The estate of Chris Northon has sued the wife who killed him in a Lostine River campground in fall 2000 for $7.5 million.

Defendant Liysa Northon, who pleaded guilty to manslaughter during a July 2001 trial in the case, is serving a 12-year sentence at the Coffee Creek Correctional Facility in Wilsonville.

A wrongful death complaint against Liysa Northon was filed by Philip Hetz, personal representative of the estate of Christopher James Northon, earlier this month.

“This is being filed on behalf of the beneficiary of the estate, her son Dane,” said attorney Gary R. Johnson with the Bend law firm of Hurley, Lynch and Re. “We are trying to preclude her from ever being able to benefit from Chris Northon’s death.”

The suit asks for a judgment that includes $5 million for the economic loss suffered by the estate, plus another $1 million in economic damages specifically for loss of Chris Northon’s services. Another $1.5 million in noneconomic was claimed for “the disability, pain and suffering he suffered between the period between the time he was injured and when he died” and for the loss to his beneficiaries of his society and companionship.”

Chris Northon was a pilot with Hawaiian Airlines at the time of his death, while his wife, Liysa Northon, was a professional photographer. They were camping with their young son, Dane, at Two Pans campground on the Lostine River when Liysa Northon shot Chris Northon while he was apparently asleep in his sleeping bag.

Liysa Northon, who still has family members living in northeastern Oregon and southwestern Washington, claimed a history of domestic violence in the marriage, and said the action was a matter of self-defense.

In the middle of her trial at the Wallowa County Courthouse, however, Liysa Northon changed her plea from not guilty of murder to guilty of first-degree manslaughter.

In an unsuccessful plea for clemency filed with Gov. John Kitzhaber before he left office, Northon claimed she was coerced into the guilty plea and stated that her husband had repeatedly promised to kill her if she left with her son.

Liysa Northon said in December in her request for clemency that she was employed as a recreation clerk, worked on children’s stories, and taught yoga and nutritional education to other inmates.

The Northon case will soon become internationally known when a hardcover book, titled “A Heart Full of Lies,” about the Northon killing is published by best-selling true-crime writer Ann Rule.