MONKTON — Vermont State Police on Tuesday afternoon arrested Angela Auclair, 47, of Monkton in connection with the murder of her late husband, David Auclair, who was shot to death in Hinesburg near their Monkton home on July 11.
On Wednesday morning, Angela Auclair pleaded innocent in Chittenden Superior Court, Criminal Division, to charges of aiding in the commission of a felony (that felony being first-degree murder) and obstruction of justice arising from the July 11 slaying.
“The investigation revealed a pre-planned and coordinated effort to burglarize a Colchester residence where a firearm was stolen and used in the killing of David Auclair just over one day after the burglary,” state police said in a press release. “Detectives also learned Angela Auclair instructed at least one witness in the case to lie to the police.”
Auclair was jailed without bail on Tuesday.
Three months ago, Vermont State Police arrested Angela Auclair’s son Kory Lee George, 31, of Monkton for firearms violation charges, including possession of the gun police say was used to kill David Auclair.
Auclair, 45, a longtime Monkton resident, was shot and killed in the parking lot of the LaPlatte Headwaters Town Forest, off Gilman Road in Hinesburg, at around 9:45 p.m. on July 11, police say.
As the Independent reported in September, a little over an hour after Auclair’s killing, Det. Sergeant James Vooris of the VSP Major Crimes Unit was responding to multiple reports of gunshots in the area when he discovered Auclair’s body. Vooris said in an affidavit that the body “lay partly under a 2017 GMC pickup truck registered in his name.
“His head and torso were under the truck while his legs protruded. He had been shot multiple times. There was black grease on his hands; it appeared that he may have been trying to crawl under the truck as he was being shot.”
Nine bullets were recovered from Auclair’s body, Vooris went on to say, which the Vermont Forensic Laboratory later concluded had been fired from a 9mm Beretta semi-automatic pistol — one of the two guns Kory George is accused of possessing.
George’s previous felony convictions prohibited him from possessing firearms. He has not been charged with committing homicide, but he has been accused of stealing the Beretta the evening before Auclair was killed.
According to court documents in that case, evidence indicates that on July 10 George stole the Beretta from the Colchester home of an Auclair family friend, James Synnott, while Angela and David Auclair were having dinner with Synnott at a restaurant.
An hour before he stole the gun, George had met his mother at the University Mall in South Burlington. Then, while the Auclairs dined with Synnott, Angela Auclair’s boyfriend John Turner, 47, of Huntington, drove George to Colchester and dropped him off near Synnott’s house, said Vooris in his affidavit. George entered Synnott’s house, stayed for about 10 minutes, then left the area with Turner.
The stolen Beretta was test-fired a few hours later near the Auclairs’ Monkton property at 116 Cat Tail Lane, Vooris said.
On July 14, three days after David Auclair was killed, the Beretta was recovered from Lewis Creek, between the Auclairs’ Monkton home and the Hinesburg parking lot where the homicide took place.
The gun’s condition suggests that it hadn’t been there long. Police also found a prepaid cellphone that had been used to call David Auclair less than an hour before he was killed. “Evidence indicates that the cell phone was purchased on July 11, 2019, at the Rite Aid in Milton,” Vooris’ affidavit said.
This evidence, and the fact that the shooter left no casings at the crime scene, “indicates that the murder of the defendant’s stepfather was carefully planned and executed,” wrote the U.S. Attorney’s office in a court document.
George remains in jail. His trial date has not been scheduled yet.
Reach Christopher Ross at [email protected].