy and she fled the country. Days earlier, David had admitted to Clara that he and Gail had been having an affair, and he had promised Clara that he would end it. Joy Davis Aylor was angry that her husband Larry Aylor was having an affair, so she hired a man to murder Larry's mistress and later sent thugs to kill Larry himself. When it was over, the young girl was traumatized and frightened for her own life. Turner: TEA is giving Houston ISD two optionsclose school or be taken over, Who is Justin Dirden? Individual details - click to Hide Show Main role not specified . Lindsey Harris, along with her mother (Davids first wife), quickly filed suit against Clara Harris in hopes of claiming Davids insurance proceeds and inheriting his portion of the estate. Leave them blank to get signed up. Are ticket costs pricing Houston Astros fans out of Opening Day? ''Someone said he liked playing Santa Claus.''. Accompanying her was David's. Clearly, this is a woman who is extremely unlikely to reoffend. ''You could hear a car going round, hard.''. In the end, Galveston County probate judge Gladys Burwell ruled Davids three children would receive almost $2 million each, while Clara was allowed to retain roughly $1.2 million in assets. She lunged at Gail, slapped her, grabbed her shirt and tore it off, all the while screaming, You bitch, hes my husband! At the same time, Lindsey began hitting her father with her purse, shouting I hate you! She'd never seen her stepmother behave this way before. I also understand what you say about her naivety. Fleeing for Your Life? A lawsuit on behalf of the children of David Harris, a cheating husband fatally run down by his wife in a jealous rage two years ago, has been tentatively settled, lawyers for the involved parties have confirmed. As part of a prison program, she learned braille and worked several hours a day translating school textbooks into braille. When the story about the scorned woman who used her Mercedes to extract revenge on her cheating husband made national headlines, Americans suddenly found themselves embroiled in a debate: Was it really murder? But in cross-examination, Parnham got them to admit they couldn't see clearly. After learning about Clara Harris, read about Leona Candy Stevens lying in court to liberate her husband Charles Manson. Her friends have told me she is worried that people she meets will realize who she is and back away. Friends and family of David Harris publicly criticized the ruling. ''When we came closer, that bag turned out to be a human being.''. Harris defense attorney George Parnham urged her not to take the stand for fear she would incriminate herself. Blue Moon investigators would make a deadly mistake when it came to their client Clara Harris. Well aware she had run over her husband, Clara circled aroundcrossing two grassy medians, according to witnessesand ran over Davids motionless body; then circled around to run over him again. Over the next five years, she was turned down three more times. This beautiful & intelligent woman seemed to crack & fall apart completely due to her narcissistic husband's selfish behavior & infidelity. Lindsey Harris is a Partner at Kirkland & Ellis based in Chicago, Illinois. Bridges was very afraid of the television cameras. Clara struggled to get pregnant; after undergoing fertility treatments, she gave birth to twin boys Brian and Bradley in 1998. He holds dual bachelor's degrees from Pace University and a master's degree from New York University. She wasnt crying, said Lindsey. They said they had come to the prison every month for the last fifteen years, without fail, to visit their mother. David Harris is on Facebook. I was yelling, Stop, youre killing him!. 20 years was extremely unfair. Although she knows she cant disappear, she is going to do her best to stay out of the public eye, said Stouwie. When he walked outside, his wife did precisely that, sending him flying 25 feet across the parking lot. While the sentence for intentional murder in Texas is 20 years to life, murder in sudden passion carries a minimum penalty of just two years, with a maximum of 20 years. Mr. Parnham was a defense lawyer in that case, too. "What happened when you got off that elevator?" What did Disney actually lose from its Florida battle with DeSantis? Harris found her husband and Bridges in the hotel lobby. She then cradled her husband and told him she was sorry and loved him, according to The New York Times. Recent work includes the illustrations for Alan Mulhern's two books: Healing Intelligence, the Spirit in Psychotherapy (Karnac, 2012), and The Sower and the . The defense had a setback when the judge ruled that their computer simulation was inadmissible because it was dramatized. We have found at least 200 people in the UK with the name Mark Harris. As a result, David began spending more time away from home and longer hours at his office, as well as spending large amounts of money lavishing gifts on his mistress, along with high-end hotel rooms for their couplings. Solicitor - non-practising Admitted as a solicitor: 15/10/82. Menu Log In Sign Up Although Clara loved Lindsey like her own, she was desperate to be more than a stepmother; she wanted her own children. Harris knew her husband was being unfaithful and hired a private investigation agency to follow him, as reported by ABC News. Yes, she made a horrible fifteen-minute mistake. She said she remembered one of them telling her, "Don't go where they're going. "I thought: so they're going together in her car, and so my thought was stopping that car.". "Soon after that, it all turned into massive turmoil, and the only thing that I could do was to yell for help for someone to please, please get her off of me.". Gideon Lindsey Harris, who went by the name of Lin or Lindsey, was born December 12, 1813 in Wilson County, Tennessee on his father's farm off the south bank of the Cumberland River. Why Does He Get to Make That Call? Yet they say they have forgiven Dr. Harris and in court today described an unblemished marriage that was, in Mildred Harris's words, ''made in heaven. I do not regret or will ever regret that I got to know him and that he became part of my life.". When David Harris wasnt at the steakhouse, Lindsey drove her stepmothers car -- with Clara Harris in the passenger seat -- to Bridges house, then to a hotel and two other restaurants the couple had frequented. David Harris was gasping for air, making gurgling sounds and his limbs were drawing close to his body, similar to those of stroke victims, she testified. Mr. Harris said he had been aware of ''some difficulties in the relationship'' between his son and Clara, but suggested that he saw no serious impediments to a future together. Lindsey Harris filed a wrongful death lawsuit against her stepmother and was awarded about $2. ''What David did outside his marriage was a tragic mistake, and what Clara did was a tragic mistake,'' he said. Creger, who said she was trained in CPR to care for a premature son, tried to help the injured dentist breathe. According to the Los Angeles Times, Lindsey later testified that Harris said, Im going to hit him, as they sat in the car and waited for David to appear. Witnesses recalled seeing Lindsey punch Harris in the face before both of them exited the vehicle. Lindsey Harris is a Director, Marketing at CPS Solutions based in Dublin, Ohio. Eventually, Clara and Lindsey stormed back to the Mercedes. ''She said she could kill my father for what he'd done to her,'' Lindsey testified, glancing only briefly at her stepmother, a former beauty queen and dentist, in almost five hours on the witness stand. David pushed her to the brink of insanity. When he landed, it was approximately 30 feet from where he had been standing only seconds before. Join Facebook to connect with Harris David and others you may know. Theres An App for That. "I drove over David," she said in tears, adding that she was so disoriented she wasn't aware of being at the wheel of her car. A dozen photojournalists flocked to Harris first court appearance. Even if they take such sentiments into account, jurors are being asked to weigh testimony that points to Clara Harris's revving her silver S-Class Mercedes and speeding toward Ms. Bridges's Navigator, next to which David Harris and Ms. Bridges were standing, then running over her husband up to three times as she circled the Nassau Bay Hilton parking lot. The tragedy took place at the parking lot of the Hilton Hotel at Nassau Bay last year. That would change sometime in June 2002, when Clara hired the services of Blue Moon Investigations. View Lindsey Harris results in Oklahoma (OK) including current phone number, address, relatives, background check report, and property record with Whitepages. Clara Harris is serving a 20-year sentence for murder in the case, which drew national attention. The Campaign to Sabotage Texass Public Schools. Garza asked Bridges. Mistresses everywhere were warned to take note: next time it could be them. Join Facebook to connect with David Harris and others you may know. The testimony of Lindsey Harris, a high school student from Columbus, Ohio, in the trial of her stepmother, who is accused of murdering her husband of 10 years, David Harris, in a hotel parking . It was an accident. Yes, the twins acknowledged, they had lost their father, but at the same time they had lost their mother, whom they loved deeply. David Harris is on Facebook. Many of the mock jurors said that judging from what they had heard in the media, they believed Harris had killed her husband intentionally. She first became eligible for parole in 2013 but her request was denied. 24/7 coverage of breaking news and live events. At the trial, Lindsey Harris testified against her stepmother, claiming to have attempted suicide four times after her father's death. She has since filed a wrongful death suit against her stepmother. "We were leaving the hotel and I was looking at David and I noticed all of a sudden his face changed. I wish Clara would have been stronger, but unfortunately she wasn't . Harris, a 45-year-old Houston dentist, was accused of killing her cheating husband by running him over with her Mercedes in a hotel parking lot in front of half a dozen witnesses. She suffered plenty without going to prison. A Harris County, Texas, jury would have the official and final say. When asked how many times, he said twice. Harris found her husband and Bridges in the hotel lobby. Do Not Sell or Share My Personal Information. ", Next, the defense team showed the panel a videotape they had made of Harris talking about the night of the killing. Copyright 2023 Click2Houston.com is managed by Graham Digital and published by Graham Media Group, a division of Graham Holdings. It's highly unlikely Clara was not "aware" of her husband's cheating ways. Is that understood? Clara Harris and attorney George Parnham after the first day of testimony in 2003. David, Im so sorry., The murder made headlinesall over the world. But back in February, after Clara Harris was convicted of killing her husband, News2Houston asked the other woman in David's life for an interview. The tape did not capture the moment of initial impact, but it showed Harris' Mercedes driving in circles afterward, lurching over what prosecutors were saying was her husband's body. In the statement she gave to police on the night of her husband's death in July 2002, Harris was at times barely coherent, talking nonstop about dental practices and her desire to remake herself for her husband after he told her he was seeing another woman. As soon as News2Houston walked into her home with a camera, she bolted into the bedroom and did not want to come out until the camera was gone. David Lindsay Harris. She had two sons with her orthodontist husband, David Harris. Clara and husband David were both respected dental practitioners in Houston, Texas, with a shared office in the shadow of NASAs Johnson Space Center. Her lawyer contends that the 44-year-old dentist acted in the heat of passion, a wife unhinged by her cheating husband. Lindsey, meanwhile, testified that Harris had made shocking statements one week before David was killed, as reported by ABC News. There are 300+ professionals named "Lindsay Harris", who use LinkedIn to exchange information, ideas, and opportunities. Suzie from Carson City on April 17, 2016: Val..I would agree with you about Clara's reaction & out of control behavior, but as you can see from my comment~ I firmly believe she allowed her husband's infidelity to literally drive her to the brink of insanity. Only 16 at the time she witnessed her father's traumatic death, Lindsey stated she had since attempted suicide on at least four occasions. He and Gail both contributed to the situation. If you fill out the first name, last name, or agree to terms fields, you will NOT be added to the newsletter list. Their most devastating witness was David Harriss teenage daughter Lindsey, who testified that a week earlier her stepmother had told her, With all hes done to me, I could kill him and get away with it. On the night of the killing, she said, Clara stepped on the accelerator and went straight for him, saying moments before impact, Im going to hit him.. Skip Hollandsworth specializes in long-form narratives. She did not know David was dead until Lindsey, David's daughter who was in the car with her stepmother, approached her. Skeptical that he would do so, Lindsey accompanied her stepmother that day on her quest to find her husband, whom they believed to be with Ms. Bridges. Also known as Lindsey D Clay, Clay Lindsey. At the Clear Lake office, he employed a married woman by the name of Gail Bridges as his receptionist.