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Charee Nichole Howard, 39, was found not guilty by reason of insanity after she called 911 and said she had choked and killed her sister, Sherry Lynn Howard, 54, at their St. Petersburg, Florida, home on April 11, 2023.

Howard made the call at about 3:30 p.m. that Tuesday. St. Petersburg police officers found Sherry Howard strangled and lying just inside the front door of the home in the 600 block of Newton Avenue South. No one else was inside. Charee Howard was taken into custody and charged with second-degree murder. Police did not publicly state a motive.

The sisters shared the home and were about 15 years apart in age. Sherry Howard had worked as an independent real estate consultant at Keller Williams until the month before her death. Charee Howard was a licensed osteopathic physician who ran her own business and belonged to the 2023 Leadership St. Pete class through the local chamber of commerce. Their brother, Michael Hobbs, said they were inseparable: "These girls were like twins. You didn't see one without the other." He said Sherry had cared for Charee after their mother died, and Charee had recently returned to help Sherry through health problems.

Less than a month before the killing, in March 2023, Charee Howard called 911 and reported that a man inside her home had tied her up. That call was later cited as part of her behavior leading up to her sister's death.

The St. Petersburg Police Department investigated the case. Because Howard reported the killing herself and was at the house when officers arrived, police did not search for a suspect and instead focused on her account and mental state. During her interview with detectives on April 11, 2023, she did not deny killing her sister. Her account moved away from the events inside the house and toward beliefs that she was being pursued and was in danger. Two mental health experts later found that she was plagued by paranoid thoughts and persecutory delusions centered on witchcraft and spiritual warfare.

Howard was held without bond and assigned a public defender. She was described as uncooperative and did not appear at her first hearing at the Pinellas County Courthouse.

On December 11, 2023, Pinellas-Pasco Circuit Judge Keith Meyer found Howard not guilty by reason of insanity on the second-degree murder charge. Two mental health experts, defense lawyers and state prosecutors supported the agreed finding, which Meyer approved after hearing expert testimony. Dr. Mark Ruiz testified that Howard suffers from schizophrenia, had displayed bizarre and unusual behavior before the killing, and was in a psychotic state when her sister was killed. She received no prison sentence and was involuntarily committed to a state psychiatric hospital for treatment. No later public account of her release, commitment status or medical license has been reported.

The video is the police interview-room recording and runs about 74 minutes. It presents the interview itself, preceded by a short narrated introduction naming the people involved.

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Part 2 of 2 of the recording described above.