Joanna Madonna Trial (Cross Exam Continues) Day 8 Part 1 09/24/15

[00:00:00] Speaker 1: almost every day on the phone so yes I was comfortable enough to talk about [00:00:05] Speaker 2: hand-holding with somebody at that point and so the context of the letter the statement that touching Jose made your skin crawl was this because that's another thing I've been thinking about hand-holding because I think it's been many years since I've willingly held a man's hand someone I actually wanted to touch I used to love holding hands when I was younger but touching Jose made my skin crawl after the first six months with him as I've explained there were [00:00:39] Speaker 1: times that Jose was I would say coming on to me and it made me uncomfortable and I was not in the mood for being touched at those times so yes and that was before you even married him um don't remember saying that specifically but since you read it I suppose that's true I was not big Jose and I did not hold hands much after the first six months yes but I still loved him and I still love him today [00:01:05] Speaker 2: now Michelle's your middle daughter right she is my middle daughter how old was she when you murdered Jose I'm sorry [00:01:12] Speaker 3: sustained as to the characterization of Quinn how old was your daughter Michelle [00:01:16] Speaker 1: when you killed Jose well that was 2013 so Michelle would have been 19 and she had a pretty bad attitude about him as you testified to yesterday is that correct well I think ever since he had lied to her and told her that he was buying a house up in New York ever since then they had had a real contentious relationship she [00:01:39] Speaker 2: didn't want to even talk to him did she there were times that she did not want to [00:01:43] Speaker 1: talk to him and there were times when she was very pleasant with him and so there were times when we did do things together especially like when we went to Puerto Rico or [00:01:52] Speaker 2: went to New York all together yeah so as disrespectful and nasty as she was to him [00:01:57] Speaker 1: he still took her to Puerto Rico on a family trip they were amicable with each other when we were all [00:02:04] Speaker 2: together most of the time yes and Michelle had a boyfriend while you were all living in schoolhouse street right Michelle yes she did and she had her own car she did have her own car yes and she stayed out sometimes overnight at her boyfriend's house yes she [00:02:22] Speaker 1: did and she drank liquor I'm sure that she did although when I asked her about it she denied it she smoked dope she denied it every time I asked her about it didn't you talk to her while [00:02:35] Speaker 2: you were in the jail and she visited and you told her to take it off of her Facebook because it would [00:02:39] Speaker 1: be hard for her to get a job later on that was my recommendation to my daughter having been a teacher I know that everything you put on Facebook is public and so I recommended that she take down [00:02:50] Speaker 2: anything referring to anything illegal she she has a lot of the same issues you had when you were younger [00:02:58] Speaker 1: doesn't she I do not believe that my daughter has ever been molested I do not believe that my daughter has ever been raped my daughter grew up in a recovering house so I can't say that she necessarily has those same type of issues so um you indicated that um when you first got a call that the [00:03:24] Speaker 2: police were at your house that you started calling your daughter Michelle I started making several [00:03:29] Speaker 1: phone calls Michelle had been the last thing that he had been talking about he was coming for her he was going to get her so she was most on my mind at that point and so is that why you asked her that's why [00:03:43] Speaker 2: you told her that you had dumped his body someone where no one would find it I made up a lie lie to [00:03:48] Speaker 1: Michelle I lied to Michelle I lied to Michelle and I believe that I said that yesterday I told Michelle whatever I needed to tell her to get her to be quiet yes I lied to Michelle the answer to that question [00:04:01] Speaker 2: is yes yes I did say that you told her that you had dumped Jose's body where it would never be found [00:04:09] Speaker 1: among the other lies yes I told Michelle that they would not find him and is that why you also asked [00:04:15] Speaker 2: her to come help you clean up all of Mr. Perez's blood out of the jeep when she got home I was cleaning [00:04:24] Speaker 1: I did not ask her to come help me clean up I was cleaning off the where he had spit the blood on the dashboard she came in and I was cleaning and at that point I had been just I was exhausted my body I couldn't do it anymore and I asked her to help me and she said no you asked her to stop on the way [00:04:44] Speaker 2: home from where she was and buy new seat covers for the jeep too yes I had mentioned yesterday there was [00:04:50] Speaker 1: blood on the passenger side seat on the corner where he had been sitting and I asked her to get me seat [00:04:55] Speaker 2: covers before you went out and killed Jose did you ask Michelle for her taser did you just take it [00:05:01] Speaker 1: I don't remember Michelle having uh Michelle and I having a conversation about her taser so you just [00:05:07] Speaker 2: took it I don't remember taking her taser so there was no taser involved in anything I did not have a taser anywhere near Jose and so that's why you felt it necessary to throw the taser out with all the other things like the knife box the bloody clothes and all of Jose's personal items I threw everything out [00:05:30] Speaker 1: including Jose's GPS just because that had been in the car and it had blood on it at the time that you [00:05:41] Speaker 2: went out on a drive with Jose you knew that tasers could kill stun guns um I was thinking about what [00:05:50] Speaker 1: I was going to say to Jose I wasn't thinking about stun guns at that time but you'd been looking it up online um when I was still working at Garner I had looked up tasers briefly I had students that had had a lot of experience with the criminal justice system and they had talked to me about different types of personal weapons that you could use for protection so at some point I did look up tasers uh they had told me that there was an instance where somebody had died from a taser and I googled can a taser kill someone and um once I got on that page there were all kind of stories about that situation where people [00:06:28] Speaker 2: had died from a result of tasers so that's the taser situation and um your students were worried about [00:06:37] Speaker 1: whether tasers could kill someone with a heart condition like Jose had I had students who um they had given me their probation officers phone numbers instead of their parents phone numbers so this was a very new kind of um experience for me teaching in a high school like that so they gave me a lot of information about um they spoke about weapons quite often now um you said yesterday that you did not gain [00:07:04] Speaker 2: anything from Jose or from his death and you never had any expectation of gaining anything no there are [00:07:10] Speaker 1: no VA benefits payable unless the veteran dies of a service connected disability and that's something that um we had known for quite a while that if somebody does not die as a result of their disability for example if Jose had died from a heart attack if he had died from his diabetes then the spouse can potentially get something but only if they're destitute and um so I knew that I would never I mean I never expected to get any benefits from the VA you certainly wouldn't get any benefits from the VA or social security if you were divorced would you uh actually social security when Jose and I were looking at the social security information it had said that the wife uh you know a spouse of a disabled person in general not just a VA a spouse of a disabled person is entitled to a benefit if they don't get remarried and as we started working with Diane Wilson and working with the um social security to try to work that out I said to him you know your ex-wife is eligible for these benefits too because she's not married yet and I said why don't we tell Myrna that she can get this money and he said he was not interested in doing that but yes um there is a benefit that the family can get if uh the person is disabled through social security but that again ends if they pass away and on September 4th uh 2013 you wrote to your daughter Michelle that easy money was evil money is that correct yes my opinion is that um oh I'm sorry to [00:08:57] Speaker 2: apologize and you also wrote to her that the bottom line is that we can ask for forgiveness and then move on I've had to do that here I'm sure God pointed me to a thousand good resources to get Jose to leave but I kept saying I can do this on my own 80 days later I've asked for forgiveness and I am healed so that's done no more fast money moving on um fast money is definitely I'm not sure what I was [00:09:25] Speaker 1: referring to in that instance I had met a lot of young ladies who were in professions um that where the money came very quickly and um I'm sure I might have been referring to staying longer than I should have because of concerns about you know I have to catch up just one more car payment before I go just one more mortgage payment before I you know before we leave so I'm sure that that's what I was referring to there was no money when um this happened there had been times when the money was so bad that I had to go to the um food pantry uh off of Durant Road um within the the year before Jose passed away so there was no money [00:10:07] Speaker 2: there was no money you uh told people that um Mr. Perez was drinking and drugging because you found empty liquor bottles and empty pill bottles in the house correct there were a lot of unexplained [00:10:20] Speaker 1: hydrocodone bottles surfacing here and there underneath his um medicine cabinet in the bathroom [00:10:26] Speaker 2: and you told people that you thought he was cheating on you because you smelled another woman on him and [00:10:32] Speaker 1: you found empty um condom wrappers in the house um what I had actually found was something that I think is a male libido enhancer something that you would buy in like a gas station so I refer to it as like an over-the-counter viagra type of thing but um I knew that he could not take those because of his heart that's what he had told me so I was very surprised that was probably right around the time that I found that email um to that Martha Hernandez so that was just one of the last things that [00:11:11] Speaker 2: really got me kind of disgusted at that point you never confronted either one of your daughters about [00:11:16] Speaker 1: whether those liquor bottles were theirs did you um Rachel was so involved in her church at that point she was going to the furnace pretty much every day at that point I knew she was not drinking um Michelle with all of the other issues that she had going on that seemed like one of the least [00:11:35] Speaker 2: important things for me to be talking to her about so you just decided you knew that those liquor bottles [00:11:41] Speaker 1: were Jose's um well there were like I said they were in his things in the garage it was rum which had been his drink of choice um he talked about rum all the time in Puerto Rico living right next to a rum factory so he was a very fond of rum and so I kind of put all that together both of your older daughters were sexually active weren't they had boyfriends oh um yes both of my daughters were sexually active [00:12:16] Speaker 2: and so if there were condom wrappers or some other sexual devices in the house it could have belonged to [00:12:22] Speaker 1: your daughters or their boyfriends um I found the pill thing in Jose's little sock basket he had a sock basket in his bedroom on his shelf in the closet nobody came into our bedroom for any reason uh the closet was in the master bath so um and it was right there bunched up in his socks so again my assumption was that these were his and uh you kept that facebook letter that you said was from Martha Hernandez right I saved it I titled it evidence I wanted to have something to be able to show him and say um now I have proof [00:13:10] Speaker 2: so yes I did say you didn't keep the liquor bottles you didn't keep the pill bottles and you didn't keep [00:13:15] Speaker 1: the condom wrappers did you well as a recovering alcoholic first of all I don't want to be around bottles I don't want to be around pill bottles I don't want to be around any type of alcohol and my children have always respected that I have asked them whatever you are doing do not do it in this house and that's the way that they grew up so that's been a policy with me for their entire lives don't disrespect me and bring it in the house um in terms of the pills that I found the the over-the-counter viagra stuff that I call it I threw it in the garbage I felt it was disgusting and I didn't want to touch it not evidence I'm sorry you didn't think it was evidence I was disgusted I was shocked um like I said Jose had had this conversation with me about viagra within the first week that we had started becoming intimate and he had told me that he could not take anything like that because of his heart condition so when I found that in the bedroom I was absolutely shocked so um you everything about you is [00:14:25] Speaker 2: for your girls right I'm sorry everything about you is is your devotion to your children um I would say [00:14:32] Speaker 1: that I have over the past two years tried to become a little more balanced um and have um had to realize that I am a separate entity from my children um so codependency is something that I've struggled with my whole life and yes I have been um too dependent on my children I have put their needs before mine on many occasions same thing like I put my husband's needs before mine and my father's needs before mine so um that was definitely a pattern of for me for many many years and I'm still trying [00:15:11] Speaker 2: to work on that um with al-anon you taught your girls to be honest hard-working and ethical right [00:15:20] Speaker 1: I hope that they saw that modeled in me I don't think I actually had to teach that I hope that's something that they saw modeled in me of course I'm not perfect though I'm human and I'm perfect and that's why we have things like forgiveness and stuff like that moving on I'm sorry you're moving on I would like to think that I'm becoming a much healthier person um I've got a I have no idea what God has planned for me I've been talking about a lot of religious vocations and things I've been talking to um a lot of people about um getting on a different type of path um not sure if I'm supposed to be a social worker not sure if I'm supposed to be um paralegal or something I'm not really sure what I'm supposed to be doing but I've had two years to think about what my future might look like and there are a lot of possibilities so you wrote to clergy and told people told them that you wanted to be a nun right um I had told them that if I could stay in my family and be able to be a nun at the same time I would love to do that um I think that I have proven to myself that relationships have been very difficult for me it's definitely not my strong suit and I have felt at times that I love the Lord so much that I would be more than happy to just devote myself to him entirely but I would not do that if I couldn't still maintain being a mom to my children [00:16:55] Speaker 2: so on the 15th of June 2013 um you lied to um Jose to get him into the car to go with you didn't you [00:17:05] Speaker 1: no I asked him to come for a ride with me and I asked him to go to the dollar store um I knew that I was asking him to leave so I asked him to come for a ride with me but I knew and I knew that I was asking him to leave so I'm not sure how that constitutes me lying to him you lied to him you [00:17:23] Speaker 2: told him you wanted to go to the dollar store to get him in the car didn't you we did go to the dollar [00:17:28] Speaker 1: store isn't that what you told Jose I told Jose I wanted to go to the dollar store and we did go to the dollar store I did not tell him I'm going to ask you for a divorce on the way so that he could be ready for that I didn't think that that would make much sense to do and over the five years that you'd [00:17:47] Speaker 2: known him he told you a lot of things that weren't true correct yes and that made you angry didn't it [00:17:57] Speaker 1: um yes it still makes me angry when I think about it doesn't mean I don't love him but um [00:18:02] Speaker 2: the sex wasn't satisfactory and that made you angry too didn't it um no that didn't make me angry he [00:18:08] Speaker 1: didn't make the car payments on time and that made you angry didn't it um the fact that he lied about those things yeah that made me angry made me sad too that somebody would be sober that long and still lying about things you know that's one of the most important foundations of recovery is being able to [00:18:26] Speaker 2: be honest he didn't pay the car insurance always on time and that made you angry um no he lied about [00:18:32] Speaker 1: paying the car insurance and that would definitely frustrate me he didn't pay for your beauty pageant bills on time and that made you angry didn't it um I paid my pageant bills um that was something that we would do together and um I think what you're referring to is when he said he was going to go pay the pageant and bounce the check and um that put me in a position where I had to go back to the trophy people and uh work that out and that was very uncomfortable I had not had any experience with check bouncing in quite a while so that was a very uncomfortable situation for me to be in again [00:19:11] Speaker 2: what I'm referring to is your letter that you wrote to Bonnie Henry Henry that you entitled all the lies Jose told me in which you wrote to her he told me he paid several bills including pageant trophies and he didn't reality he had started writing bad checks that's exactly right yes he had started [00:19:29] Speaker 1: writing bad checks and that was going to affect my credit his credit and again like I think I've said that's a kind of chaos that um when you're in recovery your life is supposed to become very simple that kind of chaos bounce checks lying like that to me that's drinking behavior that's pre-recovery behavior so for me to have to be dealing all of a sudden with lies again um it was it was just chaotic and very confusing especially because I cared about him and that's why I tried to say well maybe it's because of the agent orange and that's when he said I've been lying to my wife for 20 years you have to give me a chance to undo those behaviors so and your credit wasn't very good either was it [00:20:18] Speaker 2: no I had um oh I'm sorry sorry about that in fact you came into the marriage with a 46 000 loan default [00:20:27] Speaker 1: didn't you uh yes I believe I'm still in default from my student loan and um that was one of the things I was hoping to pay off when Chuck and I sold the house in rollsville I ended up putting I believe I may have put I want to say six thousand dollars towards it but um after paying off everything else I didn't really have that entire amount I felt that it would have been selfish of me for um to take that amount of money and put it towards something um personal like that so but I had been working with the um collection people on that and um as a matter of fact since I've been in jail they had um they wrote to my daughter while I was in jail and they asked her what are you doing with this and my and she said my mother's not available right now but that's something she wants to take care of so I have tried to [00:21:20] Speaker 2: stay on top of that and that loan was that you took out was a government loan for educational purposes [00:21:27] Speaker 1: was that for your undergraduate or your graduate no um my father paid for um my education at Fordham University so um these were loans that I took out between 2000 and 2003 when I was trying to do graduate school and um what happened at that point was that when my father had that stroke and all of a sudden became um disabled and incapacitated I dropped out of um grad school immediately at that point um not realizing there was a process that you actually had to go through to do paperwork and all [00:22:02] Speaker 2: that so um you came into the marriage with a 46 000 debt yes and I still have that debt today yes [00:22:10] Speaker 1: that is a student loan debt and um when we went to see the financial counselors together about rebuilding credit they said that's not one of the things that's most important to worry about right now um so that was something that you know I figured we would pay off those repossessions that he had and um his ex-wife's car and all that stuff so those were going to be more crucial to getting the credit [00:22:35] Speaker 2: scores up and you were uh he didn't own a million dollar value farm in puerto rico like he told you [00:22:43] Speaker 1: did he no um he had talked about owning a farm after he started talking about selling the property to buy the house in new york that made you angry didn't it when I found out that he had told everybody in my family and had involved an architect in new york and had involved a real estate lawyer had involved the realtor I was devastated for all those people that had been affected by that lie so what made me yeah it made me angry to be lied to like that absolutely that's a trust issue and then to try to have sex with me after telling me these lies that's a horrible that's a horrible situation and he didn't have a [00:23:27] Speaker 2: trust fund that he told you that he had is that correct um he had told me that he had a trust fund [00:23:32] Speaker 1: to pay off the house that he owned in youngsville and that administrator of his trust fund was this man [00:23:39] Speaker 2: named jesse who were we were getting bills from that's a lot more information than i've asked oh sorry the answer only requires a yes or no were you angry when you found out he didn't have the trust fund he told you you had i was angry that he lied about the trust fund and he told people that he had to take [00:23:58] Speaker 1: more medicines than he really did that made you angry didn't it um every lie that he told me yes it knocked my trust down and it knocked me out yes i didn't ask about your trust i asked if it made you angry um well when i get angry i get depressed so i spent a lot of time um in bed in a lot of depression from [00:24:22] Speaker 2: um going through all those lies you told people that he had 13 stents in his heart but it was really [00:24:28] Speaker 1: just three that made you angry too didn't it uh well like i said every time that he lied about something it um i got angry i got depressed and i went to bed so i spent a lot of time depressed in those [00:24:43] Speaker 2: last few years and the the big lie that he told you what was that he was dying of cancer wasn't it [00:24:49] Speaker 1: that was to me one of the most heinous and unforgivable things is to say i have cancer because i know how many people's lives are affected by cancer and i could not wrap my brain around somebody using cancer um for whatever reason he told people he was dying and i never was able to get him to say yes i lied he still denied it up until the last year we were together he never admitted that he lied so to me it was one of the most bizarre things to use cancer um and again i'm not sure even [00:25:33] Speaker 2: why he had ever said that in that meeting but yeah and as devastating and terrible and awful a thing it was that he told you he was dying of cancer and he was not you still married him i still married him yes and [00:25:50] Speaker 1: i believe that anybody can change and i believe that everybody deserves another chance i believe that everybody makes mistakes and i was hoping that that was just a big mistake that he made and he didn't know how much honesty meant to me and how much trust issues i had especially having been raped i do have a lot of trust issues um i wanted to give him the benefit of the doubt that he would change and work on those things and he did seem very willing to work on those things the question was knowing that he had [00:26:24] Speaker 2: lied to you about cancer you still married him yes or no yes now you were angry about all those lies that he told [00:26:33] Speaker 1: correct i don't know if angry is the right word i think it was very depressing [00:26:39] Speaker 2: but you were depressed so you wrote to bonnie henry and wrote her a nine-page letter listing every lie jose told me because you were depressed well i'll tell you um the reason that i ended up in this [00:26:52] Speaker 1: situation is because i didn't tell anybody what was going on in my life and um that was very obvious to me within the first week or two of being alone in a jail cell without anybody else and you sit there and reflect on what brought you to your current situation so i sat there and i promised myself i will never do this again i will never cover up i will never um i will never keep these things to myself there's a saying in the program we are as sick as our secrets and i had too many secrets those five years so i um went ahead and listed every lie i could remember um at that point i didn't know that he wasn't a da so i would have probably added um that to that list [00:27:44] Speaker 2: you um told miss henry in that lies letter that um jose wanted to buy you a mercedes and that you wanted to put a deposit down on it but jose wouldn't let you because it needed to be in his name is that [00:27:57] Speaker 1: correct yeah he said he was going to buy a brand new mercedes he took my friends to the dealership he um got he got the guy involved at the car dealership he wanted to buy a susan komen for the cure thing um and i was fine i had my little saturn my little saturn was all paid off but he said you know this is something i want to do and i said well that's fine and we went there and he test drove it and everything yep and he didn't buy you that mercedes there was no money to buy anything i think that was right before his jeep got repossessed and you were just fine with your little car what kind was it i'm sorry you were fine with your little car what was it i had a saturn that i had paid off i had had a minivan and that was also paid off that was the last car i had in new york and before we moved down i had the saturn and when we sold my dad's house in new york chuck bought himself a pickup truck so i believe that those were the two cars that we had although i know rachel had probably started doing her driving stuff down here so i was probably looking at getting something for rachel too [00:29:18] Speaker 2: yes ma'am [00:29:27] Speaker 3: is that marked it's not yet [00:29:36] Speaker 1: yes ma'am [00:29:48] Speaker 2: i've marked the document that you just looked at as states exhibit 72 it's a bill of sale isn't it it is and it's from december of 2012. it is so you were already married to mr press yes ma'am i was and [00:30:02] Speaker 1: it's from capital one auto brokers it is it's for a white mercedes it's for a 2001 white mercedes yes it [00:30:12] Speaker 2: is and with 180 000 miles on it purchase price was seventeen thousand four hundred eighty two dollars and 78 cents that sounds right and the purchaser's name was joanna roberta madonna yep okay when you told people about jose cheating on you you were angry weren't you [00:30:43] Speaker 1: uh yes i was angry yes i was angry when i found out confirmed for sure that he was cheating on me [00:30:52] Speaker 2: and you confirmed it i for sure when you saw that letter on the internet yes it was uh i knew that it [00:31:00] Speaker 1: was potentially that it could be spam i knew that there were um things like that but if the fact that this young lady was in florida um and that he had had this up on his facebook when i got up that [00:31:14] Speaker 2: made me think it was for real and you were uh angry uh and you told people that he was drinking didn't you [00:31:24] Speaker 1: um i think what it was was that i was angry that he was lying to people in recovery because that's oh i'm [00:31:32] Speaker 2: sorry you were angry enough to post on facebook about old timers drinking yeah one of the uh worst things to me is lying in the rooms so when you got back to raleigh from south carolina and you got jose into the jose into the jeep and you had the gun and the knife uh with you you were angry still [00:31:51] Speaker 1: weren't you you were trying to get rid of him no i was not angry i was worried how he was going to take it i was worried about being by myself i was not angry you were ready for your next soul adventure though weren't you uh well that's a fairly uh i was in that little beginning thing with mr richardson but that had nothing to do with my asking jose for a divorce i had been ready to ask jose for a divorce [00:32:21] Speaker 2: for a long time you had never feared physical harm from jose before the 15th of june 2013 had you [00:32:29] Speaker 1: um jose had held me down on several occasions while he was trying to have sex with me he had held me down on several occasions when we had little minor arguments he would hold me down and leave little bruises little random little fingerprint size bruises but i wasn't physically [00:32:49] Speaker 2: afraid of him he never hit you he never hit me he never hit michelle no he never he never hit rachel [00:32:58] Speaker 1: he never hit anybody in the house he didn't hit isabel uh actually that's not true i was visited by child protective services when i got to jail so about four days after this incident happened child protective services came and said miss madonna we need to follow up on a report that was made at heritage elementary school that isabelle's father hit her one morning before school and she had a big bruise on her leg and i said well the only person with her before school is jose who's her stepfather so yes cps came to the jail and saw me at the jail to try to confirm um this incident that isabel had reported that jose had hit her other than that i had only seen jose drag isabel across the floor by her shirt when she was in the middle of a meltdown which her meltdowns were pretty explosive so um it was very frustrating for everyone but other than that i had not seen jose be really physical with isabel and these meltdowns she could harm herself isabel um well it's very common for people with autism to um bang their head on the floor yeah so sometimes isabel would bang her head on the floor and that was one of the things that was most upsetting to us and um jose had never hit your dad no jose would nobody would ever hit my dad he'd never hit my dad he'd never threatened the safety of you in the past had he um until that day he had never threatened our safety although i think all the financial abuse probably threatened our financial safety but um he didn't physically threaten you did he he threatened me that day but before then he had never physically threatened me [00:34:49] Speaker 2: nor had he before the 15th of june ever threatened michelle um no he had never threatened her before [00:34:58] Speaker 1: that moment no he never threatened rachel no he never threatened anybody in the house not isabel not your dad i can't confirm anything about isabel um like i said but i never heard him threaten anybody he [00:35:13] Speaker 2: was kind to your pets he was a wonderful dog foster yes he was and um before you visited william lopez on the 15th of june 2013 uh neither you nor anyone else in your house had a rampage stiletto knife [00:35:32] Speaker 1: with a black and red handle did they that's the knife that my nephew gave me and the way it got to raleigh [00:35:41] Speaker 2: was through you it was yes it got to raleigh through me and before you went to south carolina on the 15th of june um a there was no 380 taurus revolver in your home was there not that i know of and um you left uh the 15th of june for south carolina at 8 45 in the morning correct [00:36:05] Speaker 1: um i went swimming at the y in wake wakefield first and um then when i got out of there i got on the road i'm not sure exactly what time that was but i believe it was between 8 and 9 from the [00:36:17] Speaker 2: testimony i've heard and then you left south carolina to come back home at 2 38 in the afternoon is that correct that sounds right and it took you four hours each way that's right and in the time left uh that you were in south carolina you went to billy's billy lopez's house i went and saw billy first billy [00:36:40] Speaker 1: and i had not seen each other and uh you know that it was his son going through the cancer and i wanted to just um you know check with him and be with him for a few minutes before we went to his son's house [00:36:51] Speaker 2: well you didn't go directly to his son's house did you you went to a pawn shop to try to buy a gun [00:36:56] Speaker 1: he took me to a pawn shop to show me um what types of guns you could get for a certain price range and [00:37:02] Speaker 2: what might be good for a woman who had never had a gun and after you visited um with billy and went to the pawn shop then you went and visited william and michelle that's right and lionel her husband was [00:37:17] Speaker 1: there and you got a gun and a knife from william william uh let me borrow his gun and he gave me his knife to protect his cousins he felt very strongly about being able to do that and you didn't say [00:37:31] Speaker 2: anything about it yesterday but the reason he felt really strongly about protecting his cousins is that you told him that there had been break-ins on either side of you and across the street at the schoolhouse [00:37:41] Speaker 1: road address is that correct um i had heard that there were break-ins um jose said that he had confirmed that with people in the neighborhood that there were break-ins so that was something i was [00:37:53] Speaker 2: very concerned about now um when you got back to north carolina you got jose into the jeep with you and decided you were going to tell him you didn't want him didn't want to be married to him anymore yes and you decided that the best way to tell him that was while you were driving around [00:38:11] Speaker 1: yes it was a beautiful sunny day um we were in a comfortable area where he knew you know and there [00:38:18] Speaker 2: was no stress and um you had william's gun and william's knife with you didn't you i believe they were probably still in the back seat and you just left them out on the back seat i had come in the house [00:38:34] Speaker 1: and went in the bedroom i'm not sure i mean the last time i had seen them that's where they were and you put the gun box in your closet i put the gun box in the closet um later that night or in the morning i was going to go back and get the gun for william because that wasn't mine i wanted to make sure that i returned that to him so i saved the box for him well let me ask you this um [00:39:01] Speaker 2: you early on made a statement uh to a lawyer that came um overall you early on made a statement to a lawyer that you called and who met you on the night that you were arrested correct about what had [00:39:20] Speaker 1: happened yeah i was working for a criminal defense attorney at the time and as soon as i found out the cops were at the house [00:39:27] Speaker 2: um he was yeah i did call him and you made a statement to him and told him what had happened and authorized him to give information to the police about what you had done to jose that night [00:39:39] Speaker 1: yes and i did uh lie to him i did not give him all the information either uh the first person i told the whole story to was the next day when um mr thomas was appointed my lawyer through the court [00:39:51] Speaker 2: so you lied to your first lawyer yes i did that lawyer that the gun was at the same place where jose's [00:39:57] Speaker 1: body was found yes i did i lied to him and told him that the gun was at the same place where jose was [00:40:03] Speaker 2: you never told that lawyer even though you might have thought it was important that they find that gun you didn't tell anybody about anything happening at some church parking lot did you i didn't tell [00:40:14] Speaker 1: anybody until the next day when i met mr thomas my public defender [00:40:22] Speaker 2: now you say that um mr perez um after you told him that you wanted a divorce faked a heart attack and you pulled over into the church parking lot and got out when he uh said that he was having a heart attack attack and you were going to go around the car and help him right yes i was and that instead of a heart attack that he pulled a gun out and tried to shoot you yes that's what happened and somehow in trying to shoot you he managed to shoot himself in the face and the arm he pointed the gun at himself i [00:40:54] Speaker 1: think i had said this yesterday he had the gun pointed at himself and i went to grab it out of his hand and the gun went off and so i believe at that point he and i were both holding it so you had nothing to fear from jose and a gun did you i was concerned about the fact that jose was going to try to kill himself i didn't have any um at that point i did not believe that he would have really killed me [00:41:20] Speaker 2: and you say that after he as you say shot himself in the face in the arm while he was trying to shoot you that um the gun was dropped in the parking lot of the church yeah before i got in the car once i [00:41:36] Speaker 1: got him in the car and i buckled his seat belt to take him to the hospital i ran around to the to my side of the car and i dropped the gun right there i'm not sure if i dropped it on his side or on my [00:41:50] Speaker 2: side but i just left the gun there and got in the car and you uh told us yesterday that you left it in some church parking lot you're not sure which one you're not sure where yeah i'm not really familiar [00:42:04] Speaker 1: with that area there was like a little lot right next to the church um i looked up i knew it was a church it was a saturday evening and there were no cars in that parking lot right there but it's on the way to rollsville there's like an intersection and there's a little mechanic shop there on the left hand side and this was right past there on the right hand side so there was a little pull-off right [00:42:26] Speaker 2: there on the main road and you didn't go to the mechanic shop to call the 911 did you no i was taking [00:42:31] Speaker 1: him right to the hospital and you were going to take him to the va uh no originally i was going to take him to wake med because that was the closest one and um by the time he had figured out that that would they would charge him he wanted to just go to the va instead he was bleeding pretty profusely at that time wasn't he he was bleeding pretty profusely from his mouth yes he was and he'd shot been shot in the arm as well i'm not sure if the um i'm not sure if he was actually shot in the arm or not i know the gun went off a second time i'm not exactly sure what happened with that instance [00:43:10] Speaker 2: and um he was injured so badly that you could see into the inside of his mouth from where that wound was [00:43:16] Speaker 1: couldn't you um i did not look inside his wound i just know that he was bleeding and he was spitting [00:43:23] Speaker 2: blood on the glove box and so you uh he had an argument with you while he had shattered dentures in his mouth and a huge gash in the side of his face about which hospital to go to because he was worried [00:43:37] Speaker 1: about whether they were going to charge or not yeah i didn't know anything about the dentures until this trial started i didn't even know anything about the dentures but he was yelling and he was arguing with me the whole time and so you decided to go to the va he asked me to take him to the va because that's where all his medical records were and he does not get charged at the va so um he wanted to go to the va [00:44:05] Speaker 2: and so from this place where you didn't have any clue where you were out somewhere and where you didn't recognize anything where you decided to have this talk with him and where this shooting occurred at the church parking lot you somehow managed to get yourself [00:44:21] Speaker 1: back to 98 get yourself right on the way to the va oh no we lived in rollsville um for over a year so i knew the way on down 98 i knew how to get to young's from youngsville to rollsville if you asked me names of roads i can't tell you names of roads um it's a little rural for me i'm not really familiar with that area but i know in terms of sense of direction and how to get from one place to the other i know enough how to get myself back to rollsville from youngsville but you don't know where that church was i believe that i just explained where the church was [00:45:01] Speaker 2: so on your map where it says possibly where this happened that's not possible anymore it's it's [00:45:06] Speaker 1: definite no i think that between my lawyer and myself it was very difficult for me to explain exactly um like i said i don't know the names of streets and stuff so when mr thomas went out there to look um himself he was asking me very specific questions like exactly how far from this and how far what's the name of that and i wasn't able to give him any of that information i don't know the name of the church i don't know the cross street so um i believe that was the easiest thing for mr thomas was [00:45:39] Speaker 2: to put down this is possibly where it it happened so um there's no gun in the car anymore you put jose in the car seat belt him in you're heading on 98 to the durham va and he fakes another heart attack yes and you believe it again absolutely so you pull off of 98 and you pull on to bailey old bay leaf that's right and you don't stop at the corner of old bay leaf and 98 where there's a house where you [00:46:07] Speaker 1: could call 911 i was concerned about getting him out of the car and letting him he said he had to throw up so um i was just thinking about pulling over so he could throw up and yeah and you had to go a [00:46:23] Speaker 2: hundred plus yards down the road for him to throw up i don't know how far from the corner we were i just pulled over so you pull over and uh he gets out of the car you come around and he pushes you down so that you fall either to your knees or your back which one was it um no it felt like he punched well he [00:46:44] Speaker 1: punched me or did something right here in my sternum and that knocked the wind out of me and that's how i ended up falling back onto the ground on your back or on your knees i fell down i believe on my back and at that point he gets out and he's brandishing a knife uh i didn't see him holding the knife um the next thing i realized my arm was cut and uh which arm was that my left arm and uh so you're down on your back he cut you with a knife yep i'm that's the only way i can explain how i was bleeding and he did what then he put his arm across he got on top of me and he was um suffocating me with his weight um it was as if somebody were standing on top of my lungs that's how it felt felt like i was drowning yesterday [00:47:39] Speaker 2: you said he put his arm across your neck or your chest is that right he put his arm across me here [00:47:45] Speaker 1: where it was cutting off the air like right here at the top of my lungs i couldn't breathe [00:47:51] Speaker 2: that's where he was applying the pressure and then you realized that the knife was on the ground and you picked it up with your left hand and you started stabbing him uh i was struggling for breath [00:48:03] Speaker 1: for i would like to say it was probably a couple of minutes i had some very bizarre thoughts going through my head at that point and i had thanked god at that point for my life and asked him to take care of my kids i don't know how long i was struggling for breath but by the time i finally realized there was a knife there yeah i got i got the knife and started swinging at him and at that point he didn't have any weapons in his hands did he i don't know uh i was just trying to get him off me and just be able to get out of there you didn't see any weapons did you i did not see any weapons when i left no you didn't [00:48:41] Speaker 2: see any weapons while he was leaning across you other than the one on the ground to your left [00:48:46] Speaker 1: i was not looking for any weapons i was trying to get air i was trying to breathe you're 510 [00:48:56] Speaker 2: yep and you weigh about 170. now i weigh 160. at the time you weighed around 170 didn't you that sounds right and he was 59 yep and weighed about 190. i believe so and so you were struggling and struggling with him and took the knife into your hand and you couldn't get out from underneath this man [00:49:21] Speaker 1: so you had to keep stabbing him i just kept stabbing him until i felt like i could get up [00:49:29] Speaker 2: and um did you stab him first in the face next to his his mouth um i don't remember stabbing him [00:49:37] Speaker 1: in the face no i believe that the injury to his face is where the gun had gone off and that was from [00:49:44] Speaker 2: the gun the only i do not believe i stabbed him in the face you didn't see the picture of the stab wound [00:49:52] Speaker 1: right next to his lip and the testimony of the uh me i believe that um what is on his face was from the gunshot that's the only thing that i i believe that that's where he was shot and you didn't hear [00:50:08] Speaker 2: the testimony and see the photographs from the me that showed two stab wounds on the side of his face [00:50:17] Speaker 1: i don't recall seeing any stab wounds on his face and um he'd already had that uh gaping wound on the [00:50:27] Speaker 2: side of his face where you said he shot himself when did you slash him on the other side of his neck [00:50:33] Speaker 1: um i don't know in what order i stabbed at jose i don't know where i stabbed at him first i'm not sure what order any of that took place in [00:50:46] Speaker 2: so you stabbed him and you stabbed him until you felt like you could get out from under him yes ma'am and then you scooted out from under him i did and he was face down on the ground yes he was and um the whole time that he was on top of you he was bleeding profusely wasn't he [00:51:06] Speaker 1: um i'm not sure if he was still bleeding at that point from his mouth or not i'm not aware of that you saw um what his shirt looked like didn't you um i am not sure if i have ever seen pictures of that part there was a couple of pictures that i saw early on when mr thomas first got the pictures and um i don't believe that i have seen all the pictures although i do know um from hearing the testimony i do know how much blood he lost i'm not talking about the pictures you were there you saw his shirt didn't you i don't remember seeing his shirt i just remember getting out from under [00:51:47] Speaker 2: him and starting to head towards the car and you say that after you stabbed him and the uh emmy said it was i think 12 times um or it added up to 12 stab wounds you um still thought he was going to get up off the ground and chase after you yes i did so you took off his shoes and you threw him into the woods that's right and you threw the knife that you used to stab him all those times and you threw it into [00:52:10] Speaker 1: the woods i threw yep and you went home that's right and you changed your clothes uh i didn't change [00:52:18] Speaker 2: my clothes until later on so when you got home rachel was in the kitchen right um i believe that i got home [00:52:26] Speaker 1: and i went into the bedroom to get my phone and when i came out rachel was in the kitchen and rachel [00:52:33] Speaker 2: said that she saw you come in through the garage door was she not right i don't remember i don't remember where i was at and rachel also said you were wearing a brown tank top and some shorts [00:52:48] Speaker 1: i had changed later later on i was wearing a brown tank top and shorts what rachel said was that when [00:52:55] Speaker 2: you came in from the garage into the kitchen where she was uh getting something to eat at around nine o'clock that night that you were wearing a brown tank top or cami and shorts was that not true did your [00:53:08] Speaker 1: daughter lie i'm not sure um if what point she's talking about i she saw me at some point with that outfit on yeah that's what i was wearing later on so i'm not sure if that was when i first got there [00:53:21] Speaker 2: or not i'm not sure what your daughter said is my question what your daughter said was that when you came into the house from the garage at nine o'clock that night you were wearing a brown tank top and shorts is that true or not true um that's what she said was it true um what i'm saying is that [00:53:42] Speaker 1: at some point that evening i was wearing a tank top and shorts that's usually what i sleep in so i'm not sure at what point she's referring to i don't remember what i was wearing at the moment i saw rachel i know that when i got home from this incident i was wearing my black t-shirt and those blue um shorts [00:54:03] Speaker 2: so when your daughter rachel testified here in court last week and said that when you came into the from the garage into the kitchen and she was already there and you were wearing a brown tank top or camisole [00:54:16] Speaker 1: and shorts your daughter was not correct well again what i'm saying is i changed at some point in the evening i didn't change as soon as i got home i changed at some point in the evening so i mean i can't tell you if my daughter i'm not saying my daughter lied but at some point i was wearing a tank top and a pair of shorts [00:54:37] Speaker 2: your daughter's testimony was that when you came in from the garage into the kitchen you were wearing a brown tank top and shorts was your daughter correct um yes so at some point i was going back and forth [00:54:51] Speaker 1: from the garage to the kitchen wearing the shorts and the tank top that wasn't immediately when i got home that would have been later on in the evening after i had changed so your daughter was lying when she [00:55:02] Speaker 2: was on the stand when she said that she heard you pull into the garage the garage door opened you walked in the kitchen and you were wearing a brown tank top and shorts um i can only think that maybe [00:55:14] Speaker 1: this has been such a traumatic experience maybe she is not remembering correctly exactly what time she saw me in my shorts i can't answer for rachel but i cannot imagine that rachel would ever knowingly lie um to anyone especially in a courtroom and so it's likely in fact that she was correct if she would never lie in a courtroom especially um well like i've said i did change eventually um and i did put on my um sleeping attire which was pair of shorts and a camisole so i'm sure at some point she did see me going in and out of the garage with that outfit on if you could just answer the question one time i'm sorry what what question am i not answering you are not answering the question [00:56:07] Speaker 2: did your daughter tell the truth when she said on the stand under oath sustained as to the question you may ask something again did your daughter you heard your daughter testify right i did hear my daughter testify and you said that she wouldn't lie i do not think rachel would lie ever and her testimony was that when you came into the uh kitchen from the garage when you first got home she was in the kitchen getting something to eat and you were wearing a brown camisole or tank top and shorts um she's mistaken [00:56:50] Speaker 1: i when i came in from this incident i was wearing the clothes that you saw in that picture i was wearing the clothes that you have seen in this courtroom when i got back from seeing jose i was wearing the blue shorts and the black t-shirt so if rachel remembers me wearing my night clothes which was a shorts shorts and a tank top i'm not saying that she lied i'm just saying that that's what i was wearing [00:57:17] Speaker 2: later on and so you're saying that you were wearing that black t-shirt and those jean shorts that you used when you killed jose i was still in the same outfit that i went out in and rachel noticed a couple little scratches on your arms but she didn't notice any blood on you um i believe rachel's [00:57:39] Speaker 1: testimony said that she that i was bleeding when she came in and that's why she asked me to call the cops i don't think she would have asked me the cops asked me to call the cops if i hadn't been bleeding i think that that's what alarmed her was that i was bleeding and i believe that that's what her [00:57:56] Speaker 2: testimony said and your testimony was just a few minutes ago that um jose was had a big huge wound on the side of his on the side of his face that he got on top of you he was leaning over you and you stabbed him and stabbed him and stabbed him and slashed him and there was no blood on you [00:58:21] Speaker 1: he was laying directly on top of me at the point when i started swinging at him and um so that's what i can tell you no blood in your hair i'm not sure if there was blood in my hair i um took a shower i knew i had blood all over my arms and my face and my neck and i went in and took a shower [00:58:47] Speaker 2: because it had started drying and rachel when she testified said that she saw some scratches on your arm on one arm she didn't testify about blood on your face or blood on your neck or blood on your chest [00:58:59] Speaker 1: or blood anywhere else did she i did not hear her say anything about blood on my face or anything [00:59:14] Speaker 2: so you came home you changed your clothes you went back out in the garage and started cleaning up the jeep [00:59:21] Speaker 1: i cleaned the jeep a little bit first and then i went inside i was getting overheated i was physically and mentally just exhausted at this point and yes i went back out and continued to wipe off the blood off the um off the um off the the dashboard and the glove compartment and you bagged up jose's medicines the next day i started bagging up all the stuff that i thought that he would need and you bagged up his ids i threw everything i'm not sure the ids were in the same bag i don't remember what bag the ids were in i know that eventually i threw everything into the garbage his va cards his [01:00:08] Speaker 2: debit cards his credit cards his glasses his family photos his aa pamphlets his bible i threw it all out [01:00:17] Speaker 1: didn't you yes i threw everything into the garbage everything that was in his nightstand i threw it [01:00:22] Speaker 2: all out now you told people that he had a suitcase that you packed up his suitcase with his clothes so he could go to his sponsor and go down to florida right that was a lie yes i told everybody that lie and what you were doing the night that um the police showed showed up at your house is you were on a date [01:00:41] Speaker 1: with chad um that wasn't a date we were sitting in his living room but i was at mr richardson's house yes i was and you weren't at a meeting um no i had lied and said i was going to a meeting and i sat there in mr richardson's um living room while he was watching golf and uh i'm sorry when you returned to your house you'd already called a lawyer i called um the young lady who i was working for i was cleaning their house once a week and i was cleaning their law office on fridays oh i'm sorry did you call a lawyer um i called the young lady who i worked for and her husband was a lawyer yes i called [01:01:30] Speaker 2: catherine and uh you got to the house and when you got to the house you knew that jose perez was mortally [01:01:38] Speaker 1: wounded didn't you um at that point i had started to suspect that he hadn't made it to fred's you [01:01:44] Speaker 2: didn't suspect it when you left him with both sides of his neck slashed and 12 stab wounds in his body [01:01:51] Speaker 1: no i thought he was getting up and going to fred's and i started um looking for my restraining order information and my separation agreement i thought he was going to be fine so you lied to the police when you got to your house i lied to the police i lied to my children i lied to everybody you lied to chad and [01:02:08] Speaker 2: chuck and danica and lynn and paul collins and yes again yes i lied to william and billy and michelle [01:02:17] Speaker 1: i did not lie to william and billy and michelle about anything about break-ins no i had been told there were break-ins in the area and jose had confirmed with neighbors in the area that there had been break-ins so i did not lie about that either and so you just thought you'd stick with your story about going to florida i had told myself that he was going to florida and that is absolutely what i wanted to believe i wanted to believe i was going to have an amicable divorce with jose just like i have with chuck and that i would be able to bring isabel down to see him once a year down in florida and that's what i wanted i wanted my friend but i didn't want to be his wife anymore and by august the 15th of 2000 [01:03:05] Speaker 2: excuse me august of 2015 you had already written to a number of people businesses clergy domestic violence publishing houses and written out your whole story about what had happened and your whole life story about your terrible childhood and young adulthood is that correct [01:03:31] Speaker 1: my feeling is if i can help even one woman to not end up in my situation if one woman listens when her friends say your husband is unstable do not approach him by yourself if one woman ends up not in my situation i will write anything that i can do just to help one woman and so you were in the process of writing your autobiography of your five years with jose correct i will let anybody read my story just like i have read so many stories in in jail about other domestic violence situations that ended like this i will let anybody read my story if it can help them so when you were writing to all these domestic [01:04:14] Speaker 2: violence businesses and publishing houses you were trying to get them to publish your book so you could make some money and they were all you were also trying to get speaking engagements so you could [01:04:24] Speaker 1: get paid for telling this story about jose correct i will speak to any group of any person where it can help them to not end up in this situation and i think when i was talking about publishing anything i was very clear and said 50 of that will have to go to a domestic violence organization and i would love for the rest to be able to go to my children if god forbid things don't work out well for me here and you wrote [01:04:52] Speaker 2: to many of those businesses and organizations and you offered every last one of them 50 of the profits didn't you [01:05:01] Speaker 1: i do not recall um i believe there were there was one person that i wrote to um so i don't think that there were numerous i mean again i would have to look at them but um every time i did say that this money has to half of it has to go to domestic violence awareness and i don't think i said i will go speak for a fee i will speak anywhere i had volunteered with interact for a little bit i knew what interact was and so um my understanding is interact has people that go to high schools and talk about domestic violence i wanted to be able to say that just because someone doesn't leave bruises on your body [01:05:44] Speaker 2: does not mean that it's not abuse so in august of 2015 you wrote to father richard varus [01:05:54] Speaker 1: i wrote to father richard varus yes um i wrote to him about all the things that i had done that i thought made me not a good catholic before this situation happened including in that was the um abortion situation which i feel that as a catholic woman that has plagued me for 15 years and um yes i wrote to [01:06:17] Speaker 2: that priest and um yes so you wrote to him that um forgive me father for i have sinned it has been over 20 years since my last confession i almost cheated on my husband i hit my daughters each of them one time i screamed at them a lot i even cursed at them i lost my patience with my elderly dad more than once and i may have even shown that in my actions i covered many horrible lies and behaviors for my husband being too proud to let others know the things he'd done because of what they would think of me i gave in to my gluttony and sought comfort and food and my eating disorder i lied to everyone around me i lied to my children when i didn't want to drive them places making up excuses for why i couldn't help them i betrayed my daughter's confidence when they told me private things i left work early and cut a lot of corners at my job i lied to my friends about money i had sex when i was unmarried i even got pregnant twice and had two abortions i took a bottle of hand lotion that someone left in the common area here i lied to fellow inmates i lied when women have tried to beg food for me i could go on and on but i feel like those are the most horrible sins i could have told you about is that right that is 20 [01:07:39] Speaker 1: years worth of sins that i had not gone to confession about excuse me and i have been uh very fortunate to learn a whole lot about the catholic church since i've been in jail and um so yes i listed all my sins [01:07:57] Speaker 2: for father richard veras and you already had your story out there about having killed jose because you've written dozens of letters to people in businesses domestic violence uh organizations and friends and relatives and you didn't once mention in your confession that you'd killed your husband [01:08:21] Speaker 1: everybody was well aware of what had happened um in that situation everybody knew that i was already charged with a crime so um yeah everybody already knew anybody that i wrote to already knew that i had been charged with this crime and i had been told by my lawyer on so many occasions till he was blue in the face they are going to copy everything you write so i tried to be respectful of that and not write any details about my case apparently i did not do a good job of that and i apologized to my lawyer again for the 5 000 pages of letters that they had to read [01:09:06] Speaker 2: so father veras wasn't a local guy was he father veras i had found his name in a magazine called the [01:09:15] Speaker 1: magnificat he is a priest up in poughkeepsie new york and when i found that he was from the same area that i was i felt like i could write to him have a little bit of a connection because i knew that area so i have never actually met father veras i um was visited by a priest from the catholic diocese of raleigh um father kerber but he's been extremely busy with um a new parish [01:09:45] Speaker 2: so um i did write to somebody i'm sorry mr father veras wasn't a local priest was he [01:09:54] Speaker 1: no father veras is an author he's from poughkeepsie new york he is an author from poughkeepsie new york [01:10:01] Speaker 2: who writes for an international was he's from poughkeepsie new york is that correct or not correct yes he is from poughkeepsie new york okay so he wasn't around to watch the local television coverage and read the local newspapers about what was going on with you father veras knew why i was in jail [01:10:20] Speaker 1: because you told him no because it was all over the news up there in westchester [01:10:26] Speaker 2: and knowing that you were arrested for the murder of your husband you still didn't feel like you could say anything to father veras and ask for his absolution about killing jose is that correct [01:10:41] Speaker 1: my lawyer had instructed me do not talk about what happened so anything that i talked about i did it in the most general way that i possibly could while still being able to be honest with people [01:10:57] Speaker 2: uh you wrote to paul collins on the 15th of august uh in fact you wrote him two letters on that date and uh you asked him on that date or told him on that date uh window with a little flower written next to it i go to the window at the top of every hour eight nine ten then four five six seven eight nine ten i stay a few minutes i look at the lights in the sky i look at the clouds maybe i'll [01:11:25] Speaker 1: see you there with on friday i'll look for you um paul is someone who lives downtown and this is somebody who has been so completely supportive of my family and myself for the past two years paul would come walk downtown with his dog he would walk down past my window when i was in jail and he would wave up to me at the window and that was a wonderful thing you also wrote to him in that same letter august 15th [01:11:55] Speaker 2: of 2013 the picture of me in the pool that was taken last year in florida i was looking at the camera and imagining i was looking at you it was right before we were supposed to go to new york together [01:12:10] Speaker 1: yep paul was a friend of mine and um i had a little bit of a crush on him for a little while i'm not embarrassed to admit that paul is a wonderful man and i hope that he finds someone to make him [01:12:22] Speaker 2: happy you also told him that um you needed a job and you didn't think that since you still have no convictions of any kind ever on your record that you're hoping to start working as quickly as possible [01:12:37] Speaker 1: my only convictions had been when i was 16 living on the streets i had been um shoplifting and i got arrested twice for shoplifting about the age of 16 or 17. it was considered youthful offender status and those were taken off my record i was arrested one other time when i was 30 years old somebody i was dating had given me a money order and asked me to cash it for him i cashed the money order not having verified where it had come from and it turns out it had been stolen so i got charged for that and i complied with everything that the police had asked me to do and i believe i was 30 when that happened other than that i have never been convicted of anything in my life and i like to think that i've been a law-abiding citizen the entire time i've been sober except for that one incident with the money order [01:13:29] Speaker 2: on the 21st of august 2013 you wrote to paul again and said i'll be at the window tonight at nine maybe [01:13:35] Speaker 1: you'll be there is that right paul and i had a standing appointment where he was going to try to come by every night at nine o'clock um and i was going to look out the window and wave if i saw him [01:13:49] Speaker 2: outside on the corner and on the in october of 2013 you wrote to paul and said i've been thinking about this recently i never met my soul mate excuse me i've been in and out of love enough times to write some great songs lol i've shed about a billion gallons of tears for each time my heart has been pulverized but i've never had a grown-up honest trust-based mentally intellectually spiritually connected adult monogamous fun playful heartfelt relationship right you wrote that um that's a long [01:14:24] Speaker 1: time ago and that was about four months after this incident i'm not quite sure i mean you just read that to me so it sounds like i wrote that i can't remember exactly what was going on at that point but um that was right after um paul first made contact with me um after i was in jail then you wrote him a poem in that same letter didn't you it's quite possible i have written a lot of poems i started writing poetry when i was seven years old so it's possible that i wrote a poem and sent it to paul [01:14:57] Speaker 2: he sang to me with lyrics only meant for me and the words spoke straight to my heart he played for me his lips never moving only his hands and the melody went straight to my heart he looked at me and when the shyness overcame him he looked away but when he looked at me he saw straight into my heart he thought of me it was the exact moment i thought of him and then in parentheses no i can't prove it [01:15:21] Speaker 1: but his thoughts have come straight to my heart you wrote that that sounds like the type of poetry that i've [01:15:28] Speaker 2: been writing for a long time and on the 2nd of may 2014 you wrote to paul told him to write write you whether he was sober sober or whether he was buzzed that you needed to have good talks with him and you wanted to take dance lessons with him when you got out of jail yep paul is one of the men that i trust [01:15:49] Speaker 1: most in this world and i have told him and he knows this that i do not believe i would have survived these past two years without the help that he's given to me and my family he has become a very trusted wonderful memory one wonderful part of my life and i'm very grateful for that relationship and you wrote [01:16:11] Speaker 2: him on january 8 2015 this year and a half has taught me how to develop boundaries and how to break bad habits [01:16:22] Speaker 1: i like to think that i have learned to develop boundaries and break bad habits yes that's the [01:16:27] Speaker 2: same letter where you wrote him about uh wanting to think about what kind of blanket he was under while you were under the scratchy blanket that you were under um okay is that true do you write that [01:16:39] Speaker 1: i'm not sure but if that's what's in that letter then yes and that's the same letter that you wrote to him about wanting to hold hands with him um i'm not yes i believe that's in the same letter that you [01:16:53] Speaker 2: read to me yes so and you concluded so first date holding hands and comforters and quilts that's what i've covered today guess i'm telling you things about me just so you know me more love you come see me [01:17:07] Speaker 1: joanna i love paul paul and i are um he's one of my best friends so yes i do love paul and if we ever have a first date that would be great um on the other hand if he finds some wonderful woman who [01:17:21] Speaker 2: makes him happy that would make me happy also so on april 30th you wrote to paul you said i was thinking i was thinking what else i can promise paul as an incentive to bond me out right now instead of waiting for a bond reduction i think the only other thing i have to offer you is companionship not calling the sex i'm not offering carnal satisfaction but my warmth you can call on me any hour day or night and tell me you need to lay down and i'll know what you mean spooning cuddling whatever you need i'll keep you company sing you and rock you to sleep i'm soft and i'm soothing because i'm at peace i'm happy i'm content you wrote that yes i did you also wrote about wanting to spend time with him that you said it's not about worth or dollar values it's about time time together time to lend you a hand though i know you are incredibly self-sufficient independent we are we aren't meant to navigate this world on our own it's also possible that we might be able to get a private lawyer i'm sorry a private lawyer for what i'm sorry i don't remember that part it is also possible that we in quotation marks might be able to pay a higher private lawyer i think we'd be more likely to get the attention we need stay you wrote it didn't you um sustain good next question now on the 28th of june 2015 you wrote another letter to paul and you started it out my paul in italian that's paolo mio molto bene correct that's right i have [01:19:24] Speaker 1: studied italian and i love italian and i cannot wait to become fluent in italian and you wrote him [01:19:29] Speaker 2: a lengthy letter telling him a lot of things about yourself well like i said paul and i have been [01:19:36] Speaker 1: corresponding now for two years and i have gotten to the point where i am more comfortable definitely [01:19:43] Speaker 2: talking about more information about myself so you started off and you told him i snore i have stretch marks on my stomach i'm self-conscious about them if you try to touch my belly i may swat your hand away while some while simultaneously sucking in my gut my favorite cars are catalogs but i confess i love two-door jeeps i can't grow anything i don't like to clean i have greedily lusted after a food processor and a mixer and you go on and on to tell him many things one of which was that your dad only hit you once because you lied he told me that he only hit me because i lied i never forgot that and no matter what i tried to always tell the truth after that lesson he actually punched me on the arm dad was strong as a bull and my arm stayed bruised for a month god has endowed me with excellent shoulders for rowing i currently weigh 170 pounds but want to be 165. i love to exercise especially walking swimming pilates and yoga i could use some gentle massage once a week i believe in good manners common courtesy respect modesty decorum i believe we should own our own way earn our own way i was faithful to three husbands i never cheated although i am a natural flirt you also indicated that you said you've been thinking of me today i wonder if maybe you think of me at night when it's quiet and you're warm and comfortable when no one and nothing needs your attention it's probably the same time i think of you [01:21:43] Speaker 1: there's not a lot to do in jail other than write letters and think about the people that you love [01:21:49] Speaker 2: and i pray that nobody ever has to go and the last one i want to ask you about was from july 15th of this year um you wrote him what you um characterized as an e-harmony profile for yourself yep i gave him a lot of information about myself and then um you also um told him for me ideally you and i can be side by side no one on a pedestal give and take like tossing a beach ball back and forth back and forth side by side on a couch my place of yours pillow talking my place of yours all kinds of good stuff side by side that sounds like something i would write and then you told him at some point you realize you're going [01:22:40] Speaker 1: to have to be naked in front of somebody again right oh yes i was concerned that i had lost a lot of weight and my body parts were sagging and there was a woman who volunteered at the jail to um check out my body for me and make sure that it would still be not horribly unattractive if at some point somebody did see me naked and so i at some point lifted up my shirt and showed her what i looked like and she approved she said i would not kick you out of bed and you also included a long list of things [01:23:20] Speaker 2: that you prefer one over the other for example beach over pool seafood over me crunchy over smooth paul over other guys is that how i phrase to that i prefer would you like me to read you the whole list [01:23:37] Speaker 1: no the one about paul can you just read me what i wrote about paul paul over other guys oh dot dot dot dot smiley face yes i am not talking to anybody with that much intimacy at this point in my life other than paul paul is the only man that i trust at this point in my life like that [01:24:00] Speaker 3: that's fine we'll take a morning recess because i know you're working a poor report of your death ladies and gentlemen we're going to take our morning recess at this point during this time it is your duty not to talk among yourselves about this case it's your duty not to talk to the parties the witnesses or the lawyers about anything at all it's your further duty not to talk to anyone else to allow anyone else to talk with you to say anything in your presence about this case you over here see you getting the information all about this trial let the sheriff know about it when you come in don't do any individual research or investigation on your own about any issue touching on this trial stay away from your smartphones and do not form or express any opinion about this case during this time that while everyone else core remains seated i'm going to excuse the 13 of you and ask that you return and assemble in the jury room at 11 15 this morning if that's your excuse [01:25:16] Speaker ?: For more information, visit www.fema.org