When Love Hurts: Scorned Girlfriend Faces Death Penalty

Mississippi middle school teacher Carla Hughes could face the death penalty after she was found guilty Tuesday of fatally shooting and stabbing her lover’s pregnant fiance in 2006. Hughes, 28, sobbed loudly as a judge read the verdicts on two counts of capital murder for the deaths of Avis Banks and her unborn child. The jury also found the slayings occurred during the commission of a burglary, making Hughes eligible for the death penalty.

Banks, 27, was found lying in a pool of blood on November 29, 2006, in the garage of the Ridgeland home she shared with Pittman, the father of her unborn child. She had been shot four times in the leg, chest and head, and then stabbed multiple times in the face and neck as she lay dying, according to medical testimony.

Suspicion initially fell on Pittman, who admitted to having an affair with Hughes, a language arts teacher. Pittman old the jury he began seeing Hughes one month after finding out his girlfriend was pregnant. He testified that the two met frequently in Hughes’ home and even went out of town together, but he insisted the relationship was based solely on sex.–BB