Thursday, March 16, 2017
Staff report
BOARDMAN
A police report detailing a shooting for which Tena Garver, 47, faces charges sheds new light on the incident that sent officers to the Chelsea Court Apartments about 4 a.m. Tuesday.
Garver, along with the victim, reportedly tried to blame the shooting of her boyfriend on “a black male wearing a black hooded sweatshirt,” a claim township police quickly dispelled based on the evidence at the scene.
“As officers arrived at the apartment door, we observed no foot tracks in the freshly fallen snow from either direction,” an officer noted.
Inside, police found Garver and her boyfriend, who was lying on a couch with a gunshot wound to the chest. He was taken to an area hospital, and reportedly was in stable condition later that day.
According to police, Garver repeatedly changed her story before confessing the shooting. She at one point told police a man came to the apartment door and shot her boyfriend, then later said the shooting occurred outside when the victim was taking out the trash.
“She said [the victim] went to take the trash to the dumpster, and when he returned, he was holding his chest and covered in wet blood, complaining, ‘I got shot,’” according to the report. Police, however, observed no footprints near the trash receptacle and found a garbage bin in the apartment still had trash in it.
Garver then claimed the victim had shot himself, but eventually relented and said, “I’m going to jail, aren’t I?’”
When asked why she would go to jail, she reportedly replied, “I did something bad. I shot him.”
According to the report, Garver told officers she shot her boyfriend after an argument in which he had “threatened to shoot her dog after it made a mess on the floor.”
Garver remained in the Mahoning County jail late Wednesday on charges of felonious assault and domestic violence.
According to jail records, her bond is set at $12,000 and $2,500, respectively, for the two charges.