HOUSTON, Oct. 17 -- The woman accused of killing Tejano star Selena Quintanilla Perez said on tape recordings played for jurors Tuesday that she accidentally shot the singer as she tried to kill herself. The remarks were contained in recordings of police negotiators trying to get defendant Yolanda Saldivar, 35, to surrender after the shooting of Selena at a Corpus Christi motel on March 31. Previous testimony indicated Selena was trying to retrieve some paperwork about Selena's boutique and salon business from Saldivar at the motel when the shooting occurred during an argument. Saldivar managed Selena Etc. for the 23-year-old singer. Relatives earlier testified they and Selena suspected Saldivar was stealing from the business. Defense attorney Doug Tinker contends the shooting was an accident and that Saldivar was upset when she waved the gun toward Selena, and it accidentally fired. Selena was shot in the back. After the shooting, Saldivar took the gun to her pickup truck in the motel parking lot where she held officers at bay for more than nine hours. Police taped six hours of conversations between Saldivar and negotiators. 'She's gone. She's gone. I don't want to be alive because she isn't alive. The world is going to be mad at me,' a sobbing Saldivar said on the tapes. 'I bought this gun to kill myself,' she told negotiators. Saldivar said Selena had gone to the door of the motel room after Saldivar said she wanted to kill herself. Saldivar said she was waving the gun toward Selena and telling her to close the door when the gun went off, striking Selena.
'The gun, it just went off. I didn't mean to kill her. I was trying to kill myself. It was a mistake,' Saldivar said on the recording. While talking with police negotiators Larry Young and Isaac Valencia, Saldivar also said Selena's father, Abrahama Quintanilla Jr., had raped her and that he terrified her. Quintanilla never has been investigated for the alleged assault. Nueces County District Attorney Carlos Valdez last week asked Quintanilla about the accusations while Quintanilla was on the witness stand. Quintanilla denied having raped Saldivar, threatened her, hurt her or paid anyone else to hurt her. The trial was moved to Houston because of massive publicity about the case in Corpus Christi, Selena's hometown.
