See update No. 3 at the end of post about Cypress Police reportedly confirming Brinda McCoy tried to take her own life.
See update No. 2 at the end of post about McCoy hospitalized after being found bleeding in her Cypress home.
See update No. 1 at the end of post about the maximum sentence McCoy faces and the scheduled date of that hearing.
ORIGINAL POST, JUNE 18, 2:22 P.M.: A jury today found the wife of Oceanside's police chief, who is also a former mayor of Cypress, guilty of firing two rounds at Cypress police officers responding in 2010 to a disturbance at her home.
Brinda Sue McCoy, 49, was convicted on five counts of assaulting a police officer for waving, pointing and firing her husband Frank's semiautomatic service handgun at the cops the night of Dec. 16, 2010.
Ms. McCoy headed into the trial facing six felony counts of assault with a semi-automatic firearm on a peace officer, one felony count of discharging a firearm with gross negligence, sentencing enhancements for the personal discharge of a firearm and up to 61 years and eight months in state prison with a conviction.
She called 9-1-1 that fateful night and, 1 1/2 hours after Cypress officers responded and tried to get her to come out of her residence, she pointed the gun at her head, the ceiling and then directly at the cops outside. McCoy testified during the trial that she did not know police were outside and that she was instead pointing the weapon at a truck on the street.
Fortunately for McCoy, the cops did not immediately take her out but instead warned her that if she fired her weapon, she could hurt an officer. McCoy responded by firing twice from inside her home at officers stationed behind two parked vehicles. She was arrested after a SWAT officer stopped her with a bean-bag gun.
At trial, her lawyer denied his client fired the gun. She blamed her outburst on depression.
UPDATE, JUNE 18, 2:27 P.M.: In addition to the five felony counts of assault with a semi-automatic firearm on a peace officer, the jury today found Brinda Sue McCoy guilty of one felony count of discharging a firearm with gross negligence with sentencing enhancements for the personal discharge of a firearm.
She faces a maximum sentence of 29 years and eight months in state prison at a scheduled Sept. 10 hearing in Santa Ana, according to a statement from the Orange County District Attorney's office.
UPDATE, JUNE 25, 1:10 P.M.: Orange County Fire Authority first responders were called just before 11 a.m. Sunday to the Tuscani Drive home in Cypress of Brinda Sue McCoy, who was found bleeding.
The 49-year-old wife of Oceanside Police Chief Frank McCoy, a former Cypress mayor, was taken to Los Alamitos Medical Center, where her condition is being kept under wrap.
Brinda McCoy is free on $250,000 bail after being found guilty June 18 of one felony count of discharging a firearm with gross negligence with sentencing enhancements for the personal discharge of a firearm. She is scheduled to be sentenced Sept. 10.
UPDATE, JUNE 25, 2:11 P.M.: Cypress Police confirm Brinda Sue McCoy, who was found bleeding in the backyard of her Tuscani Drive home Sunday morning, suffered self-inflicted wounds in an attempt to kill herself, the Orange County Register reports.
Her husband, who is the Oceanside police chief, and her son were reportedly home at the time. No one other than Brinda McCoy are believed to have participated in causing the injuries, which were unspecified but serious, according to the report.
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OC Weekly Editor-in-Chief Matt Coker has been engaging, enraging and entertaining readers of newspapers, magazines and websites for decades. He spent the first 13 years of his career in journalism at daily newspapers before “graduating” to OC Weekly in 1995 as the alternative newsweekly’s first calendar editor.