On a summer day in Jersey City, what initially appeared to be a routine car accident quickly unraveled into a homicide investigation. Robert Ashbourne, a 46-year-old male from Mount Vernon, New York, was found unconscious behind the wheel of his vehicle after it drifted through an intersection and struck a parked car on August 5, 2014. Witnesses to the minor collision believed the driver had simply been knocked out from the impact, but the grim reality was far more severe.
When emergency responders arrived, they discovered that Ashbourne was bleeding from a gunshot wound to his neck. He was pronounced dead at the scene.
The investigation into Ashbourne's death, who was a father of nine and worked as a limousine driver for high-profile celebrities, soon pointed towards his ex-girlfriend, Cheryl Nisbett of New York City. The Hudson County Prosecutor's Office determined that Nisbett had shot Ashbourne in the back of the head while he was inside his car. Following the fatal shot, the vehicle, with Ashbourne no longer in control, rolled slowly forward until it came to a stop against the other vehicle.
A Hudson County grand jury indicted Nisbett on murder charges in June of 2015, and she was subsequently taken into custody in New York. For several months, she fought extradition to New Jersey before finally making her first court appearance on the murder charge in October 2015. In a turn of events before her trial was set to begin, Nisbett accepted a plea deal in February 2017. She pleaded guilty to the lesser charge of aggravated manslaughter, facing a potential prison sentence of up to 10 years for the death of Robert Ashbourne.
