Metro

Queens woman who killed abusive husband rips courts before five-year term for gun possession – turns self in

INDIGNATION: Barbara Sheehan (above), who used these guns to kill her abusive husband, speaks to The Post yesterday before going to jail—not for murder, but for gun possession.

INDIGNATION: Barbara Sheehan (above), who used these guns to kill her abusive husband, speaks to The Post yesterday before going to jail—not for murder, but for gun possession.

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A Queens woman — acquitted for killing her abusive husband — slowly walked into Queens Supreme Court this morning to turn herself in to begin a five-year prison sentence for a gun charge conviction.

Barbara Sheehan, 52, was surrounded by a gaggle of family and friends who have continued to support her since she shot her retired-cop husband, Raymond 11 times inside the bathroom of their Howard Beach home.

“We love you Barbara!” shouted one relative as court officers placed handcuffed on the petite woman.

“You’re our hero!” exclaimed another as Sheehan soberly walked into the back of the courtroom to be transferred to Riker’s Island.

The jury justified Sheehan for shooting Raymond with one gun, but found her guilty of using a second weapon to finish the job.

“If this makes the County of Queens feel like they are doing taxpayers a favor by putting me away, then put me away,” an exasperated Barbara Sheehan told The Post yesterday,

“I’ll be there tomorrow,” a visibly upset Sheehan said, speaking from the front steps of her Howard Beach home, where, inside the bathroom, she’d emptied a two-gun fusillade into the retired cop four days after Valentine’s Day, 2008.

“I’m not happy about it, but I’ll be there.”

Sheehan lost an appeal in May to lower her five-year term sentenced issued by Queens Supreme Court Justice Barry Kron in Oct. 2011. One appellate judge dissented and criticized Justice Kron’s decision to not take advantage of “Jenna’s Law” — which gives first-time-violent offenders a chance at a compassionate sentence if the crime was provoked by domestic violence.

Sheehan’s attorney, Niall MacGiollabhui requested for the $1 million bail to be exonerated and to place her into protective custody.

Justice Kron granted both applications.

The attorneys have taken their case to the highest court in the state, the Court of Appeals, which will decide if they will hear Sheehan’s case.

“If the Court of Appeals grants us leave and decides the appeal is in our favor then Barbara will be released,” said MacGiollabhui.

“Where are we in our country if [you] can’t even defend yourself in your own home?” she complained yesterday.

Sheehan, 52, had told jurors at her lengthy trial that she was a victim of domestic violence for almost 20 years. She and her husband were about to leave for a trip to Florida, where she believed he was going to kill her, which is why she shot him as he shaved, she’d told jurors.

Sheehan, a mother of two children in their 20s, said she plans on putting her time in prison to good use.

“While I’m there, I’ll get an education, my college degree, something I never got,” she said.