DANVERS — Kathie DeFelice pulled tissue after tissue from the box in front of her, wiping her tears, as her 25-year-old daughter told jurors about seeing her being beaten by William Olsen Jr.
Alexandra DeFelice said living with her mother was "very fun" as a child growing up in Salem. Then, about 10 years ago, something changed.
But did the years of abuse to come cause DeFelice, 48, to develop battered women's syndrome and stab Olsen to death in self-defense? Or is she a murderer who stabbed Olsen, 55, in the heart in October 2006 and then coldly left him to bleed to death in her Lynn apartment?
Prosecutors have suggested the latter — that DeFelice waited hours and walked more than two miles from Lynn into Swampscott before calling police on a nonemergency line. But even as Assistant District Attorney Kate MacDougall rested the state's case yesterday, the motive remained unclear.
State police Sgt. Barry Brodette, the lead investigator, attempted to testify about a desk calendar found in DeFelice's apartment, on which the words "Goodbye Andre" were written in the space for Oct. 28. When MacDougall asked Brodette who that was and what connection he had to DeFelice, defense lawyer Edward Hayden objected, arguing that the information was hearsay.
After a discussion with the judge out of earshot of the jury, MacDougall and Brodette moved on without the question ever being answered.
Brodette also testified about records of phone calls between DeFelice and Olsen — calls that appeared to be one-way, from DeFelice's Cingular cell phone to Olsen's Verizon home phone in Danvers.
On Oct. 15, there was a call from DeFelice that began at 8:33 p.m. and lasted more than 51/2 hours. It presumably was the first time the two had talked since a restraining order was issued against Olsen in 2005, barring him from contact with DeFelice. It was one of five restraining orders granted to DeFelice during their seven-year relationship, during which Olsen was also arrested three times.
Calls to Olsen
Then, on Oct. 25 and 26, there were four calls from DeFelice to Olsen between 9:10 p.m. and 1:32 a.m., again totaling more than five hours.
On the night Olsen died, DeFelice made a series of brief phone calls to Olsen between 6 and 7 p.m.
During cross-examination, Brodette testified that DeFelice left both her purse and her cell phone in the apartment — something Hayden may use to suggest she fled in fear.
Hayden also questioned Brodette about why he did not mention in his report that there was a television remote control, a cigarette box and a wine bottle cork on the floor, calling into question the prosecution's contention that there were no signs of a struggle.
Dr. Henry Nields, the acting chief medical examiner who did the autopsy on Olsen, said the single stab wound entered between the third and fourth ribs and hit the pericardial sac and then the ascending aorta. Blood filled Olsen's chest cavity and eventually bled through the wound, leaving him soaked in a puddle of blood on DeFelice's white sofa.
It took minutes for him to die.
The autopsy also showed that Olsen's liver and kidneys had some damage — his liver was "fatty," likely due to heavy drinking, something corroborated by toxicology tests that showed a blood alcohol level of .15.
Drinking was a part of DeFelice's relationship with Olsen, her daughter testified.
Daughter witnessed abuse
Alexandra DeFelice said that when she was around 14 or 15, her once fun-loving mother started to change. She was "very tired and exhausted," and seemed withdrawn. It was around that time she met Olsen.
"They went very fast," Alexandra DeFelice said. "She was with him a lot." She didn't see her mother as much.
Then DeFelice, who had once been a legal secretary and helped run a newspaper, lost her job and then the apartment she and her daughter shared on Broadway in Salem.
DeFelice moved in with Olsen. Alexandra DeFelice moved in briefly, and almost immediately witnessed abuse.
"He called me a bitch," Alexandra DeFelice testified as her mother cried audibly. When her mother confronted Olsen, "he picked her up and threw her onto the coffee table."
Alexandra DeFelice quickly moved out, "because I didn't like being with him, and she thought it best if I left."
Over the next few years, she witnessed the effects of the relationship on her mother. She frequently saw bruises and, once, a missing tooth.
Hayden asked her if she ever saw DeFelice attack Olsen.
"Never," said the daughter.
Her mother would sometimes leave and stay in a shelter for battered women or with her daughter. Olsen would eventually find them.
"There were times he would come and leave notes on the car," Alexandra DeFelice testified.
She also described calling her mother one time and learning about the abortion she had just had — an abortion DeFelice says she had at Olsen's demand. MacDougall, the prosecutor, objected, and the line of questioning was abandoned.
DeFelice appeared to try to make eye contact with her daughter several times during a lengthy sidebar discussion between the lawyers and the judge. But Alexandra DeFelice did not meet her mother's gaze and did not look at her as she walked out of the courtroom.
DeFelice broke down again moments later after jurors were led out of the courtroom for a break. By the end of yesterday's proceedings, there was a pile of crumpled tissues on the defense table.
Jurors also heard from a crime scene investigator, John Soares, who testified that there were two other knives found in the apartment besides the murder weapon: a green and black knife behind the front door and another knife, its handle wrapped in black electrical tape, on a bureau in the living room.
Soares also described a blood stain on the wall near the entrance to the kitchen.
The jury also heard from chemists from the state police crime lab, who testified that none of DeFelice's DNA was found on Olsen's fingernails — calling into question how she got the scratches on her neck. But Olsen's DNA was found on DeFelice's neck.
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