08132015 - News Article - Shooting victim warned of potential harm

Shooting victim warned of potential harm
NWI Times
08/13/2015
Bob Kasarda bob.kasarda@nwi.com, (219) 548-4345
http://www.nwitimes.com/news/local/porter/shooting-victim-warned-of-potential-harm/article_82924695-752d-5a2c-b7d1-2c79e6e35f65.html

PORTAGE | A woman shot and killed at her home Wednesday had told the courts nearly a year earlier that she feared the alleged gunman - her estranged husband - would hurt her.

"The thought of him losing complete control of our marriage could well cause him to act violently and irrationally," Maria Contreras said in a handwritten letter used to help convince the court in September to order Miguel Contreras to stay away from her.

Elsewhere in the same letter, she said Miguel Contreras "has demanded complete control of everything" during their 22-year marriage. She said the marriage had been terrible during its last two years and Miguel Contreras had refused to disclose information about their assets.

"Recently, when I told him I was leaving, he told me I should kill myself rather than return home," she said.

Miguel Contreras, 51, is believed to have shot Maria Contreras, 45, and then himself around 4 p.m. at her home in the 3000 block of Edith Street in the Sandalwood Estates subdivision on the city's east side, police said. Miguel Contreras, who has not been charged, survived the apparent suicide attempt and is hospitalized in an unknown condition.

The couple had a final divorce hearing scheduled for Sept. 29, according to court records.

Police said they were called to the home Wednesday for a report of a verbal disturbance and were told while en route that shots had been fired. They arrived to find Maria Contreras' body lying across the track of a sliding glass door at the rear of the house with her body half inside and half outside the home.

Miguel Contreras was found inside the home, injured but still breathing. He was transported to The Methodist Hospitals' Northlake campus in Gary.

Police found a semi-automatic handgun believed to have been used in the homicide inside the home.

Maria Contreras secured the protective order in September in anticipation of the divorce.

"I am very fearful that he will harm me when he is served with the divorce papers that I am filing with this protective order," she wrote. "I ask that he be removed from the marital residence pending a provisional hearing in the divorce."

The protective order was issued and then dismissed at Maria Contreras' request two weeks later, according to court records.

Maria Contreras was pronounced dead at her home at 4:39 p.m., Porter County Coroner Chuck Harris said.

The cause of death was ruled multiple gunshot wounds suffered in a homicide, Harris said.

The case remains under investigation by Portage police.

Miguel Contreras was also arrested for drunk driving in July 2010, according to court records.