SEQUIM — Trish Schultz was 48 when she died Christmas Eve, her record stained by a drug conviction.
On Thursday, barely three weeks later, the state Supreme Court threw out the conviction in a precedent-setting 5-4 decision.
Schultz’s son, George Peterson of Port Angeles, said Friday he knows exactly how his mother would have reacted.
“This is one of those occasions where she would walk in the door with a beaming smile on her face and say, ‘I hate to be saying this, but I told you so,'” said Peterson, 29.
“It’s really kind of sad, but it’s the only bit of news I’ve received in the last few weeks that’s been kind of uplifting,” Peterson said.
He wasn’t surprised that Schultz didn’t give in after she was convicted in Clallam County Superior Court of possessing methamphetamine and after the state Court of Appeals upheld the decision, instead continuing her appeal to the state Supreme Court.
“My mother’s tenacity, when it comes to some things, was quite impressive,” he said.
“To kind of have this [happen] a couple of weeks later in the midst of everything is kind of good.”
The court ruled that two Sequim police officers who lacked a search warrant should not have entered Schultz’s apartment April 4, 2004.
They did so without Schultz’s explicit consent even though “she acquiesced to the entry” by stepping aside as they entered her apartment, Justice Tom Chambers said in the majority opinion.
Officers Kori Malone and Michael Hill had showed up at her door in response to a potential domestic violence call from one of Schultz’s neighbors.
The justices also ruled Malone and Hill had no evidence that an emergency was occurring when they entered her apartment without Schultz’s consent and without telling her she could refuse to allow them to enter.
In its ruling, the court set a new “imminent threat” standard for warrantless searches by law enforcement officers responding to domestic violence situations.
Chambers said the court had never before “specifically addressed the emergency aid exception to the warrant requirement in the context of domestic violence.”
Clallam County Prosecuting Attorney Deb Kelly said Thursday she may ask the court to reconsider its decision.
She defended the officers’ actions as appropriate and pledged to continue to aggressively pursue domestic violence cases.
Kelly said Schultz served “maybe a day or two” of a 30-day sentence, with credit for time served and community supervision.
But the sentence still hung over her, Peterson said.
“She was on probation for quite a while,” he said.
“She had a lot of court fines,” he added, and the case had been “kind of a thorn in her side” until the day she died.
At the time of his mother’s death, she had been on Social Security for seven or eight years for an injury she suffered while employed as a motel housekeeper in Vermont, he said.
The cause of Schultz’s death is pending, Peterson said.
She is survived by two sons, three daughters, a sister and both parents.
Schultz would have turned 49 on Jan. 29.
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Senior staff writer Paul Gottlieb can be reached at 360-417-3536 or at paul.gottlieb@peninsuladailynews.com.
