A Cheltenham man is on trial for killing his wife and mother-in-law during an argument in 2020

Lawyers for a Cheltenham man on trial for killing his wife and mother-in-law during an argument in 2020 said Tuesday that his rage consumed him and led to the fatal shooting that unfolded in front of his two young children.

Prosecutors in Montgomery County rejected that explanation, saying Frederick Clea made a clear, conscious choice to execute the two women inside the home he shared with them.

“This is not a whodunit. The defendant is the one who shot and killed his wife and mother-in-law,” Assistant District Attorney Gabriella Soreth said. “He appreciated the consequences of his actions, and his actions speak loudly in this case.”

Clea, 59, faces counts of first- and third-degree murder in the killings of Latiya Clea, 41, and her mother, Mekenda Saunders, 75, in the July 2020 slayings. His fate will be decided by Montgomery County Judge Gary Silow, who is presiding over the bench trial in Norristown.

Clea’s attorney, Thomas Egan III, said there is no question that his client is responsible for the women’s deaths. But he urged Silow to find him guilty of third-degree murder or manslaughter.

“This is a case about an argument, about rage, about things getting out of hand between a husband and wife,” said Egan, who added that his client “absolutely lost it” during the dispute.

“This was a killing in the heat of passion. ... This is a killing where, as the old expression goes, ‘he saw red,’” Egan said. “It is not a premeditated killing.”

Investigators said the argument started when Clea grew upset he could not find the extra magazine for his Glock 9mm handgun, which he had purchased months earlier. He then took the gun and shot his mother-in-law once in the chest, and his wife at least five times in her legs, arm, and chest.

Clea took the stand late Monday and said he had no recollection of the shooting. He described waking up in a “brain fog” to see his wife’s body on the floor.

“You may never accept me as family again,” Clea said tearfully to his relatives assembled in the courtroom. “I know you will never forgive me, because I can never give back what I’ve taken, but I still love you.”

The carnage unfolded just feet away from Clea’s two children, Ashiyah, 11, and Avery, 6, who were not injured.

Ashiyah took the stand Tuesday, slowly and deliberately recounting the horrors of that day in her home.

She said she woke that morning to the sound of her parents arguing, and heard her father tell her mother “this is your last chance, tell me where my magazine is” as she and Saunders were putting away groceries they had just purchased.

Minutes later, the girl said, Clea left to retrieve his gun, then fired the first shot, striking a balloon left over from her brother’s birthday party a week before. She said she took her brother and cowered in the corner of the kitchen as Clea continued to fire, striking his mother-in-law in the chest, causing her to collapse behind a couch.

He then turned the gun on his wife, hitting her in the leg. Ashiyah said she heard her mother scream and ask Clea why he was shooting.

Ashiyah said her father told her and her brother to go into a nearby room. From there, she said, she watched her mother beg for her life before her father shot her again at point-blank range.

Afterward, she said, her father hugged her and her brother and told them he loved them. When the police arrived not long after, he surrendered without incident, the child said.

In a later interview with detectives, Clea admitted to shooting the women, saying he had “gone too far,” according to the affidavit of probable cause for his arrest.

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