48-year-old Dale Collinge, of Pembroke, New Hampshire, has been charged with second-degree murder in the shooting death of his roommate Karen Boelzner. The shooting comes just nine days after a judge returned seized guns to Collinge.
In 2006 Collinge's then wife claimed that he had threatened to shoot her, their three children, and himself. She took out a domestic violence protection order on Collinge, under which Collinge could not possess firearms. The guns were seized by the Pembroke police.
On November 4 of this year, Judge Scheffy noted that because there are not "any outstanding protective orders or qualifying domestic violence misdemeanor convictions which would prohibit the defendant from possessing a firearm" Colligne was now legally eligible to possess firearms and ruled that police should return Collinge's guns.
Colligne was convicted in 2006 for criminally threatening his then-wife but this conviction does not prohibit him from possessing a gun. For that, he would have to have been convicted of a charge of misdemeanor domestic violence.
Police would not say if the gun used in the shooting was one of the returned seized guns. Collinge is being held without bail.
