Seventy-year old Jane E. Schreiner accidentally shot to death her husband of 19 years in August, but she never meant to fire the gun, her lawyer told a Schuylkill County judge on Monday.

Schreiner’s defense lawyer, Joseph P. Nahas, asked Judge Cyrus Palmer Dolbin to throw out charges of first and third degree murder against his client. He argued that there is no evidence Schreiner acted maliciously or with intent when the gun went off in the kitchen of the couple’s McAdoo home on Aug. 4, killing Kenneth S. Schreiner.A first-degree murder charge requires the defendant to have killed with intent, premeditation, and malice.Dolbin will study the transcript of a Sept. 14 preliminary hearing, and listen to a recording of a lengthy state police interview with Schreiner before ruling on Nahas’ request.Nahas also asked Dolbin to allow Schreiner to go home and stay there with electronic monitoring. Now, she’s in jail without bail; no bail is set in first degree murder cases.His client has no history of violence; she has close ties to her family and community, and has no passport, Nahas said.Nahas said that he would ask for reduced bail if Dolbin throws out the first degree murder charge.Nahas and First Assistant District Attorney John T. Fegley agreed to file their briefs in the matter by Nov. 18.Before the hearing, Schreiner, handcuffed and clad in a drab prison uniform, chatted with family members in the courtroom. The slight woman, who turned 70 on Oct. 30, appeared to be in good spirits.“She is a danger to no one,” Nahas said.Prosecutors, however, argue that Schreiner shot her husband in a fit of rage after he refused to stop disparaging her family with vulgarities loud enough for the neighbors to hear.After listening to four hours of testimony at the preliminary hearing, District Judge Stephen J. Bayer of Tamaqua sent charges of first-degree murder, criminal homicide, third-degree murder, voluntary manslaughter, aggravated assault, terroristic threats, possessing instruments of crime, and recklessly endangering another person on to Schuylkill County court.Bayer said he struggled with the murder charge in light of testimony from both sides.At that hearing, Assistant District Attorney Jennifer N. Lehman argued that intent can be formed in an instant, and that Schreiner had the presence of mind to take four bullets and one shell casing out of the Smith & Wesson .38 revolver she used that day and put them into a nightstand drawer, but did not tell police about it. The gun was left on the kitchen counter.She quoted Schreiner’s words, “I can’t say it was an accident,” spoken in the state police interview.