Mom accused of shooting son with gun she used to kill ex-husband

Story here. Excerpt:

'A woman who was acquitted of murder after killing her ex-husband more than 20 years ago in South Florida is now facing charges of trying to kill her adult son — with the same gun.

Prosecutors in Las Vegas want a jury there to learn about the trial Linda Cooney won in 1993, when she was accused in the Feb. 7, 1992 shooting death of prominent Palm Beach County tax attorney James Cooney.

The testimony of Kevin Cooney, 11 at the time of the trial, was key to his mother's acquittal, according to Peter Magrino, the prosecutor who tried the case. James and Linda Cooney had divorced four years earlier, and she claimed she acted in self-defense when she shot him.

When Linda Cooney shot her ex-husband in 1992, Kevin Cooney told police he saw his fatally wounded father lying on the floor after he'd been shot. His hands were empty, he said. But during the trial, he told lawyers his father may have had something in his hands after all.

"Unfortunately, the children were at such a young age and had been so traumatized, it presented the prosecution with a problem in terms of the inconsistency of their statements," he said.

In June 2011, Kevin Cooney was on the receiving end of a bullet from the same .357 Magnum that killed his father. The gunshot left him paralyzed. But Las Vegas prosecutors are concerned Kevin Cooney will again emerge as his mother's best witness after she talked to him while he was recuperating in the hospital.'

The CBS news program "48 Hours" here in the US will be airing a segment titled "Mommy Dearest" on this case on Sat., Oct. 4, 2014 at 8:00 PM Eastern time.