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When Jackson County Sheriff’s aides W.Va. found Wanda Palmer on her couch in June 2020, she fell and was bleeding from head injuries.
“We were sure it was a murder case,” Sheriff Ross Mellinger told The Washington Post.
But Palmer ended up surviving, even though he fell into a coma. For two long years, while he was unconscious, the case stalled. Investigators were unable to find enough evidence to charge a suspect.
But earlier this month, Palmer woke up and told lawmakers it was his brother who had nearly killed him, Mellinger said. Daniel Palmer is now in custody and has been charged with attempted murder and willful injury, according to the sheriff’s department.
“Just the fact that he survived is nothing more than a miracle,” Mellinger told The Post. “But being able to go back … two years later and identify who his attacker was, is spectacular. ”
It was not immediately clear if Daniel Palmer had a lawyer. According to a criminal complaint obtained by CNN, Palmer denied having attacked his sister, saying he was not at home at the time of the attack.
Wanda and Daniel Palmer lived half a mile away on the same property near Cottageville, a Jackson County village near the northwestern border of the state, Mellinger said. He said Wanda lived alone in a mobile home. The criminal complaint noted that there was a history of violence between the brothers, CNN reported.
One morning in June 2020, someone showed up to cut Wanda’s grass and found it inside after she was attacked, Mellinger said. His injuries appeared to have been caused by a cutting weapon, such as a machete or an ax, although investigators found no weapons, he said.
Other evidence was hard to find. Wanda’s house had no electricity, so there was no surveillance footage or cell phone records. Mellinger said Daniel was a suspect from the start because of the brothers’ story. A man told deputies he had seen Daniel on his sister’s porch the night before, about 10 hours before Wanda was discovered, but it wasn’t enough to continue, Mellinger said.
Deputies had even traveled across the state to chase down several tracks, but in the end, “we had nothing,” Mellinger said.
Then, just before the July 4 vacation, Wanda’s social worker contacted the sheriff’s department and said she had woken up. Deputies interviewed her shortly after, Mellinger said. According to a criminal complaint obtained by WCHS, Wanda said she remembered being wounded in the head at home and that it was her brother who did it.
When asked why Daniel would have hurt her, Wanda replied that it was “pain,” WCHS reported, citing the complaint.
Mellinger said he’s not sure if Wanda will fully recover from the attack. He referred to his awakening from coma after more than two years as a miracle.
“From a research standpoint, this is kind of a holy grail,” Mellinger said. “You never get a chance to talk to someone once they go into a coma.”