In August 2007, Jennifer Gauthier Magnano was murdered by her husband in their Connecticut home after years of enduring emotional and physical abuse. Two of Jennifer’s children witnessed their father, Scott Magnano, shoot their mother in cold blood.
This video posted by Inside Edition shares her three children remembering their beloved mother and the abuse they all had to endure prior to her murder, and how they’re all fighting to get a law in place to further protect women and children.
As Jennifer’s children sit around looking at their parents' wedding album and photos of their late mom, they can’t help but wonder if she knew that she was making a mistake in marrying Scott.
“We lived in a big, beautiful house … that my mom and Scott built, but inside it was hell. It was prison,” recalls Jennifer's daughter, Jessica Rosenback. Jessica explains that the kids always felt like they were walking on eggshells at home and that there were so many house rules they all had to follow.
She remembers that they didn’t actually get to spend that much time with their mother because she always had to be by Scott’s side and at his “beck and call.”
“I just always never knew what I would do that would set him off. Things that a normal child would do that their parent wouldn’t necessarily be irritated by would set him off more than you could imagine,” explains Jennifer’s other daughter, Emily.
Today, Jennifer’s children are advocating for their mother by fighting to have a law passed called Jennifer’s Law. The law would expand the definition of domestic abuse to include coercive control, which is a strategic and abusive pattern of behavior often used against women to control, entrap, and dominate them.
To learn more about this law, as well as the firsthand accounts from her children about their mother’s death, watch the full video.
