By RODNEY HART
Herald-Whig Staff Writer
MEXICO, Mo. — The jury has begun deliberating in the Calvin Duane Pettey murder trial. Pettey did not testify in his own defense as the third day of his murder trial continues in Audrain County on Wednesday.
After one brief defense witness, jurors were given a 30-minute break by Judge Keith Sutherland. Defense attorney Todd Schulze said Pettey would not testify. Sutherland also denied a motion by Schulze to have the jury consider a second-degree murder verdict.
Pettey is accused of killing fiancée Sandra Fugate in April 2010. Marion County Prosecutor Tom Redington sailed through 25 witnesses before resting his case Tuesday afternoon, and Schulze had one witness take the stand.
The most riveting part of the trial came Tuesday morning when a woman who admitted to having an affair with Pettey more than two years ago said Pettey told her he killed Fugate.
Rebecca Kirk, now of Hannibal, said she was driving back from Columbia with Pettey on April 15, 2010, when Pettey asked her what she would think if he went "to the extreme" to be with her, then said he had killed Fugate that morning.
Kirk admitted to being in on plans to kills Fugate, but said she couldn't go through with them.
Kirk said she and Pettey began a sexual relationship in February 2010, many years after they knew each other in high school. Pettey told her he was going to marry Fugate on April 17, 2010, and said "he was trying to find a way out of getting married."
"He said he loved me, and I said there were only two ways out of this — either lose me or lose her," she said.
But Kirk also pointed out she did not want to see Fugate get killed or want to kill her.
If he went through with the marriage to Fugate, Kirk said she told Pettey she would no longer see him. At some point, they went to Kirk's estranged husband's house, and Pettey took a .22-caliber rifle belonging to her husband, Kirk said. The rifle was later located in a river after Kirk tried to throw it away, but she took investigators to the spot where she tossed it.
Evidence was shown Tuesday that shell casings found by Fugate's body were fired from the recovered rifle. Bullets removed from Fugate's body were consistent with characteristics from the gun, but were too badly damaged to conclusively prove they came from the weapon.
The first plan was to have Pettey shoot Fugate in her Hannibal home, then have Kirk shoot Pettey in the leg and stomach, and take items from the house to make it look like a robbery. Kirk said she and Pettey even went into Fugate's house and Kirk held the rifle, but Kirk said she did not want to participate in the plan and couldn't shoot Pettey.
"I told him to go marry her because I couldn't do this," Kirk said while sobbing on the witness stand. "It was best we don't see each other any more … but then he showed up at my door the next morning."
About a week before Fugate was murdered, Kirk and Pettey went to Hannibal to "carry out his plan," Kirk said. But Pettey flagged Kirk down in a restaurant parking lot and told her it was off because Fugate wasn't home, Kirk said.
On the day Fugate was killed, Pettey picked Kirk up at 8:39 a.m. in Frankford, where she was then living, and they drove to Columbia for Pettey's doctor's appointment. Pettey was quiet on the drive there, Kirk said, but on the way back he admitted to having killed Fugate.
"I never dreamed in a million years he would do it," Kirk said.
Kirk said Pettey asked her to burn clothing in a black garbage bag and throw the rifle and bullets into rivers, which she did. Ashes and the items were later recovered by investigators. Redington produced testimony from expert witnesses Tuesday afternoon showing Pettey's fingerprints on a long white box that Kirk said Pettey gave her to destroy, but for some reason she didn't.
The day after Fugate was found dead, Kirk said she got a text from Pettey asking if "I took care of things," meaning the disposal of the evidence.
A friend of Kirk's, Michelle Hinch, testified Tuesday that Kirk told her about Pettey's admission and the affair. Hinch said she urged Kirk to take the evidence to the police instead of burning it. When Hinch saw on the news that night that Fugate was dead, she went to the Hannibal Police Department, starting the investigation.
Redington ended his initial questioning of Kirk by asking if she killed Fugate.
"No, I did not," was Kirk's firm reply.
Under cross examination by Schulze, Kirk admitted she made plans with Pettey to participate in the killing of Fugate, and she never warned Fugate or police. She also admitted lying about several other things in the days leading up to the murder.
At one point, Schulze raised his voice and said, "You killed Sandy Fugate, didn't you?"
Again, Kirk's immediate reply was, "No!"
Kirk said she did not know why she destroyed evidence and did not go to the police. The day after the murder, investigators called her and interviewed her.
"I was very stupid," she said between sobs. "I believed he loved me, and I never thought he would do it."
Schulze also got Kirk to say Pettey did not want to marry Fugate because Fugate's friends would get him fired from his job at General Mills, file sexual harassment claims against him and keep him from having health insurance for his son.
Much of Tuesday's later testimony was about evidence recovered from water and other areas. There was also evidence from a Minnesota crime lab technician that a hair found in Fugate's hand after she was found dead was tested for DNA, and it could not be ruled out that it was Fugate's own hair.
But it did not belong to Kirk. The expert said a hair sample was requested from Pettey, but never received.
The first defense witness was Bill Elledge of Hannibal, a cousin and friend of Pettey who said he knew nothing of the affair with Kirk. Pettey and Fugate seemed excited about getting married, Elledge said.
The day after Fugate was found dead, Pettey was "quiet" and "distant," Elledge said, and he cried several times. Pettey was arrested later that night by Hannibal police and has been jailed since on $1 million bond.
— rhart@whig.com/221-3370
Calvin Duane Pettey, left, and his attorney Todd Shulze, at Pettey's murder trial Wednesday. (H-W Photo/Phil Carlson)
Calvin Duane Pettey, right, collects his thoughts as Marion County Prosecutor Tom Redington looks up information on a computer during a break in Pettey's trial Wednesday morning. (H-W Photo/Phil Carlson)
Rebecca Kirk, right, walks from the Marion County Courthouse in this 2010 file photo. (H-W File Photo/Michael Kipley)
