A “drunk, angry and selfish” West Australian woman who shot dead her partner after 35 years of a seemingly “normal and loving” life together has been sentenced to life imprisonment, with a 14-and-a-half year minimum term.
Key points:

• Debra Holmes fatally shot Wayne Chappell in the stomach after a row
• The court heard her blood alcohol reading at the time was .204 per cent
• But the Chief Justice described the shooting as “quite deliberate”

Debra Jane Alicia Holmes was found guilty by a Supreme Court jury of murdering mine worker and union official Wayne Chappell at their property in Muja, south of Perth, on July 15, 2018.
The two had been drinking in a shed when they had an argument, whereby Mr Chappell grabbed Holmes and pulled her hair before throwing her onto the bitumen outside.
Holmes, 55, went into the house and retrieved what the family called the “night shift gun”, a .22 calibre rifle, before returning to the shed and shooting Mr Chappell in the stomach.
Holmes shot Mr Chappell with a .22 calibre rifle in what was called a “quite deliberate” attack.(Supplied: Supreme Court of WA)
She then made a series of drunken calls to triple-0, in which she claimed Mr Chappell was mean and nasty, that she could not put up with it anymore and that she would rather be in jail than with him.
“I try to be nice to him every day he comes home and he’s just whinge, whinge, and now I’m the bad guy,” she said.
The court was told it was estimated Holmes’s blood alcohol reading at the time of the shooting was .204 per cent.
Want more WA news?
Did you know we offer a local version of the ABC News homepage? Watch below to see how you can set yours, and get more WA stories.
(Hint: You’ll have to go back to the home page to do this)
Chief Justice Peter Quinlan accepted she had not intended to kill Mr Chappell, saying he doubted that in her drunken and angry state that she turned her mind to the lethal consequences of firing the gun.
But he said while Holmes’s intoxication was an explanation, it was not a mitigating factor, describing the shooting as “quite deliberate”.
“In the end, your actions were motivated by selfishness, anger and stupidity, fuelled by your drunken state,” he told her.
He also accepted that she must have been in a state of shock after being assaulted, adding that she had the opportunity to calm down but did not, instead deciding to go and get the gun.
Murder tragic for ‘close-knit’ family
Chief Justice Quinlan described the family as “close-knit”, with Holmes and Mr Chappell having two daughters and four grandchildren together.
He said the couple’s 35-year relationship was a “normal, supporting and loving” one, but said that made Holmes’s actions all the more tragic and difficult to comprehend for her daughters, who loved her and their father very much.
He said he also wanted to make it clear that the assault on Holmes by Mr Chappell on the night of the shooting was, as she told police, the first time he had ever done something bad to her.
A Supreme Court jury found Holmes guilty in September of murdering Mr Chappell.(ABC News)
Chief Justice Quinlan said while the assault was “cowardly and unlawful”, it was not the result of a history of domestic or family violence.
That was echoed by Holmes’s lawyer, Katherine Dowling, who said the defence was not trying to disparage Mr Chappell, whom she described as “clearly a wonderful man and an outstanding member of the community”.
Holmes has been in custody since her arrest on the night of the shooting.
With time already served, she will first be eligible for release on parole in January 2033.