Weapons and violence mark Trimble's past, present.(Knight Ridder Newspapers)

Byline: Kymberli Hagelberg

HEMPHILL, Texas _ For the first time since a gun was held to her head in 2001, Susan McCoy feels safe enough in her own home to sleep through the night.

What keeps her awake now is the thought that the man she predicted would someday become a killer actually has.

From 1990 to 2003 McCoy was married to James Earl Trimble _ the Brimfield Township man accused of the shooting rampage last weekend that engaged a small army of law enforcement officers and left three people dead.

The Portage County grand jury has yet to decide what to charge Trimble in the deaths of his girlfriend, Renee Bauer, 42; her 7-year-old son, Dakota; and 22-year-old Kent State student Sarah Positano. But Trimble was already indicted Thursday on 12 counts of attempted murder for shooting at police.

Last week, word of his arrest reached this rural East Texas community with a thud.

For even though his troubles seemed to start here, in retrospect, he wasn't seen as all that bad, and his sound and fury wasn't taken all that seriously.

After all, he was the American Legion commander, a volunteer firefighter, a churchgoer, an established handyman and a person noted for helping others.

He did boil over, though, on that afternoon in April 2001 after McCoy filed for divorce and a judge ordered him to appear in court to respond to a protection order she sought.

"They should have held him on attempted murder then," McCoy said. "I told the sheriff that if he didn't come back and kill me, …