Ex-Calif. Lawmaker Accused of Aiding Wife's Suicide as Defense Says She Was in 'Severe Pain'

A former California assemblyman has been charged with helping his wife kill herself in 2016, PEOPLE confirms.

Steve Clute, 69, is accused of aiding the suicide of his 66-year-old wife, Pam Clute, a respected math educator who was found dead in the couple’s home in Palm Desert, California, on Aug. 21, 2016.

Steve was charged on Thursday. He served in the state assembly from 1982 to 1992.

Prosecutors allege that he provided his wife with the handgun she used to kill herself, according to John Hall, a spokesman with the Riverside County, California, District Attorney’s Office.

Hall says the charge came after a follow-up investigation into Pam’s death, following “a significant and thorough investigation initially.”

The DA’s office requested the additional inquiry after reviewing the evidence from the first probe, Hall says.

Steve’s defense attorney, Virginia Blumenthal, says he will plead not guilty at his arraignment, which is scheduled for Wednesday. She tells PEOPLE that Steve and Pam, who had been married since 1977, were “absolutely very much in love with each other.”

Blumenthal says Pam was in “severe pain” from a debilitating back condition at the time of her death, though the condition was not terminal. She was “very, very holistic” in her pain-management approach, opting not to use “man-made” medicine, Blumenthal says.

“When people have severe severe pain that is not controllable sometimes, it is only so long you can take it,” she says. “Everyone’s tolerance of pain is different.”

In California, an adult can receive assistance to kill themselves but only if they are terminally ill and a doctor prescribes the life-ending medication.

Blumenthal says that the couple had numerous guns in their home and Pam usually kept one in the nightstand drawer.

“The way it is coming out is that he went out to get her a gun and that is not true,” she tells PEOPLE. “Those guns had been there for quite a while. He did not go out and buy her a gun to give to her.”

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“I am shocked at the news,” Elle K. Kurpiewski, a friend of the couple, tells PEOPLE. “But again my first thought that came to my mind is this is a couple that loved each other so much and if what is alleged is true, it was done with love. It was done because of love.”

Kurpiewski says she had no idea that Pam — a longtime professor at the University of California, Riverside, and a champion of getting more female students involved in math and science — had killed herself until Steve was charged last week. “I thought it was cancer,” she says.

“The cause of death was not public knowledge until they filed the charges,” Blumenthal explains.

Deputies were first called to the Clute home about 5:45 a.m. on Aug. 21, 2016 after Steve called 911 stating that he was awoken by a gunshot and found his wife dead.

“He also told the dispatcher that Pamela suffered from severe pain and wanted to end her life,” according to an arrest warrant declaration obtained by PEOPLE.

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Deputies discovered a revolver next to her body. Her husband told investigators he had changed his clothes at least three times prior to calling 911.

Authorities determined that Steve took about 45 minutes before he called them.

According to the warrant declaration, detectives re-interviewed Steve the day after Pam died and he “changed his story several times, and stated he had provided Pamela with the revolver, which she used to kill herself. Steve said Pamela was unable to ‘do it’ herself, but he did not pull the trigger.”

“Steven said he had given Pamela the revolver as an option to end the pain she was going through based on a previous discussion they had about using the revolver as an option,” the warrant declaration states.

“It is going to be interesting to see how it plays out,” says Kurpiewski, the couple’s friend. “The whole thing is as sad as it could be.”

Despite the allegations, she says, the Clutes really seemed to have “a love story going on — that was obvious to anyone who would see them.”