North Georgia woman says her father was wrongly convicted, now she is fighting for justice

CHEROKEE COUNTY, Ga. — A North Georgia woman is fighting for justice for her father who she says was wrongly convicted.

He was convicted of shooting and killing her mother, and last week, he was sentenced to life behind bars.

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“It’s hurtful because I’ve lost both of my parents you know,” said Chelsea Collins as she described her new reality.

Chelsea Collins remembers getting the call in July of 2023 that her father, Charles, had shot and killed his wife and Chelsea’s mother, Deborah.

“I dropped to my knees crying,” said Collins.

Chelsea feared this moment would come after years of abuse by her mother, documented in police reports.

“To my dad also, he got the worst of it. I even have where she ripped my earrings out as a child,” said Collins.

And on that night last summer, at her parents’ home on Raven Drive in Cherokee County, she said her father was just defending himself.

“Everybody was wondering when she would go too far. That night she had been trying to pry open the door to where my dad was sleeping with a knife,” said Collins.

But it’s a story that didn’t sway jurors, who convicted Charles Collins of several charges including malice murder in January. Chelsea said the evidence is clear that this was self-defense.

“They tried to say that the knife was planted by my father who had recently just shot a gun. So if you place a knife somewhere you have gunpowder residue on your hands, that gunpowder residue would transfer to that knife. There was no gunpowder residue found on that knife,” said Collins.

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Channel 2 Action News reached out to the Cherokee County District Attorney’s office who prosecuted the case and said in a statement:

“The defense claimed justification at trial and the jury was presented with evidence including testimony from the defendant himself, his daughter, and a crime scene expert hired by the defense. The jury returned a verdict that demonstrated a rejection of the self-defense claim.”

For Chelsea, she says justice wasn’t served in this case. They will appeal her father’s conviction.

“He’s a good man that deserves a lot better than this,” said Collins.

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