Opinion ID: 1679338
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: o'bryant's testimony

Text: According to O'Bryant, Mrs. O'Bryant telephoned him about four o'clock that Sunday afternoon. He pleaded with her to return home, telling her he was to go back to work the following Thursday. He said that she finally agreed to come home and stay with the children while he was at work. Around 7:30 that evening he took their youngest son, J.J., with him looking for Mrs. O'Bryant. As they drove by Rick Milam's apartment, J.J. told O'Bryant he thought he saw his mother through a window. O'Bryant stopped and saw Mrs. O'Bryant through a kitchen window, standing next to the sink. O'Bryant drove down the street, turned around and came back and parked. At this time he also saw Milam in the apartment. J.J. went up to the apartment and returned in a few minutes. J.J. then went back to the apartment and again returned. O'Bryant then went to the apartment himself, and knocked on the door. Milam opened the door and O'Bryant told him he wanted to speak to his wife. Milam replied that Mrs. O'Bryant was not there, that he had not seen her for two or three days, and did not know where she was. O'Bryant left, drove around the block two or three times, and returned to the apartment. He said he sat there for about ten minutes, and saw Milam in the apartment. About two minutes later Milam and a man named Ashmore came out the front door, and he saw Josie kind of stoop over and shut the door behind them. O'Bryant then told Milam that he wanted to talk with Josie, and asked Milam to take him up to the apartment and show him she was not there. Milam refused to do so. When Milam left, J.J. went back to the apartment and O'Bryant, in his car, followed Milam and Ashmore as they drove away. O'Bryant ceased following them and went by his house to get his gun. He returned to the apartment. O'Bryant testified as to what followed: A. Well, I got out of the car and proceeded to go up to the apartment. I walked a few steps and I turned back, went back to the car and got my pistol out of the glove compartment and stuck it in my back pocket. Asked why he got his pistol, he replied: A. Well, I was aware of Rick Milam's reputation, and I didn't know where they had went or when they would be back, or if there was someone else in the apartment. O'Bryant then testified as follows: A. I knocked on the door. Nobody answered at first. I knocked again, and I called out, Josie, I know you're in there. I want to talk to you. So she come and opened the door. I went in,, and she had backed up to the kitchen table, end of the kitchen table. I said, Josie, what are you doing in this place? And she said, I have no place to go. And I said, I love you, the kids love you, we all want you home. Come on. You can't stay in this place., So I caught her by the hand and she went hysterical, just fighting and everything. I grabbed her around  it was over her right shoulder, her left arm, around her back and under her left arm, and I proceeded to pull her out. I told her that I would take her  she didn't have to go home with me, but I would take her somewhere else, anywhere she wanted to go. So she was fighting, trying to get away from me, grabbing anything she could get ahold [sic] to. When we finally reached the kitchen door, she just hooked her arm around the door  it was open  around the door, and I had to jerk her aloose [sic] from it. We finally made it out of the kitchen door and proceeded down the first set of steps. Q. All right, sir, where was the gun? A. The gun, I had it in my right hand, because during the struggle she had her right arm behind me, and I didn't want her to get ahold [sic] of it and I had pulled it out and held it in my right hand. Q. All right, then tell us what happened. A. We made it to the bottom of the first set of steps and she had got ahold [sic] of the railing, and I had to jerk her aloose [sic] from the railing real hard, to get her aloose [sic], and at that time she had lost her balance. I was trying to hold her up  she had kind of got around in the front of me, and we had stumbled and we fell down the steps, and during this time the gun went off and we both landed at the bottom of the second steps. Q. All right, sir. Did you know at that point that she had been hit? A. No, sir. O'Bryant denied Nina Fillyaw's testimony and testified that he had never threatened to kill Mrs. O'Bryant. He admitted that Mrs. O'Bryant did not want to leave Milam's apartment. He stated that he did not intentionally kill his wife. Three policemen noticed a trail of small drops of blood leading up the stairs into Milam's apartment which O'Bryant attributed to the two abrasions on his wife's arm and to a cut on his hand that occurred while they were in the apartment. When asked why he told the policeman to arrest him if the killing had been accidental, O'Bryant answered, It was an accident. She was still hurt ... I didn't think about it.