Woman accused of killing terminally ill husband in failed suicide pact released from jail

The 76-year-old Florida woman accused of killing her terminally ill husband at a hospital in a failed suicide pact was released from jail on a $150,000 bond Friday night.

Ellen Gilland, 76, is accused of gunning down her bedridden husband, Jerry Gilland, 77, at AdventHealth Hospital in Daytona Beach in January after she said the two had planned for weeks that she would kill him and then shoot herself.

However, after she fatally shot her husband, she was unable to go through with her end of the pact. 

The hospital was put on lockdown and patients were evacuated as Gilland barricaded herself inside of the 11th floor room for four hours. She  never threatened police, but never put the gun down, and police worried about a potential shootout. 

She was eventually taken into custody after a SWAT team used a flashbang to disorient her.

Gilland was originally charged with first degree murder, however on Wednesday she was indicted on a lesser charge of assisting self-suicide/manslaughter and aggravated assault of a police officer.

Jail records show she was released from the Volusia County Jail on Friday.

After hospital workers heard a gunshot coming from Jerry Gilland’s hospital room, they entered and found Ellen Gilland standing beside her husband’s lifeless body in a pool of blood, according to a police report.

She pointed the weapon at the two workers and told them to leave. She said the same to a third staffer who entered the room.

An officer’s bodycam video 10 minutes after the shooting shows cops lining the hospital hallway screaming at Gilland to “drop the gun!”

After deploying the flashbang, SWAT teams busted in the room and tried to use a stun gun on Gilland but it failed to subdue her. She fired a single shot into the ceiling before officers could detain her.

With Post Wires