NC man convicted in wife’s slaying 14 years later

The Fayetteville Observer reports (http://bit.ly/1tn0nQP ) that 53-year-old John Avery Phillip Cumbee was convicted Thursday of voluntary manslaughter in the August 7, 2000, shooting death of 36-year-old Angela Jones Cumbee.

The case originally was ruled a suicide. The victim died of a single gunshot wound to the head.

Columbus County Sheriff’s Capt. David Nobles says the circumstances always seemed suspicious and two years ago investigators re-examined evidence and again interviewed the couple’s children, who were minors at the time.

That led authorities to charge Cumbee.

He was sentenced to at least five years, four months in prison and no more than seven years, two months.