ORLANDO, Fla. (Court TV) — A Florida man pleaded with his sister for help in the hours after he shot and killed his wife, text messages read aloud in court on Wednesday revealed.
Timothy Kramer sits in court on Aug. 5, 2026. (Court TV)
Timothy Kramer, 53, is charged with first-degree premeditated murder and aggravated animal cruelty in the death of his wife, Rosa Kramer. Investigators say Timothy Kramer shot and killed his wife and severely injured his dog because he was upset that the victim was leaving him.
Prosecutors said Rosa Kramer was killed on July 23, 2024, at the property she shared with the defendant. About two weeks before her death, Rosa Kramer had moved into her father’s home. Text messages read into evidence on Wednesday showed that for 24 hours before the deadly shooting, Timothy Kramer had been begging his estranged wife to speak to him.
Brittany Crawford, a criminal investigator for the Escambia County Sheriff’s Office, read into the record a series of messages the defendant sent on July 22, to which the victim did not respond. The messages alternately begged for a response and pleaded for her to return to the home.
Timothy Kramer: “Rosa, can I hear your voice if I call you?”
Timothy Kramer: “I hurt without you. I cannot help that I am hurting bad.”
Timothy Kramer: “I love you and miss you. Come spend the night with me, please.”
Timothy Kramer: “Please tell me you did not mean that long letter you left me. You told me today that we can fix this and you love me and miss me.”
Timothy Kramer: “Why did you leave your nightgown over here if you knew you were not coming back? All that was doing is leading me on the last three days.”
Prosecutors said that the defendant sent multiple messages to Rosa Kramer claiming — in what prosecutors described as an effort to lure the victim to her death — that he had her mother’s bowl, a photo album and a birth certificate she needed.
Timothy Kramer’s defense countered that there were days and weeks of messages between the couple showing that feelings were unresolved on both sides of the relationship, and denied any plot to kill Rosa Kramer.
After the shooting, investigators said that Timothy Kramer reached out to his sister, Delores Kramer, and told her that he had killed his wife in an act of self-defense. In the minutes after the shooting, the defendant texted his sister, “Call me now ASAP please,” and “Call me now, it is important.” A text half an hour later from Delores Kramer to her brother read, “Tim, you told me you killed her. I cannot be an accessory to this. I have a fiance and his daughter to think about.”
Timothy Kramer told his sister that he called the police and began asking her whether she would be willing to let him hide at her home if prosecutors issued a warrant for his arrest. “Be honest, if they put one out for my arrest, you’re not going to hide me, right?” he asked multiple times. Delores Kramer repeatedly stated that the defendant had nothing to worry about if he was acting in self-defense.
The defendant wasn’t so sure.
“I was just looking at stand your ground law, and I think I will be f—ed after reading the laws,” Timothy Kramer said at one point. “By what I read, I did not have the right to use it.”
In his opening statement to the jury, Timothy Kramer’s attorney, Andrew Benson, said that the defendant was terrified for his own life when he shot the victim, who was punching and kicking him at the time.
