Former School Principal Accused Of Killing Spouse For Insurance

California investigators have filed a request to obtain certain banking records pertaining to a former elementary school principal charged with killing her husband.

Specifically, investigators are trying to find out if Leslie Chance shopped at a south Bakersfield Wal-Mart following her husband’s Aug. 25, 2013 slaying.

Why? Because they believe Chance shopped at the Wal-Mart on Colony Street just once — about three weeks before the killing — to locate a pay phone which they say she later used to call a cab after shooting her husband to death, according to a search warrant filed in Superior Court.

Chance, 51, is scheduled to stand trial on a charge of first-degree murder Feb. 25. She faces life without the possibility of parole.

Prosecutors say she gunned down Todd Chance, 45, to collect on life insurance policies.

It’s alleged Leslie Chance disguised herself and used different modes of transportation to get home after the shooting. The vehicle her husband drove the day of his death was found abandoned near the Wal-Mart.

Her purchasing records show she only visited the Colony Street Wal-Mart once in the year before the killing, according to the warrant. That trip occurred Aug 9. Investigators are now requesting to review her purchasing records for a 1-year period after her husband’s death.

The Wal-Mart on Gosford Road is closer to the residence where the Chances lived, and records show Leslie Chance made “many purchases per month” at that store, according to the warrant.

If only one purchase was made at the Colony Street store, investigators say, it bolsters their argument she went there to perform reconnaissance as part of her murder plot.

Leslie Chance, at the time the principal of Fairview Elementary School, was initially arrested four days after the killing, but was released while the Sheriff’s Office continued its investigation. She was rearrested in late 2016 and has remained in custody since.

The body of Todd Chance was found off a dirt section of Noriega Road near Enos Lane. He suffered two gunshot wounds to the chest and one to the palm of his right hand.

Investigators believe Leslie Chance learned about criminal investigative techniques and tried to cover her tracks through information she gained after attending a “CSI” exhibit in Las Vegas about two months before the killing, according to court documents.

She claimed she was home the morning her husband was killed, but investigators say surveillance cameras spotted her at multiple locations that morning as she traveled from the site of the shooting back home.

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