Tucson woman sentenced to probation for poisoning husband’s coffee with bleach for months (2024)

A Tucson woman who poisoned her husband’s coffee every day for months last year was sentenced to probation last week, according to court documents.

Records show that Melody Feliciano Johnson, 40, was sentenced to three years of probation on May 10 after pleading guilty to two felony counts of adding poison or another harmful substance to food or drink for putting trace amounts of bleach in her husband's coffee maker on July 11 and 18. Through a plea deal, Melody was able to drop her original charges of attempted first-degree murder and attempted aggravated assault.

Melody's husband, Roby Johnson, told police in a criminal report that he believed his wife was poisoning him with bleach in an attempt “to kill him to collect death benefits.”

A 'toxic' marriage

Roby's suspicions arose in March 2023 when he first noticed a foul taste in his coffee while stationed in Germany with his family while serving with the U.S. Air Force. At the time, he and Melody were living together with their child but were in the process of a divorce.

Roby continued to drink the coffee for two to three weeks before using pool testing strips to determine what was causing the foul taste. Roby told detectives that after testing his family’s tap water, which generated typical readings, he tested his coffee and found that it contained “high" levels of chlorine.

Roby stated in documents that his wife knew he would prepare his coffee pot at night, so that he would only need to turn it on in the morning to make his coffee.

A criminal report showed that Roby pretended to drink the coffee for the rest of the time that the family was in Germany, as he did not want to alert authorities about his discovery until he returned to the U.S. and was able to record video evidence of his wife poisoning his coffee.

When the family returned to Tucson in late June, Roby installed a camera inside their temporary housing at Davis Monthan Air Force Base to observe his wife’s behavior, a criminal report stated. The camera recorded video of Melody pouring a liquid into her husband's coffee maker on July 5, according to records.

The next day, Roby filed a report with the Tucson Police Department that his wife was attempting to poison his coffee with bleach, but officers did not investigate further because the video footage he captured did not clearly depict what liquid Melody was pouring into the coffee maker. As a result, documents showed Roby installed hidden cameras that looked like fire alarms above the coffee maker, in the laundry room — where the bleach was — and between the laundry room and the coffee maker.

A criminal report stated that on July 18, Roby returned to police with multiple videos that showed Melody putting bleach into a container before pouring it into the coffee maker, which he said only he used. Records showed that Melody was arrested later that day.

After a search of the family's house, officers found that the liquid inside the coffee maker smelled like bleach, and they also located a container with a small amount of bleach-smelling liquid in Melody's bathroom, according to a police report.

Wife to be released from jail

As a part of her plea agreement, Melody could be fined or sentenced to prison, probation or prison followed by probation. Both counts to which she pled guilty carried a maximum sentence of two years in prison each.

In addition to sentencing Melody to three years of probation, Judge Javier Chon-Lopez ordered her to undergo a mental health evaluation and prohibited her from having contact with her husband unless they were in the presence of a legal team. With the probation sentence, Melody was set to be released from jail, where records showed she has been held for nearly a year.

Melody said she experienced "abuse" in her "toxic" marriage with Roby, who she said had drinking issues and threatened suicide at least once while "blacked out" when she rejected his sexual advances, according to court records. In addition, Melody said she has "long struggled" with mental health issues and believed her husband was also experiencing problems with his mental health as a result of his deployment, court documents stated.

The couple were in the process of finalizing their divorce and would not be living together going forward, court records showed.

Madeline Nguyen is a breaking news reporter for The Republic. Reach her at Madeline.Nguyen@gannett.com and 480-619-0285. Follow her on X @madelineynguyen.