Judge sentences Clearlake Oaks woman to 50 years to life for murder of ex-boyfriend
- Elizabeth Larson
LAKEPORT, Calif. — A judge on Monday afternoon sentenced a Clearlake Oaks woman to 50 years to life for the premeditated killing of her ex-boyfriend in his own apartment in July 2021.
Calling her “remorseless,” and saying her attempts to justify the killing as being in self-defense were disproved by the evidence at trial, Judge Andrew Blum handed down the sentence to Tammy Sue Grogan-Robinson.
Following a lengthy trial and less than a day’s worth of deliberations, a six-man, six-woman jury convicted Grogan-Robinson, 58, last month of the shooting death of 56-year-old Charles Vernon McClelland.
The jury convicted Grogan-Robinson of first-degree murder and special allegations of intentionally discharging a firearm causing death, use of a handgun in committing the crime and inflicting great bodily injury or death, as well as a second count of assault with a firearm and a special allegation to that charge of committing great bodily injury on McClelland.
Fifty years to life is the maximum sentence for the crimes of which Grogan-Robinson was convicted, “and that’s what I’m going to impose,” Blum said, after having listened to the victim impact statements of McClelland’s ex-wife, his son, younger brother and uncle.
“This was a coldblooded, premeditated murder. I saw not one indication of the slightest remorse from the defendant through the entire lengthy trial,” even as she sat on the witness stand and described how she shot McClelland as he pleaded for his life, said Blum, who presided over Grogan-Robinson’s trial.
“Her crime,” the judge added, “was absolutely remorseless.”
McClelland, of Rohnert Park, had dated Grogan-Robinson on and off over the course of five years before he finally ended the relationship in March of 2021.
Deputy District Attorney Rich Watson said she would not accept that their relationship was over and continued to try to get McClelland to continue the relationship, which he refused to do. However, McClelland tried to remain friendly with her.
In July of 2021, McClelland came up to what family called his “lake house,” a home in Clearlake Oaks, part of which he rented to Grogan-Robinson, with an apartment he kept for personal use.
Friends came with him for that holiday weekend. After they went home, on July 6, Grogan-Robinson and McClelland had dinner. When she heard him texting with his new girlfriend, she began sending texts to another man saying she planned to kill McClelland, that he couldn’t treat her that way.
Investigators believe that it was early the following morning that Grogan-Robinson shot McClelland several times as he tried to flee from the home, as he pleaded with her to stop and asked her why.
Evidence showed that Grogan-Robinson, who has spent decades working as a surgical technician, then smoked a cigarette and offered McClelland no assistance as he lay dying.
Later that morning, she drove to Clearlake, made some phone calls and reported to her employer, Adventist Health, that she had been sexually assaulted. She was directed to Sutter Lakeside Hospital where a sexual assault examination was done.
She told deputies who responded to the hospital that McClelland had raped her and she shot him in self-defense.
However, the sexual assault exam showed no sign that such an assault had taken place or that they had been intimate, Watson told Lake County News after the trial concluded.
Sheriff Brian Martin was in the courtroom for the sentencing, expected to be the last resolution of a major crime case his agency has handled before his retirement at the end of the month.
Hearing from the victims
Grogan-Robinson appeared in court in a black and white striped jail jumpsuit, her hands shackled at the wrists and in leg chains. She carried with her a walker when she initially was seated in the jury box before she was moved to the defense table to be seated beside her attorney, Mitchell Hauptman.
McClelland’s family made sure that his death and its destructive impact on them was heard and felt in the courtroom on Monday afternoon.
Sheila McClelland, Charles McClelland’s ex-wife who appeared by Zoom, offered the first victim impact statement, thanking the staff of the District Attorney’s Office, that agency’s Victim Witness Division and the Lake County Sheriff’s Office.
She said it offended her on so many levels that Grogan-Robinson said she had been raped, adding that offense to the crime of his killing. No one who knew him believed that.
“You made my son have to grow up and have to deal with so many responsibilities that someone his age should not have to,” which included him having to clean up the crime scene, fix the bullet holes in the wall and clean up his father’s blood, she said.
The killing robbed McClelland’s mother of her son, his son of his father, and his brother and others of a beloved family member. “Why? Because he didn’t love you anymore? Because he wanted to move on? I guess you’ll be the only one who has the answer to that.”
She said it was an offense to women who have actually been raped that Grogan-Robinson calimed she had been, too.
And after shooting him, Sheila McClelland asked if Grogan-Robinson watched him die. “Obviously you planned your lies out.”
Victim advocate Tatsu Suzuki of Victim Witness read the letter on behalf of Nicholas McClelland, Charles McClelland’s son, who recounted getting the news from his uncle the day after the murder and being unable to believe it. But his first question was if it was Grogan-Robinson.
“It sure was,” his uncle said.
He said she was known to be obsessed with his father. Worse was reading the news story in which it was reported that she accused his father of having sexually assaulted her as justification.
Nicholas McClelland was only 19 when this incident occurred. “My dad was taken away when I needed him the most.” And his father won’t be there for him during the milestones in his life to come.
He recounted having to scrape off, paint over and disinfect his father’s blood in the home where he died.
He said his father was a hardworking man who was qualified for retirement from the job he started when 19. His father’s dream for when he retired was to live at his lake house which he loved so much, the place where he ultimately died.
Grogan-Robinson clearly planned and acted deliberately, out of malice and jealousy, because McClelland had moved on and was happy, his son said.
Nicholas McClelland said Grogan-Robinson should never be free. “The family asks that the court orders the harshest sentence allowed under state law.”
Paul McClelland, Charles McClelland’s younger brother, described getting the news of his brother’s death by a Petaluma Police officer, who directed him to call a Lake County Sheriff’s detective. He immediately asked if Grogan-Robinson had shot his brother. “Of course, the answer was yes.”
But then he asked if she was still alive, because he had thought it might have been a murder-suicide. The detective told him that she had alleged a sexual assault and self-defense.
Paul McClelland remembered how painful it was to tell his nephew the news, and then to break it to his 81-year-old mother.
His brother worked hard for 38 years yet didn’t get to enjoy his retirement. “Tammy took a son, a brother and, most important, a father away from us without regard for our family,” he said.
Paul McClelland called Grogan-Robinson a coldblooded killer and asked for the harshest sentence.
Bill Amatneek, Charles McClelland’s uncle by marriage, recalled getting a call from Paul McClelland about the murder and then going to see Charles McClelland’s mother at her home. She was weeping and saying, “You’re not supposed to outlive your children.”
“No, you’re not,” Amatneek told the court.
In that scene in the McClelland home, “We were all incredulous, disbelieving that this had happened, and yet knowing that it had. It was the saddest room I’ve ever been in,” Amatneek said.
The family was gratified that what might have been a three-month investigation was concluded in five weeks, that Grogan-Robinson was charged with murder and, finally, that she was convicted. “But that gladness lasted seconds. Then we were back with our grief. Charles was still dead and would never reenter our lives,” Amatneek said.
He added, “It has broken this family's heart. Each of us will take this murder to the grave.”
Grogan-Robinson speaks to court, judge hands down sentence
Hauptman told the court that Grogan-Robinson wished to say something. She did not take the stand but instead stayed seated at Hauptman’s side when she spoke.
“I am sorry for your loss,” she said to McClelland’s family.
She said she understands the gravity of the case and takes responsibility for her actions.
However, she maintained that she also was a victim. “Regardless of what anyone thinks, I was raped,” she said, adding it was never investigated.
That statement directly contradicts the evidence presented in the course of the case, which included the fact that the sheriff’s office did investigate her allegations. The evidence from her sexual assault examination and McClelland’s autopsy showed that they had not had sex, and so he had not committed the sexual assault that she had claimed.
She said she had spent 38 years in her profession helping save the lives of others and asked for consideration of that in her sentencing.
Watson joined the family in asking Blum for the harshest sentence, noting that the jury came back with the conviction for first degree murder and enhancements.
He said the evidence proved she had planned the killing the night before. “She slept on that plan and she carried it out the next morning.”
The defense sought the striking of an enhancement for the use of a firearm, which Watson argued against. “I struggle to see how on earth that could be in the furtherance of justice to strike such an enhancement.”
Watson said that Grogan-Robinson used her own firearm, a handgun, to kill McClelland, chasing him through the home, firing as he cried out and asking why she was doing it.
“She executed him at the door as he’s trying to flee,” Watson said. “She then smoked a cigarette and let him die and offered no help.”
Watson said Grogan-Robinson then made up the most heinous story about McClelland, which was completely false and yet which she continues to make to this day. As such, he asked for the maximum sentence under the law.
In response to a memo on the sentencing from Hauptman, Blum agreed that he had to stay a 10-year sentence on the assault with a deadly weapon charge since under Penal Code 654, there cannot be multiple punishments for the same act.
He said the sentence is 25 years to life for first degree premeditated murder and 25 years to life for the firearms enhancement, for the maximum 50 years to life sentence. She will receive 484 days of credit for time served, accounting for the time she’s spent in jail since her August 2021 arrest in Missouri.
However, Blum declined to strike the gun use enhancement, noting that he had heard the trial and remarking on the coldblooded nature of the killing.
Besides that, he said she is still claiming she was raped, which the jury rejected and is clearly not true. Blum also pointed to how she was telling “a near stranger” — the man she was communicating with via text — what she was planning on doing the day before the killing.
“If I could make this life without parole I would do it, but that's not a possible sentence under the law here,” Blum said.
Hauptman said Grogan-Robinson has no money and asked that restitution not be ordered. Blum reserved restitution for McClelland’s estate, ordering her to pay a fine of $300 but staying an additional $400 fine.
Blum advised Grogan-Robinson of her right to appeal, with a 60-day limit that started to run from Monday.
He then remanded her into the custody of the Lake County Sheriff’s Office, to be delivered to the California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation.
Hauptman had told Lake County News following the jury verdict in November that Grogan-Robinson intends to appeal her conviction.
Email Elizabeth Larson at This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.. Follow her on Twitter, @ERLarson, or Lake County News, @LakeCoNews.