Husband to Blame in Young Wife's 2001 Death?

Oct. 28, 2010— -- The controversial and mysterious death of Melissa Huntley Motz is now one step closer to being solved.

Following unrelenting pressure from her parents and a six-month "20/20" investigation that aired this summer, a York County, S.C., coroner's inquest has overturned the initial finding of "undeterminded" and has now labeled the 35-year-old woman's death from a gunshot wound as a homicide at the hands of her husband, James "Jimmy" Motz.

The six inquest jurors ruled Melissa Motz, "came to her death on February 16, 2001, by a gunshot wound to the head and James Pease Motz, by misfortune and contrary to his will ... did kill and slay".

"This is a homicide ... along the manner of involuntary manslaughter," coroner Sabrina Gast told ABC News

Motz's attorney told "20/20" this summer that Motz had explained to police his wife had committed suicide, saying she pulled the trigger from under her chin and fired a bullet that traveled up to her head while sitting in the passenger seat of the family car, while he innocently watched through the windshield from a sidewalk a few feet in front of the vehicle.

Motz' story was contradicted by a witness he didn't notice standing about 40 feet behind him on the same sidewalk.

Witness Christopher Campbell told "20/20" and testified at the inquest that he did not hear a shot as Jimmy Motz was in front of the vehicle. Instead he saw Motz get out of the car, walk to the front, look inside and then return to the driver's side of the car, where he began to scream for help.

A lie detector expert also testified that there were new questions about whether Motz really had passed a polygraph in which he denied killing his wife.

Melissa Motz' mother and father said they never believed Jimmy Motz's version of events and told "20/20" they are now "at peace with the verdict" of the inquest, which not only confirmed their suspicions that Motz was responsible for the death their daughter, but also "took the suicide thing off the table."

What happens next is up to the prosecutor in Spartanburg, S.C., who now is handling the case after York County prosecutors recused themselves under pressure from the media and family.

Jimmy Motz's brother is a high-ranking political official in York County, which raised questions from the community about whether Motz somehow was being protected because of connections.

Now that the coroner's inquest has ruled homicide, prosecution on involuntary manslaughter charges is possible but perhaps unlikely, because the jury ruled her death was "contrary to" her husband's will.

"20/20" reported on the Motz case this past summer, questioning the original coroner's ruling of suicide and the York County prosecutor's decision not to take the case to trial, even though the investigating detectives strongly recommended Jimmy Motz be charged with a crime.

Melissa Motz's Valentine's 2001 Murder

Melissa Huntley married Jimmy Motz in December 2000. Two months later, she was dead of a single gunshot wound.

There was a wedding and a funeral, but in between there were 62 days of love and trouble in the short, strange marriage of the Rock Hill, S.C., couple.

On Valentine's Day 2001, the couple had been fighting. The falling out was so bad, the newlyweds slept in separate beds. Motz said his wife, 35, woke up the next morning still so upset she was sobbing.

By that night, the air had cleared enough so that they went out together. After drinking and smoking marijuana, Motz said he and his wife drove his Ford Thunderbird a half an hour north to a Charlotte strip club called the Paper Doll Lounge.

But, according to Motz, there were further upsets after he paid a stripper for an up-close-and-personal table dance. Melissa Motz stormed out of the club.

"There was some argument where she got up and went to get a taxi to go home," said Charles Cabaniss, who was in charge of the Rock Hill Police Department's homicide unit at the time. "[Motz] got her in the vehicle, and they left. Mr. Motz indicates there was no arguments, no words. He said there was not even ... conversation all the way home."

During the drive home, Motz said his wife, riding in the front passenger seat, took his loaded .32 magnum revolver out of the glove compartment. Motz claimed he took it away from her and put it back.

There was no more excitement the rest of the way home, according to Motz, until they pulled into the parking lot of their apartment complex.

Motz said he got out and was walking around the car to help his wife out of the car when he suddenly heard a gunshot and saw a puff of smoke inside the car. His wife had taken the gun out of the glove compartment again, Motz said, and this time, placed it under her chin and shot herself.

Motz went back into the car, and said he touched his wife's face, getting blood on his hands as he tried to "wake her up."

Abandoning any efforts to provide first aid or comfort his dying wife, Motz took the gun from her lap, went out into the parking lot, and fired the remaining rounds into the air, in what he said was an effort to get help.

CLICK HERE to see photos of the crime scene

Wife's Family Doesn't Believe It's Suicide

But Campbell, a neighbor who happened to be outside, said he had already approached Motz, and then ran inside to call 911. Campbell said he saw everything that happened in the parking lot from the moment Jimmy and Melissa Motz pulled in, but that he never saw or heard a gunshot from inside the car.

Melissa Motz's friends and family couldn't believe that their cheerful daughter would take her own life.

Her parents, Patsy and Larry Huntley, said their daughter hated guns. They added that she was planning for the future, buying greeting cards for upcoming holidays. They received a Valentine's Day card from their daughter the day after she died.

"I have a box of cards that she had bought ahead and she had bought a Mother's Day card and a Father's Day card and a birthday card for her brother," Patsy Huntley said.

In the Huntleys' eyes, there was one suspect: Jimmy Motz.

Motz said his wife had been prescribed an antidepressant and claimed she'd attempted suicide a few months before, but he kept it a secret until her death.

"You've got someone who suffers from depression. You've got someone maybe who was tempted to commit suicide before. You've got all those factors," said Motz's lawyer, James Boyd. "Now, is it logical that she'd do it? No. Is it consistent with everything that happened, that she would do that? I think, yes."

But police also began to doubt Motz's suicide story. According to a forensics exam, police said the angle of Melissa Motz's wound suggested she may have been shot by someone next to her.

"If she had fired the gun, it would have been an unnatural way that she would have had to have held the gun," Cabaniss said, noting that Melissa Motz was right-handed, but gun residue was found on her left hand. "It would have been very easy and more natural to occur from someone from the driver's side of the vehicle."

Given the police's suspicions and mounting evidence, the Huntleys were shocked when the local prosecutor at the time, Tommy Pope, told them he was not going to prosecute Jimmy Motz, believing there was insufficient evidence for a conviction.

"The prosecutor's job is to try to see that justice is done for the victims as well as the defendants. And in this particular case, it did not warrant going forward," Pope told ABC News' Jim Avila.

Case Summary Unearths Motz's Long Criminal Record

"20/20" filed an open records request and recently gained access to the evidence and police records related to Melissa Huntley Motz's death.

Along with the gun that fired the fatal shot and the misshapen bullet retrieved from her head was a three-page document -- the case summary of the Rock Hill Police Department's investigation into Melissa Motz's death. It showed that detectives discovered Jimmy Motz had a long criminal record, including some dark and violent events in his past.

Motz's two previous marriages ended in divorce, and the grounds in both cases were physical cruelty. He also had been convicted of criminal domestic violence against one of his ex-wives, Sandy, who gave police a sworn statement detailing how her husband would fly into a fit of rage and threaten her by placing a gun under her chin.

"My first reaction was that he killed her," Sandy Motz said in a police statement on the circumstances of Melissa Motz's death. "I was not surprised, because I [had] been in her position so many times before."

Also, because of his history of criminal domestic violence, Motz wasn't legally allowed to buy or even possess a gun. The revolver had been purchased by his 80-year-old mother five years earlier.

The police investigation summary ended with the following stunning sentence: "Considering the wound, the path the projectile traveled, James Motz's past history, the witness not hearing a gunshot from less than 50 feet away, along with the pinch marks on Melissa's palm of her left hand, indications are that James Motz possibly placed the gun under her chin and pulled the trigger while they were both seated inside the car shortly before arriving at their apartment."

Melissa Motz's parents sued their son-in-law for wrongful death. After a trial in 2007, a jury found Motz caused Melissa's death, although it didn't have to decide whether she committed suicide or he killed her. The jury awarded the Huntleys $25,000 in damages, but the Huntleys said Motz has yet to pay them a dime.

It was nine years later that the new county coroner actively reinvestigated the case.