In his book Schulz and Peanuts, David Michaelis thankfully did not — that I noticed, anyway — mention a violent event that once took place at 1 Snoopy Place. Maybe it was in his 1800-page first draft. But something related to the story has happened, so here are the unpleasant details.
1995 ‘Peanuts’ Office Shooter Dies
By CLARK MASON
THE PRESS DEMOCRATShirley Ann Nelson, the Santa Rosa woman who shot her estranged husband a decade ago while he was at work at the office of “Peanuts” cartoonist Charles Schulz, has died.
Nelson, 78, died in Santa Rosa Memorial Hospital on Jan. 30, two months after the onset of colon cancer, according to her death certificate.
Nelson was sentenced to a year in jail, five years’ probation and 3,000 hours of community service in 1997 for attempting to kill her husband Ronald Nelson, who was Schulz’s business manager. [Nelson was VP of Creative Associates — DOuG]
Nelson was wounded twice in the July 5, 1995, shooting. Shirley Nelson then shot herself in the chest in a suicide attempt.
She told police she tried to kill her husband because he had left her for another woman. [Reported to be Schulz’s secretary, Eileen Christiansen, then 41 — DOuG] The socially prominent couple had been married 30 years.
The jury deadlocked 9-3 in favor of acquittal on the attempted murder charge after Nelson claimed she was emotionally unbalanced and temporarily insane when she brought the loaded handgun to her husband’s office.
Prosecutors were preparing for a second trial when Nelson accepted a plea bargain that allowed her to avoid a lengthy term in state prison.
Schulz, who died eight years ago, posted bail for Shirley Nelson and later wrote to the court asking she be placed on probation in lieu of a prison term. [Schulz was the first witness called by the defense — DOuG]
Ronald Nelson, who divorced her in 1997, also asked that she get probation.
She served five months in jail and 18 months of house arrest in her home near Santa Rosa Golf & Country Club.
“I remained very close to her all these years,” her defense attorney, Chris Andrian, said Wednesday. He described her as essentially “kind and good.”
He said she was “heartbroken” over the shooting. “In hindsight she regretted it and would say, ‘I don’t know how that could have been me,’ ” Andrian said.
He said Nelson, who enjoyed driving a red Chevy Corvette convertible, had suffered from declining health in recent years.
Andrian and private investigator Chris Reynolds said Nelson donated “hundreds of thousands of dollars” to charities following her conviction. “She was one of the kindest, most charitable people I ever knew,” said Reynolds. “She would help anyone.”
After the shooting, she used her maiden name, Shirley Spencer.
Her death was not announced in newspaper obituaries and the funeral home that handled her cremation was asked not to comment.
She never remarried. She leaves a brother and a daughter from an earlier marriage.
Charles M. Schulz died eight years ago today. Seems a lot longer, doesn’t it?
