Sharon was to be tried twice for the murders of Patricia Jones and her own husband. The former began first, in June. The prosecution noted that Patricia had her lunch break at the IRS office on May 26 and it was the last meal she ever ate since the autopsy found a completely empty stomach and thus it had to be at least six hours between her lunch and her death. The body must have been laying outside for over 24 hours when it was found but the defense believed she was dead not more than eight hours. Sharon had apparently claimed Walter lost interest in her and broke it off as soon as he found out about her pregnancy. Even though she had since given birth to his child, he never acknowledged the baby and completely moved on with his life, moving to another town a few months after Patricia was killed and re-marrying.

The prosecution could not prove beyond a reasonable doubt that Sharon owned the murder weapon even though Patricia was killed with a .22 caliber gun similar to the one Sharon had owned. Roy Thrush, who'd sold Sharon's friend the gun, showed police a tree with bullets he said were fired from the gun but these rounds were extracted from the tree and could not be identified as being from the murder weapon. A total of 27 witnesses testified for the prosecution, some of whom gave kinky details about her sexual habits; they said she was dominating and liked to be in command in the bedroom, and she could be extremely possessive of her lovers. Sharon did not show much reaction at having her intimate details spilled out in the courtroom and spent most of the proceedings seated calmly as she took down notes.