‘Strange even by Florida standards’: Guilty plea concludes 1990 ‘clown’ homicide case

A Florida woman on Tuesday pleaded guilty to dressing as a clown in the killing of a romantic rival nearly 33 years ago in a case described by The Associated Press as “strange even by Florida standards.”

Sheila Keen-Warren, 59, pleaded guilty to second-degree murder in connection with the fatal shooting of Marlene Warren in 1990. Keen-Warren will likely be released from prison within a year under terms of the deal.

Keen-Warren has been jailed awaiting trial since 2017, when DNA evidence linking her to the crime led to her arrest. Investigators found a hair in the clown’s getaway car that matched Keen-Warren’s.

Prosecutors alleged Keen-Warren showed up at her victim’s door dressed as a clown and handed Marlene Warren carnations and balloons before shooting her dead in front of her son, The AP reports.

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Marlene Warren’s son, Joseph Ahrens, was 21 at the time of the killing. He watched the trial online.

Keen-Warren at the time of the shooting worked at a used car lot owned by Marlene Warren’s husband, Michael. They married in 2002 and moved to Abington, Virginia, where they operated a restaurant near the Tennessee border.

Witnesses around the time of the killing told authorities that Keen-Warren, who in 1990 was Sheila Keen, was having an affair with Michael Warren, but both denied it.

The case that has attracted national media attention to the Sunshine State was resolved without notice.

The AP’s Terry Spencer reports that “No public notice was given for Tuesday’s plea hearing in West Palm Beach, which otherwise would have drawn a throng of reporters and spectators. Instead, it was handled quietly during Circuit Judge Scott Suskauer’s lunch break from another murder trial.”

Palm Beach County State Attorney Dave Aronberg said in a statement that Marlene Warren and her son had “obtained a measure of justice.”

“Sheila Keen-Warren has finally been forced to admit that she was the one who dressed as a clown and took the life of an innocent victim,” Aronberg said.

“She will be a convicted murderer for the rest of her days.”