Woman Slain in Car on Beach Blvd. Had Feared Estranged Husband

LA PALMA —  Estela Parmenter so feared her estranged husband that last year she sought a restraining order, saying, “I believe that he is capable of coming after me and killing me--that scares me.”

Wednesday evening, a year and a day after she filed for that court order, Dennis Parmenter cut off his wife in rush-hour traffic on Beach Boulevard, stepped out of his Honda and opened fire as she sat helpless in her driver’s seat, Orange County sheriff’s investigators say. She died half an hour later at Whittier Hospital.

Dennis Parmenter, 28, then drove to the La Palma Police Department and calmly turned himself in, police said.

“This is hideous,” said attorney John Balent, who was representing Estela Parmenter in her divorce case. “She was a wonderful person, very energetic, very creative. She could easily make it on her own.”

Both Balent and Dennis Parmenter’s divorce attorney, Kenneth Hicks, said Thursday that they had thought the case of Parmenter vs. Parmenter was winding down amicably.

“It’s a total surprise to me,” Hicks said. “We had reached an agreement on the settlement. The last time I talked to him, he seemed to be happy. There didn’t appear to be any animosity.”

That would have been a conversion for the man Estela Parmenter, 37, described when she filed for divorce in September 1996.

According to court records, 3 1/2 years into their marriage, Dennis Parmenter began accusing his wife of having affairs with his friend and his boss. He’d threaten her, and she would leave their home in La Palma to stay at a hotel or at her sister’s house.

In June 1996, he began seeing a psychologist and “taking medication for his mood swings and violent behavior,” court records said.

But while at his grandmother’s house in August 1996, he threatened his wife and her family again, court records said. His grandmother called his therapist, who called police, and he was taken into custody.

Dennis Parmenter seemed fine when he was released Sept. 3, 1996. But two days later, he again began making accusations of infidelity.

During this incident, court records said, Dennis Parmenter picked up one of the guns in the house and pointed it at his wife, saying he was going to kill her. He then aimed it at his own head before she talked him into putting the gun down. She left home for good, filing for divorce three weeks later.

La Palma police arrested Dennis Parmenter for firing a gun inside his house this past spring, and he was found guilty this month, Police Lt. Edward Ethell said. Sentencing in that case is pending.

His wife received her restraining order last year and kept her new address a secret, even from her own family, in order to protect them and herself. But against Balent’s advice, she dropped the restraining order in July.

“I believe her thinking was, getting rid of the restraining order would smooth the feathers between them,” Balent said.

Balent said that even if she had kept the restraining order, it wouldn’t have prevented the shooting.

Dennis Parmenter was being held in lieu of $500,000 bail at the Orange County Jail on suspicion of murder.