Truesee's Daily Wonder

 

Gary Taylor

As blood poured out of an elderly Volusia County woman Thursday night, she called 911 from her mansion south of New Smyrna Beach and said calmly: "My husband just shot me."

While 71-year-old Patricia Malewski explained her injuries to a Volusia County Sheriff's Office 911 operator, her drunken husband could be heard yelling in the background, saying it was an "accident."

"It was on purpose," she stated adamantly from the couple's $2.2 million home in southeast Volusia County.

The nearly 10-minute recording of her 911 call provides more than just another piece of evidence for investigators, who charged retired auctioneer Theodore Malewski, 63, with a slew of crimes Friday.

The recording also offers a riveting, rare glimpse into what happens to a couple in the moments immediately following sudden violence.

Patricia is surprisingly calm as she disputed her husband's version of what happened in their waterfront home near the city of Edgewater.

"He's not shot. I am. You should see,'' she told the 911 operator. "I've got a bullet hole in my stomach."

The phone was passed first to the victim's husband and then to her sister, Rosemarie Hughes, before deputies arrived and took Theodore Malewski into custody.

He is accused of aggravated battery while using a deadly weapon, assault with intent to commit a felony and use or display a firearm during a felony offense, sheriff's spokesman Brandon Haught said.

He is being held without bail at the Volusia County Branch Jail near Daytona Beach.

Patricia Malewski was airlifted to Halifax Health Medical Center in Daytona Beach, where she underwent surgery and is now recovering in the hospital's intensive-care unit.

Haught described her as "alert and talking," just as she was in her 911 call.

Patricia told the 911 operator that her husband was "drunk as a skunk." Theodore told deputies he had been drinking whiskey all day.

But much of what he said was unintelligible, mostly mumbles. One of his few clear sentences: "It was an accident."

About halfway through the call, the operator told the man to go outside their Godfrey Road home and put his hands into the air. Instead, according to the call and a report, all three went outside.

Asked if he had a long driveway, the man replied "yes," and said: "I've got a mansion."

As the operator continued asking about his wife's condition, Theodore said: "She's okay."

That's when Hughes grabbed the phone and said; "She's not okay. She's shot."

She told the dispatcher she was Patricia's sister and repeated the dispatcher's instructions for Theodore to put his hands into the air.

A Volusia deputy and Oak Hill police officer were the first to arrive and the deputy said in a report that they could see all three on the porch. The officers tried to conceal themselves as they approached because of the nature of the call.

Before they reached the house, Theodore Malewski went inside and closed the door.

They found the two women sitting on a bench. Patricia Malewski was smoking and her sister was comforting her, according to the report.

Theodore told deputies he and his wife went out to lunch about 4 p.m. and drank wine. He said they returned home and drank whiskey, the report said.

"Malewski said he and his wife began arguing, but he did not remember about what," deputies wrote in the report. He told deputies they went upstairs to a bedroom and continued arguing and he got a handgun from a nightstand and began waving it at his wife.

He said he shot next to his wife, and did not believe her when she said she had been hit by one of the three bullets he fired, according to the report. He told deputies he did not mean to shoot her.

Deputies executed a search warrant at the home and seized two handguns, a shotgun and a rifle.

They said they also found trace amounts of marijuana and "numerous" pipes used for smoking marijuana, according to the report.

Records show domestic violence-related reports involving Theodore Malewski, but those were in the 1990s in Oak Hill, Haught said.

Annie R. Gregory obtained a temporary domestic-violence injunction against Theodore Malewski in 1994, court records show. Gregory's relationship to Malewski is not known.

Walter Pacheco of the Sentinel staff contributed to this report. Gary Taylor can be reached at