UPDATE: Patty Sue Feilds Sentenced To Life In Prison With No Parole For The Murder Of Leona Robinson

Reported by: Kyle Mallory
Published: 8:33 am
Updated: 8:52 am


Police believe an 86-year-old Coquille woman was the victim of "homicidal violence" after her body was found Monday inside her 200 East 6th Street home.

Just after 2:30 p.m., the Coquille Police Department responded to the home after reports that it had been broken into. When officers entered the residence, they found the sole resident of the home--Leona Robison--dead, the apparent victim of a homicide. There were signs of forced entry, according to police.

An autopsy will be performed later in the week to determine the exact cause of Robison's death, but police are seeking the public's help in tracking down a suspect. Investigators are interested in talking to anyone who may have seen or spoken with Robison in the last week.

Of particular interest is anyone who may have been at the home on East 6th in the last week. If you have any information, you're asked to call 541-396-2114.

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By Winston Ross
COQUILLE — Leona Robison made it to the Coquille public library several times a week, as often as she ran out of books to read. She especially loved Westerns: “I think she and Louis L’Amour were kindred spirits,” assistant librarian Jordi Lindegren said. Robison was deaf, but she could read lips and talk. She was sweet, upbeat, “a library favorite,” Lindegren said. She was 86 years old.

And just before midnight Monday night, at the close of a string of very long days on the job, Coos County District Attorney Paul Frasier typed out a news release declaring Leona Robison the county’s fourth homicide victim since Jan. 1. She’s the third person killed in Coos County in the past week, which explains Frasier’s long hours of late.

One week ago, police arrested 26-year-old Jeffrey Cue and charged him with the robbery and murder of Ronald Holliday, who was reported missing earlier in the week and whose body was discovered in a rural area in the county.

The next day, Frasier also investigated an incident in rural Coos County in which a man tried to break into a house. After several warnings, the residents of the home shot and killed the intruder, a man with an extensive criminal history who police identified as Allan Wayne Saunders. Frasier said he did expect to file charges in that case but would await autopsy and toxicology results before making a final decision.

The other killing this year occurred Feb. 20 in Lakeside. Lawrence Ervin Schnagl was arraigned on a murder charge in that case. He is accused of stabbing his live-in girlfriend, 48-year-old Brenda Gayle Gammelgaard.

Not yet four months into the year, the county already has topped the three killings recorded in all of 2010 and has tied the number set in 2009, Frasier said.

“That many homicides in this short a time is a rarity in Coos County,” he said. “Is it something where people need to be walking the streets armed? I don’t think so. Nothing causes me to believe there’s any connection between any of the cases.”
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I'll never understand an adult murdering a child or an elderly person, they are so defenseless. This is just horrible.

It happens all the time. My Grandmother was almost a victim of rape. She had to have been in her late 70's. There was a man running around her neighborhood for a while raping elderly women. One of them suffered a heart attack and died during the rape. This same Man later broke in to my Grand Mothers home. She fought back. She had long fingernails. Grandma used those long fingernails to gash in to his penis. He ran as fast as he could at that point as his penis was bleeding quite a bit. With the DNA under Grandma finger nails they put that guy away for a long time. I think crimes against the elderly and children are horrific crimes and should carry heavier penalties.

OMG LM, what an awful experience your Grandma went thru'! And what courage she had in fighting him off, especially using those long fingernails in the right spot! I'm so glad he ran off. Did that man ever get arrested? I agree, crimes against the elderly and children should guarantee they don't get out of prison or that they are older than dirt when they do.

Did that man ever get arrested?

Yes and he was convicted and sentenced to 50 yrs.

OMG, CORY, this is SCARY STUFF! When the trial is over.. YOU GET YOUR BUTT OUT OF THAT TOWN!!

I swear there are more murders in Coos County, then any other small town in AMERICA! :FBI:

Why wait? Seems as though the trial will never start!

Isn't this a sad story though??? Poor little Leona... She only lived a block and a half from me. What a world.

That's what I am saying.. WAY too close to home! I say Chatty and hubby need to move back here and bring you with them!! :riding: :riding:

I am so sad what horror this poor innocent elderly lady went through! OMG, why kill the poor gal? UGH! I hope she gets LIFE with No parole!

y Robert Jump

Patti Sue Fields, the alleged killer of Leona Elaine Robison, could face death if convicted of the crimes with which she is charged.

After a press Wednesday morning press conference Coos County District Attorney Paul Frasier formally charged Fields with two counts of aggravated murder, one count of murder and one count of burglary in the first degree.

The first two counts of aggravated murder allege the death of Robison was intentionally caused by Fields while in the course of committing a burglary and that the death of Robison was intentionally caused attempting to conceal Fields identity as the perpetrator of the burglary.

The burglary charge alleges Fields entered and remained unlawfully in the home of Robison with the intent to commit theft inside the home.

Aggravated murder is punishable by death, life in prison without parole, or life in prison with a 30 year minimum before being eligible for parole consideration. Murder is punishable by a sentence of life in prison with a 25 year minimum before being eligible for parole consideration. The sentence for burglary in the first degree is determined by the Oregon Sentencing Guidelines.


Patti Sue Fields

Fields, 48, was arrested Tuesday evening at the Coos County Jail where she was being held for a probation violation since April 15. Fields was a next door neighbor to Robison.

“We appreciate the neighborhood coming forward and the community which lead us to the path,” Dannels said at a press conference Wednesday. “We believe this was a burglary gone bad when the victim came home.”

Robison, 86, died as a result of blunt force trauma to the face, head and neck, and was suffocated, Coos County District Attorney Paul Frasier said during the press conference.

“The murder was done to cover up the identity of the perpetrator,” Frasier said.

Fields is being held in lieu of $3 million bond and is scheduled to be arraigned at 8:15 a.m. this morning before Judge Martin Stone via video.


Leona Elaine Robison

Coquille police received a telephone call from a concerned citizen April 12 that a residence on the 200 block of West Sixth Street had been broken into. When police arrived they found evidence that a door to the residence had been forced open. Inside the home, they found the body of Robison.

On April 15, the date of Fields arrest charged with probation violation, authorities said investigators had gathered evidence and leads focusing on a person or persons of interest in the murder. According to a press release, investigators had secured and submitted numerous items of forensic evidence including DNA and various trace materials to the Oregon State Crime Lab for analysis.

Fields pled guilty to second-degree robbery in 2005 after being convicted of robbing the Bank of America in Bandon.

While authorities are convinced they have arrested the perpetrator, the investigation is ongoing. Those with information regarding this case are urged to contact the Coquille Police Department at (541) 396-7112.http://coquille-today.com/2011/05/fields-could-face-death-if-convicted/

OK, this is what I don't get.. DA Frasier could be putting the DP on this gal, but NOT on Gabriel Morris for the DOUBLE homicide on his Mom and BF?? Don't get me wrong, I think this person deserves DP just as much as I think Gabriel Morris does, but I just don't understand why the DA puts it on the table for one case and NOT the other?

COQUILLE, Ore. (AP) — An Oregon prosecutor says he will not seek the death penalty against a man accused of killing his mother and her boyfriend last year near Bandon on the Oregon coast.
Coos County District Attorney R. Paul Frasier also said Thursday that Gabriel Morris has waived his right to a jury trial in the February 2010 shooting deaths of his mother, 62-year-old Robin Anstey, and her boyfriend, 48-year-old Robert Kennelly Jr.
Morris was arrested in Virginia later that month after he fled with his wife, Jessica, and their 4-year-old daughter, triggering a national manhunt.
Jessica Morris later pleaded guilty to hindering prosecution.
Frasier said avoiding a jury trial means the state will not have to pay the cost of transporting witnesses to Oregon from other states, including Virginia.
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So I guess I can answer my own question to above because it just dawned on my that Morris took a plea deal so that explains why he didn't get DP on the table... (Where is the "OH DUH" emoticon?)

mommyof3kids wrote:So I guess I can answer my own question to above because it just dawned on my that Morris took a plea deal so that explains why he didn't get DP on the table... (Where is the "OH DUH" emoticon?)

Mommy, you answered your own question, but the question of why a plea deal was offered by the DA is a bigger question......

True. I wonder what his sentence will be and if the victims family had anything to do with letting a Plea deal even happen? I guess we shall find out soon enough

December 12, 2011

Patty Sue Fields
A Coquille woman who confessed in jailhouse letters to killing her 86-year-old neighbor with a shovel pleaded guilty to aggravated murder Monday.

Coos County Judge Martin Stone sentenced Patti Sue Fields, 49, to life in prison without parole.

Fields was long suspected in the murder of Leona Robison, a longtime next-door neighbor of the Fields family who was found dead in her home on April 1, said Coos County District Attorney Paul Frasier. Detectives found towels with Robison's blood in a crawl space under the Fields home and Fields' DNA underneath the victim's fingernails, Frasier said. Fields was arrested on murder and burglary charges in May.

But the confessions Fields made in letters to another inmate revealed the details of the death. Frasier read two letters in court Monday.

In one addressed to "Angel," Fields said she was smoking in her garage the morning of the killing when Robison waved her over.

"I had so much rage going through my head I was mad at my brother and I was mad at my wife and I just snapped," Fields wrote. "I walked in that woman's house with a shovel in my hand and I hit her."

Fields then described the struggle between the two after she fell and Robison grabbed the shovel.

"I got to my feet grabbed the shovel away from her and pushed her down and started hitting her in the face and head with it," she wrote. "At that moment I just went crazy and I didn't stop until she was dead."

She will serve her sentence at the Coffee Creek Correctional Facility in Wilsonville, Frasier said.


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Thanks for this!! Would have thought Cory would have come here to update since she knew this woman who lived down the street from her.