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Father Who Claimed His Young Daughter Killed Herself Now Found Guilty Of Murder
Multiple friends of Kailee McMullen testified she told them her father, Ronald McMullen, had been sexually and physically abusing her.
The Oklahoma father standing trial for fatally shooting his daughter in the face and then saying she killed herself was found guilty on Wednesday.
Ronald Lee McMullen Jr., 43, was found guilty on the charge of first-degree murder in the death of his 22-year-old daughter, Kailee Jo McMullen, a clerk at Oklahoma’s Cleveland County Court confirmed to Oxygen.com.
The jury verdict also requested that the father, who was accused by three of Kailee's friends of repeatedly abusing and molesting his daughter, be sentenced to “fixed punishment with life without the possibility of parole.”
It took the jury under four hours to deliberate, according to The Norman Transcript.
The three witnesses testified Kailee confided in them, telling them how her father would climb into her bed and inappropriately touch her, according to the trial testimony chronicled by The Oklahoman.
One of them, Sonia Ghanatti Hester, testified Kailee "told me her dad hit her and made her nose bleed," according to the publication.
Prosecutors suspected that during the predawn hours of June 29, 2017, McMullen shot Kailee at his Norman home and then stalled in calling 911 for help. Instead, they accused the father of first calling his wife and then Kailee’s birth mother.
By 5:45 a.m., prosecutors say McMullen finally placed the 911 call and told the dispatcher that his daughter shot herself with a gun, according to a recording of the call, Oklahoma City’s NBC station KFOR reported.
“Did she do it to herself?” the 911 dispatcher asked.
“Yes,” McMullen responded.
He later admitted to moving Kailee’s body to the living room, telling the dispatcher he suspected she was “not breathing.”
“She’s gone,” he is heard saying on the recorded 911 phone call. “I’m telling you she’s gone. She’s not breathing.”
He later tried to apply chest compressions, taking direction from the dispatcher before his wife arrived and took over.
“My wife’s a nurse,” he said. “She’s doing CPR.”
Medics also attempted to resuscitate Kailee without success.
McMullen is due back in court on Dec. 4 to be formally sentenced, the clerk confirmed.
