By DOUG HARLOW
Staff Writer Tuesday, March 13, 2007

Staff Writer

SKOWHEGAN -- A former Hartland woman who spent more than five years in prison for killing her husband in 1999 has petitioned the county probate court to have her name changed.

Vella Gogan, 61, pleaded guilty to manslaughter in the shooting death and mutilation of Eugene Gogan in 1999 and was released from the Maine Correctional Center in Windham last summer.

She filed the necessary paperwork with the Somerset County Registry of Probate last month, according to documents.

Gogan's new name, if the petition is approved March 27 by Probate Judge John Alsop, will be Vella Ruth Pelletier.

"I want to go back to my maiden name," Gogan wrote in the application.

Contacted by telephone Monday morning, Gogan declined to be interviewed.

Gogan originally was charged with murder in the Oct. 1, 1999, death of her husband, who was shot three times in the head as he slept in the couple's home on Route 43, Athens Road.

The body of the 65-year-old man was cut into pieces and found six days later in the woods off Route 16 in Mayfield Township, north of Athens village and 25 miles from the couple's home.

Investigators recovered more than a dozen pieces of his body, including the torso and head.

Maine State Police detectives said the rest -- his hands, feet, parts of his legs and arms -- had been buried in shallow holes in the woods.

Vella Gogan said she had acted in self-defense against her husband of 37 years, who had been psychologically and physically abusive to her.

She said she feared her husband had planned to kill her. Two psychologists and two psychiatrists concluded she feared for her life and suffered from "battered-wife syndrome."

But the state prosecutor, Assistant Attorney General Andrew Benson, called Vella Gogan's actions a virtual execution and "the ultimate act of domestic violence."

Family members of Eugene Gogan agreed with Benson, saying the charge should have been murder.

In an angry and emotional statement to the court and to Gogan, Susan Estes, a niece, said she felt betrayed by the court system, which she said had gagged family members and treated Eugene Gogan's killer as the victim.

"There's been no justice for his death," she said at the time.

Vella Gogan pleaded guilty to manslaughter in 2001 because she feared a jury might not agree that she acted in self-defense and convict her of murder, which carries a 25-year minimum sentence in Maine.

Gogan was sentenced to 15 years in prison, with all but six years suspended, and six years of probation. A spokeswoman at the Department of Corrections said Gogan will be on probation until June 2012.

Cindy Dillon, clerk of the probate court in Skowhegan, said Gogan came in herself to file for the name change, a routine act by a widow or a woman who has been divorced.

"She does not have to come in for the hearing," Dillon said. "Adults changing their name don't have to come in unless a judge wants them to."

She said Alsop will review the petition March 27 and sign the order if it is approved and mail a certificate of name change to Gogan at her address on Middle Road, Skowhegan.

M. Michaela Murphy, a Waterville lawyer, along with lawyer Janet Mills of Skowhegan, represented Gogan in the manslaughter case.

Murphy said Monday she has not had contact with her former client. Mills said she has spoken with Gogan and said she thought it was time to leave the case to history.

"I think the case is long over with and people should put it behind them," Mills said. "She has paid her dues."

Doug Harlow -- 861-9244

dharlow@centralmaine.com