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Jolene Kay Hardy, then 55, was charged with murder in July 2009 after Wake County sheriff's deputies said she called 911 to report finding her husband, Gerald Douglas Hardy, 60, beaten to death in their Apex home, a case later halted when a judge ruled her incompetent to assist in her defense.

Hardy told a 911 dispatcher on July 16, 2009, that she had spent the previous night and most of that day searching for her husband before finding him "cold and stiff" in their home on Perney Court that afternoon, according to WRAL's account of the case and search warrants filed by investigators. "He's got his teeth knocked out, and he's all beat-up looking," she said, adding that she had tried for roughly half an hour to resuscitate him.

Hardy said her husband, who had lymphoma, frequently sought out "gang areas" in Raleigh and Durham because he had a "death wish" and did not want to die of the disease. Deputies who responded found Gerald Hardy on the kitchen floor, already cold with rigor mortis setting in, according to court documents. A preliminary autopsy attributed his death to blunt-force trauma, and the Wake County medical examiner later confirmed multiple blunt-force injuries consistent with a beating.

Search warrants released in the days that followed said Hardy gave investigators a different account once questioned directly. She admitted she had fought with her husband and struck him in the head, face and body with a hammer, and that after he lost consciousness, she cleaned blood from his body and the scene, the warrants state. Deputies seized a laptop computer, a 10-inch pipe wrench and blood-stained paper towels from the home, along with the couple's bank, phone and computer records.

Hardy was arrested July 17, 2009, and charged with murder. At her first court appearance, a judge denied her bond after she told him she was unsure whether to hire her own attorney. "I heard you should hire your own, but I don't know," she said, and was granted a court-appointed lawyer.

A relative of Gerald Hardy who asked not to be identified told WRAL that the couple had reported marital problems dating to 2004 and that Gerald Hardy had cut himself off from his own family and friends while trying to save the marriage. Relatives said they had not known he was seriously ill.

The case never reached trial. In December 2010, a Wake County judge ruled Hardy incompetent to assist in her own defense and ordered her committed for psychiatric treatment, according to WTVD-ABC11. The ruling left open the possibility of a future trial if she was found competent, and no further court action in the case has been publicly reported since.