Jason Corbett’s first wife was Margaret “Mags” Fitzpatrick, an Irish woman from Pallaskenry, County Limerick, who married him on June 28, 2003, and died in November 2006 after what her family and the original Irish autopsy described as a fatal asthma-related collapse.1People. All About Margaret Fitzpatrick, Jason Corbett’s First Wife Nearly two decades later, the cause of her death became a contested issue in a North Carolina courtroom, when lawyers for the people who killed Jason tried to argue he had a history of choking women.
Who Mags Fitzpatrick Was
Mags grew up in Pallaskenry, a small community in County Limerick. Her parents were Marian Fitzpatrick and Michael “Mikey” Fitzpatrick, who died in 2016. She had four siblings: Michael Jr., Catherine, Sean, Thomas, and Sarah.2Limerick Leader. Family of Jason Corbett’s First Wife Hit Out at Lies About How Our Mags Died Her family later described her in court filings as “the rock in our family, the one we all turned to.”
She met Jason Corbett through her best friend, Lynn, on a night out. Lynn recalled that the two were “just meant for each other” from the start. They married in Ireland in 2003 and had two children: Jack, born on September 18, 2004, and Sarah, born on September 2, 2006.1People. All About Margaret Fitzpatrick, Jason Corbett’s First Wife Her sister Catherine was living with the couple at the time of Mags’s death.
How She Died in November 2006
Mags had lived with asthma all her life. She kept a nebulizer and inhalers at home, and in the weeks before her death she had visited her GP complaining of chest pains and pain in her left arm.3The Irish Times. Family of Mags Fitzpatrick Told Court What the Martens Claimed Is Totally Inaccurate Sarah was two months old.
On the night she died, Mags used both her inhalers and her nebulizer without relief. Jason woke Catherine, called an ambulance, and then put Mags in the car to meet the ambulance on the way. According to her family, he revived her briefly before paramedics arrived. She died during transport to the hospital.
The autopsy was carried out in Ireland by Dr. Elizabeth Mulcahy. She attributed the death to “acute cardiorespiratory arrest secondary to known bronchospasm in a known asthmatic.”4The Irish Times. Jason Corbett’s First Wife Did Not Die of Asthma Attack, Prosecution’s Own Witness Tells Court That finding stood without serious challenge for nearly seventeen years.
Why Her Death Was Reopened in a U.S. Courtroom
Jason Corbett was beaten to death on August 2, 2015, at his home in Davidson County, North Carolina, by his second wife, Molly Martens, and her father, Thomas Martens, a retired FBI agent. They claimed self-defense. Both were convicted of second-degree murder in 2017, but those convictions were overturned on appeal, and in October 2023 Molly pleaded no contest and Thomas pleaded guilty to voluntary manslaughter.5People. Where Are Jason Corbett’s Killers Now
At the eight-day sentencing hearing that followed in Davidson County Superior Court, the defense made Mags Fitzpatrick’s death a centerpiece of its case in mitigation. If they could persuade Judge David Hall that Jason had once strangled his first wife, they could bolster Molly’s account that he had been strangling her on the night she and her father killed him.
What the Medical Experts Said
Dr. Bill Smock, a forensic medicine specialist and medical director of the Training Institute on Strangulation Prevention, testified for the defense that Mags had not died of asthma. He pointed to blushing around her nose and mouth noted in the original autopsy as “a physical finding consistent with strangulation” and said she had, in his view with probability, “died of an asphyxiated death.”6The Journal. Medical Experts Testify on Death of Jason Corbett’s First Wife Dr. Thomas Sporn, a Duke University pathologist, agreed asthma was unlikely and said the incomplete original autopsy “opened the door” to the possibility of homicide. Pressed by Judge Hall on whether the theory was speculation, Sporn acknowledged that it was.7Irish Examiner. Jason Corbett First Wife Death Testimony
The prosecution’s own witnesses also criticized the Irish autopsy but stopped well short of calling the death a homicide. Dr. George Nichols, a retired chief medical examiner of Kentucky, called the report “completely wrong,” noted that it ran only two pages and had omitted basic procedures such as removing and examining the upper airway, and said the cause of death should properly be classified as “undetermined.” Homicide, he testified, was “possible but nowhere close to probable.” The original examination had found no evidence of external injury.4The Irish Times. Jason Corbett’s First Wife Did Not Die of Asthma Attack, Prosecution’s Own Witness Tells Court Dr. William Bozeman, an emergency medicine professor testifying for the state, likewise found the autopsy incomplete but said he saw no evidence of strangulation and described the cause of death as “underdetermined.”7Irish Examiner. Jason Corbett First Wife Death Testimony
Prosecutors argued that Dr. Smock had reached strangulation by ruling other explanations out rather than by finding affirmative signs of it. District Attorney Alan Martin told the court that with the death officially classified as undetermined, the true cause would likely never be known.3The Irish Times. Family of Mags Fitzpatrick Told Court What the Martens Claimed Is Totally Inaccurate
What Mags’s Family Told the Court
The Fitzpatricks rejected the defense theory publicly and in the record. Assistant District Attorney Marissa Parker read a statement into the court from Mags’s mother Marian and all four of her siblings, calling the Martens allegations “totally inaccurate and untrue.”3The Irish Times. Family of Mags Fitzpatrick Told Court What the Martens Claimed Is Totally Inaccurate
Their statement described the night Mags died in detail, noting that Catherine had been in the house and had witnessed Jason’s frantic effort to save her. “He did everything he could to save the person he absolutely adored and our family have always been grateful for how he tried to save her,” they wrote.8RTÉ. Corbett Family Statement They called Jason her “soul mate,” said he had remained welcome in their home after her death, and closed: “Nothing can tarnish the love between Mags and Jason.”3The Irish Times. Family of Mags Fitzpatrick Told Court What the Martens Claimed Is Totally Inaccurate
Judge Hall sentenced Molly Corbett and Thomas Martens to 51 to 74 months in prison for voluntary manslaughter. With credit for 44 months already served, both had about seven months left to serve and were released on June 6, 2024.5People. Where Are Jason Corbett’s Killers Now Mags Fitzpatrick’s death remains officially classified as undetermined, and no criminal finding has ever been made against Jason Corbett in connection with it.