Man accused of fatally shooting girlfriend in Mesa

Jul 15, 2023

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MESA, Arizona — A Mesa man has been arrested in connection to the death of his girlfriend on Tuesday after she was allegedly "nagging' him while the two were watching TV.

Responding officers found the victim with a gunshot wound to the back of her head in a home on Obispo Avenue, near Sossaman and Guadalupe roads.

Timothy Staufenbeil, 48, was arrested by the Mesa Police Department following the shooting.

Staufenbeil is being charged with second-degree murder.

According to court records, Staufenbeil told police he accidentally shot the victim while he was cleaning his gun.

Responding officers found the victim sitting on the couch in the home's living room. She had a beach towel covering her head and body.

Staufenbeil told police he was cleaning a gun at the pool table when he accidentally shot the victim. He also told police he had attempted to do CPR and compressions on the woman following the shooting.

Staufenbeil made several phone calls before calling 911 to report the shooting, according to court records.

The three phone calls, which lasted in total around 45 minutes, were made to a friend of Staufenbeil and his mother, according to court records.

Staufenbeil reportedly called the friend just after 1 p.m. and said he had shot the victim.

Court records said Staufenbeil told the friend he and the victim were sitting on the couch watching TV and she would not stop "nagging" him and had been "carrying on" for a couple of days. Staufenbeil told the friend he had then shot the victim in the back of her head, killing her. The woman was shot about half an hour before Staufenbeil made the phone call to his friend.

Staufenbeil told the friend he wanted to kill himself and was told by the friend multiple times to call the police. That phone conversation lasted more than 16 minutes, court documents say.

Staufenbeil also called his mother two times following the shooting. One of the calls lasted about 23 minutes.

He made a second call to his mother that lasted around 6 minutes.

According to court records, Staufenbeil told his mother the victim had just arrived back in town and she was upset about several things. He said the victim had scratched him earlier in the day. When describing how the victim was shot, Staufenbeil told his mother he was in the garage. He came back inside and saw the victim with the gun pointed at her head. He rushed toward her to stop her. He grabbed the gun and it went off.

Staufenbeil later told detectives, who observed the scratches on his arm, that he had been scratched by the dog.

Detectives found a 40 caliber handgun in the home's kitchen while a fired casing was found near the couch in the living room.

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