The woman charged in the Tuesday killing of a Bangor man joked about pulling the trigger of a handgun before fatally shooting him, a prosecutor said Friday.
Olivia Babin, 20, of Bangor then threw the handgun in the Kenduskeag Stream and changed her clothes before calling 911, roughly 30 minutes after shooting Daniel Ford-Coates, 24, according to the prosecutor. Ford-Coates, also of Bangor, was transported to a hospital where he was pronounced dead.
Babin, who said she and Ford-Coates were dating, is charged with negligent manslaughter in his death. Details of the case were described by Maine Assistant Attorney General Jennifer Ackerman during Babin’s first court appearance Friday afternoon in Penobscot County Superior Court in Bangor.
Babin was given a $100,000 cash bail, which she had not posted as of 2 p.m. Friday. She is not allowed to have contact with 10 different people under her bail conditions. Her next court date is June 10.
Ford-Coates was shot and killed around 4 a.m. Tuesday morning at a house on Highland Avenue, near the intersection with Ohio Street.
Four people were in Ford-Coates’ apartment, including Babin and Ford-Coates, in the hours before the shooting, and people were drinking and using unspecified drugs, Ackerman said. She described details shared by the two witnesses, a man and a woman, with police.
At some point Babin decided she wanted to scare women in an apartment below and found Ford-Coates’ 9mm handgun, Ackerman said. Babin took the “clip out of the handgun” and manipulated it in a way that suggested it was unloaded, the assistant AG said.
Babin put the gun up to Ford-Coates’ head and said, “Oh, you don’t think I will?” then laughed and pulled the trigger, Ackerman said. Ford-Coates had muzzle burns on his forehead consistent with a contact shot, Ackerman said.
A doorbell camera captured audio of the shooting because of an open window, Ackerman said. She explained a gunshot can be heard and then a woman, whose voice is “strikingly similar” to Babin’s, is screaming expletives and saying “What do I do?” and “You’re not dead.”
After the shooting the man who witnessed the shooting left the apartment and the other woman stayed with Babin, Ackerman said. The two women walked to the Kenduskeag Stream and threw the gun in the river. Babin also changed her clothes before 911 was called at 4:25 a.m., about 25 to 35 minutes after the shooting, Ackerman said.
The state chief medical examiner’s office ruled Ford-Coates’ death a homicide after an autopsy.
Negligent manslaughter is when someone intentionally causes a person’s death in extreme anger or fear that is caused by “adequate provocation,” under Maine law. Those circumstances reduce the charge from murder to manslaughter.