ASHEVILLE – Pattie Sue Bradley, 43, an EBCI tribal member of Cherokee, was sentenced on Thursday, May 19 to 120 months in prison for killing her husband, announced Jill Westmoreland Rose, U.S. Attorney for the Western District of North Carolina. U.S. District Judge Martin Reidinger also sentenced Bradley to three years of supervised release following her prison term.
According to the information to which Bradley pleaded guilty, other documents filed in this case and statements made in court, on or about Jan. 13, 2015, within the boundaries of the Cherokee Indian reservation, Bradley stabbed and killed her husband, Henry Bradley, also an Indian. Court records show that the Cherokee Indian Police Department arrived at the Bradleys’ residence in response to a 911 call. When the responding officer asked Pattie Bradley about what had occurred, she told him that another individual had tried to break into the house and she had cut him with a knife.
According to court records, the officer then noticed that the victim was sitting and passed out on the couch inside the couple’s home. The officer also observed that the victim’s hands were covered with blood. Pattie Bradley stated that the victim had a cut on his hand, but when emergency technicians arrived at the scene they determined that the victim had actually been stabbed once in the abdomen.
The victim was transported to the hospital, where he later died. On Jan. 14, 2015, CIPD interviewed Pattie Bradley who told the officers that on the night of the incident she and the victim had been drinking and arguing, and she admitted to stabbing the victim over the course of the argument.
Bradley pleaded guilty on Oct. 23, 2015 to one count of assault with intent to commit murder. She is currently in custody and upon designation of a federal facility, she will be transferred to the custody of the Federal Bureau of Prisons. Federal sentences are served without the possibility of parole.
The FBI and CIPD investigated the case. Assistant U.S. Attorney John Pritchard prosecuted the case.
U.S. Attorney Rose was joined in making Thursday’s sentencing announcement by John A. Strong, Special Agent in Charge of the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI), Charlotte Division; and Cherokee Chief of Police James Dike Sneed.
– Department of Justice
