GRAND FALLS-WINDSOR, N.L. - A Pennsylvania woman who says she fatally shot her husband on a hunting trip after mistaking him for a bear goes on trial Monday in central Newfoundland.

Mary Beth Harshbarger, 45, faces one count of criminal negligence causing death for killing her husband Mark four years ago as the couple hunted for black bear near Buchans Junction.

She has pleaded not guilty. Her judge-alone trial will be held before Justice Richard LeBlanc in provincial Supreme Court in Grand Falls-Windsor.

"In my mind, I would say definitely it was an accident," Mark's brother, Barry, who was hunting with the couple on the same ill-fated trip, said from a hunting lodge in Newfoundland as he prepared to head to Grand Falls-Windsor for the trial.

Barry Harshbarger declined to discuss whether he and Mary Beth Harshbarger became a couple soon after his brother's death, as other family members allege. He said he moved into her home in rural Meshoppen, Pa., in May to look after his niece and nephew, aged eight and four, when their mother was extradited to Canada to stand trial.

"I'd rather not talk about it," he said when asked if he and Mary Beth Harshbarger are romantically linked. He arrived in Newfoundland a few days before the trial hoping to get in some bear hunting, he said.

His niece and nephew are being cared for back home, he said.

His father, Leonard (Lee) Harshbarger, says he has been estranged from his daughter-in-law and son Barry since Mark was killed.

"Hopefully I'm going to see justice for what happened," he said from Pennsylvania as he was about to make the long journey by car and ferry to Grand Falls, about a four-hour drive northwest of the capital St. John's.

"I think it was a negligent act and there should be justice for it."

The heartbroken father says he will be accompanied in court by his long-time companion, Carol, and two of his other five children, a son and daughter.

RCMP officers brought Harshbarger to Newfoundland from Scranton, Pa., last May after a two-year extradition fight.

"As for defending myself in a foreign country, I don't feel very confident," she told local WNEP-TV before leaving the U.S.

"But I do think the truth will prevail."

The Mounties did not issue a warrant for Harshbarger's arrest until April 30, 2008.

Mark Harshbarger died Sept. 14, 2006, on the hunting trip that included the couple's young son and daughter. He was a few weeks shy of his 43rd birthday.

Lee Harshbarger described how Mark wanted to visit Newfoundland every year to hunt after his Dad brought back "a nice bull moose" in 1997.

He fondly describes his son as about six-foot-two and 215 pounds, the youngest of his five children. Mark worked as a company estimator assessing the cost of various projects, and spent a lot of time with his father after his mom died in 1995.

His dad recalled how he had tried to persuade Mark to cancel the pricey hunting trip because he and Mary Beth Harshbarger had just built a new house.

"I almost talked him out of going."

Mary Beth Harshbarger had hunted with her husband in the past. She told police that it was dusk, about 25 minutes after sunset, when she thought she saw a bear emerging from the darkened woods and fired the fatal shot.

She described what she saw through her rifle scope as a "big black thing."

Harshbarger also stated she was preoccupied with the couple's two children who were in a pickup truck parked about 60 metres from where their father was killed.

She sued two life insurance companies in 2008 to collect benefits worth about US$550,000. A Pennsylvania state law blocks payment in cases of intentional wrongdoing.

U.S. attorney Robert Murphy represented Harshbarger during the civil action.

"The court made a specific finding that she had committed no wilful act," he said in an interview last May, adding that the state law in question "did not apply to a hunting accident."

Harshbarger won't have to pay the insurance settlement back even if she is convicted of criminal negligence, Murphy said.

"It's irrelevant to the civil decision," he explained. "The case is closed."

RCMP staged two re-enactments of events two days after the shooting and one year later. Officers concluded it was too dark to safely fire a rifle and that it's plausible Harshbarger thought she was looking at a bear, according to U.S. District Court extradition documents.

Her husband was wearing dark clothing and no orange-coloured safety gear.

Criminal negligence causing death with a firearm carries a penalty of four years to a life term in prison.