James Colley was sentenced to death by the State of Florida for the murder of his wife and her friend
According to court documents James Colley would murder Amanda Colley and her friend Lindy Dobbins
James Colley would be arrested, convicted and sentenced to death
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Where Is James Colley Now
James Colley is incarcerated at Union Correctional Institution
James Colley Case
The jury in this case found James Colley guilty of murdering his estranged wife, Amanda Cloaninger Colley, and Amanda’s friend Lindy Dobbins. At the time of the murders, James Colley was subject to a domestic violence injunction restricting his contact with Amanda. In fact, less than two hours before committing the murders, Colley personally appeared at a court hearing about an earlier violation of that injunction. We recount the hours leading up to the murders in some detail, because the sequence of events is relevant to the arguments Colley raises on appeal.
At the time of the murders, James Colley was living in his sister’s house on Garrison Drive in St. Augustine. Amanda still lived in the marital home on South Bellagio Drive, about fifteen miles away. Although he was dating someone else, James Colley hoped he would reconcile with Amanda. Colley suspected that Amanda was dating, but she had refused to admit that to him.
Around 4 a.m. on August 27, 2015, Colley drove to Amanda’s house, unaware that Amanda was not there. Colley searched the empty home and found sex toys and men’s polo shirts. His suspicions confirmed, Colley ransacked the house, smashing television sets and dumping trash on the floor. Afterward, Colley briefly visited a friend a few houses down the street (to tell the friend what he had discovered), and he eventually returned to his sister’s home on Garrison Drive. Colley also placed multiple phone calls to Amanda, most of which went unanswered.
Amanda returned to her home at about 9 a.m. She FaceTimed her boyfriend, Lamar Douberly, to show him what Colley had done. Lamar drove to Amanda’s and called the police nonemergency line to make a report. A public service assistance officer arrived at 9:55 a.m. and observed the damage. Amanda told the officer she did not want to file any formal charges against Colley until she spoke with her mother and attorney, so the officer left. Two of Amanda’s friends, Lindy Dobbins (the other murder victim) and Rachel Hendricks, arrived minutes later.
Meanwhile, at about the same time that Amanda was returning to her home, Colley arrived at the courthouse for a hearing on an unrelated violation of his domestic violence injunction. In video footage of the hearing, Colley appeared calm and cooperative. After a colloquy in which Colley, among other things, denied being under the influence of any intoxicants, the trial judge allowed Colley to plead no contest to the charged violation.
Colley left the courthouse a little before 9:30 a.m. and once again began calling Amanda. After several calls and voicemails, Amanda finally answered at 9:41 a.m. She and Colley spoke for roughly fourteen minutes.
Having departed the courthouse, Colley drove to a gas station near his sister’s house, went to his sister’s home, and then briefly returned to the same gas station, where he bought a small amount of gas and some items from the store. The evidence at trial supported an inference that Colley retrieved ammunition during his brief stop at his sister’s house. The parties disputed whether he also retrieved guns there, or whether he already had guns in the car he was driving. Regardless, shortly after 10 a.m., Colley started the twenty-minute drive back to Amanda’s home.
On his way to Amanda’s, Colley had a phone conversation with his father. A dog walker who was near Colley’s father at the time overheard the call. She testified that she heard Colley’s father pleading, “Please, please son, come back and get your truck. Everybody knows what you’ve been through.” To which the person on the other end of the call responded, “I just can’t f***ing take this anymore.”
Instead of going directly to Amanda’s home, Colley drove to an adjacent street and parked his car at an unoccupied house. From there, he crossed a berm and walked along a trail that ran parallel to Amanda’s fenced-in backyard. He was armed with two handguns, a 9mm and a .45 caliber.
Colley approached the back of Amanda’s house and began shooting from the outside. Amanda, Lamar, Lindy, and Rachel were inside. Hearing the sound of gunshots and the shattering back-door glass, Lamar shouted for everyone to run. Lamar himself ran out of the house through the garage. Fatefully, the women all ran to the home’s master bedroom area. Amanda hid in the bathroom. Lindy and Rachel barricaded themselves in the closet. At 10:36 a.m., Amanda and Lindy separately called 911 from their cellphones.
Shouting “where is he, where is he,” Colley entered the home through the shattered back glass doors. Colley first found Amanda. He screamed at her and demanded to know where “he” was. Amanda said she did not know and begged Colley to put down his gun. Colley then tried to open the door to the closet, but Rachel held the door shut with her foot. A crying Amanda told Colley that only Rachel and Lindy were in the closet, which prompted Lindy to say, “It’s Lindy in here. It’s Lindy!”
Colley returned to the bathroom and shot Amanda—but not fatally. He then went back to the closet. Again unable to open the closet door, this time Colley fired a shot through the door. The bullet grazed Rachel’s arm, causing her to let go of the door. As Rachel ran out of the closet, Colley entered it and walked to where Lindy was crouched down, hiding behind a chest. Colley shot and killed her.
Amanda was still in the bathroom. So Colley went back there and shot her three more times, until his 9mm was out of bullets. Colley dropped the 9mm and shot Amanda five more times, using the .45.
Colley then left the home, returned to his sister’s house on Garrison Drive, abandoned his cell phone, and fled the area. Police officers arrested Colley hours later after a traffic stop in Norton, Virginia.
Colley was charged with the first-degree murder of Amanda Colley; the first-degree murder of Lindy Dobbins; the attempted first-degree murder of Lamar Douberly; the attempted first-degree murder of Rachel Hendricks; burglary with an assault or battery; burglary of a dwelling; and aggravated stalking after an injunction.
At trial the State proved its case principally through Rachel Hendricks’ and Lamar Douberly’s testimony and through cell phone and video records that documented Colley’s actions in the hours leading up to the murders. Dr. Predrag Bulic, the St. Johns County chief medical examiner, testified about the autopsies performed on the murder victims. Amanda sustained nine gunshot wounds: two in the chest area, two in the abdomen, three in the right leg, one in the right hand, and one in the left hand. Amanda’s wounds showed that the shots had traveled different trajectories. Some had followed a slight downward trajectory, consistent with both the shooter and the victim standing up at the time of the gunshots. Other bullets traveled through Amanda’s body at an upward trajectory, indicating that she was lying horizontal on the ground when shot.
Dr. Bulic inferred that Amanda suffered multiple gun shots in advance of sustaining one shot that would have paralyzed her from the neck down and another that would have been instantaneously lethal. Specifically, Amanda’s arms and legs showed several defensive wounds that could only have been inflicted while Amanda was still capable of movement. When asked whether Amanda was conscious of what was happening, Dr. Bulic testified, “She was aware. She had a—a knowledge of what’s happening and—through the entire shooting process.”
As to Lindy, Dr. Bulic testified that she sustained three gunshot wounds: one on the right temple, one on the right shoulder, and one on the left foot. The trajectory of the shoulder and temple gunshots had followed a steep downward angle, consistent with the shooter being above the victim. Both of these gunshots were immediately lethal.
In its closing, the defense argued that the State had not proven premeditation and that therefore the jury should not find Colley guilty of first-degree murder and attempted murder. The defense’s theory was that James Colley had been on “an emotional rollercoaster” because of the uncertain status of his relationship with Amanda and that the killings were a “snap reaction.” Defense counsel argued that James Colley did not go to Amanda’s home with the intention of killing anyone. Defense counsel speculated that something set Colley off—counsel did not know what—only after James Colley arrived at Amanda’s home.
On July 18, 2018, the jury unanimously found James Colley guilty of first-degree premeditated and first-degree felony murder of Amanda Colley; first-degree premeditated and first-degree felony murder of Lindy Dobbins; attempted first-degree murder of Lamar Douberly; attempted felony murder of Rachel Hendricks; burglary of a dwelling with an assault or battery; burglary of a dwelling; and aggravated stalking after an injunction.