Different perceptions of Donna Moonda emerge as the case unfolds
AKRON, Ohio -- Donna Moonda sometimes smiled at family members in a federal courtroom last week, wept on occasion and often joked with the attorneys trying to keep her off death row.
Gone is the thin, blond and distraught wife of a wealthy Mercer County doctor who appeared on newscasts after a gunman killed Dr. Gulam Moonda on May 13, 2005, during a confrontation on the Ohio Turnpike -- the woman who secretly shared her affection and money with a younger, street-wise Beaver County drug dealer.
Brown, collar-length hair now tops a heavier, 48-year-old body. The intelligence she used to earn a master's degree and become a nurse anesthetist is on display as she takes notes on the testimony, confers with lawyers and passes suggestions as they question the witnesses.
Moonda's trial in U.S. District Court here resumes Monday on charges she paid her lover, Damian Ray Bradford, to kill her husband. Prosecutors contend she wanted to share Dr. Gulam Moonda's multimillion-dollar estate with him.
Her lead defense attorney, Roger Synenberg, refused to say whether jurors will hear from Donna Moonda on the witness stand.
"I'm sure we all agree that in 95 percent of the cases that are tried in the United States, the defendant does not take the stand," he said. "However, that has nothing to do with this case."
Veteran defense attorney Sumner Parker, who is not involved in the Moonda case, said there are risks involved in putting a defendant on the stand.
"My experience has been that very rarely do defendants help themselves," Parker said. "Sometimes you almost have no choice because the jury expects to hear a defendant deny they had anything to do with the crime, but it can be risky."
Bradford, 25, of Center, is expected to take the stand, possibly this week, on behalf of the prosecution.
Synenberg has depicted Donna Moonda as lonely, vulnerable and needy when she met Bradford at Gateway Rehabilitation Center in Beaver County in May 2004.
The former Donna Joyce Smouse graduated from Hickory High School in Hermitage and went to work at a doctor's office, where she met Gulam Moonda, a man 24 years her senior, in 1978.
"The evidence will show that 29 years ago, at 18 years of age, Donna Smouse met Gulam Moonda. For the next 12 years, Donna dated Gulam Moonda exclusively. In 1990, at age 30, Donna and Gulam got married," Synenberg has told the jury.
The couple had no children but raised the doctor's nephew, Faroq, after he arrived from India at age 14. The family lived in a posh home on the border of Sharpsville and Hermitage.
Faroq Moonda, now an anesthesiologist in the Youngstown area, still calls Donna Moonda's mother, Dorothy Smouse, "my grandmother" and "mom." He said the night of the slaying, Donna Moonda kept reinforcing the strong family ties.
"She said they had a perfect marriage. They were so much in love. He was the best thing that ever happened to her," Faroq Moonda testified last week.
Faroq Moonda said he was stunned to later learn Donna Moonda had a drug problem and was seeing Bradford, an admitted "crack baby" she met in the drug rehabilitation facility.
When asked whether his uncle was unhappy, Faroq Moonda replied, "You could say that."
Donna Moonda wept during much of the nephew's testimony.
Synenberg said Donna Moonda's path to rehab began in 2003 when she took drugs to lessen the emotional pain caused by the death of her father, Ross, and her mother's diagnosis of cancer. She found her way to rehab after an arrest for stealing the painkiller fentanyl at UPMC Horizon, where she worked.
Donna Moonda got out of treatment in June 2004. A month later, she and Bradford were lovers, lawyers said. Assistant U.S. Attorney Nancy Kelley has called it a "rehab romance."
Testimony has shown how Donna Moonda and Bradford kept in touch by telephone and text messages. There were hour-long calls in the middle of the night and sometimes dozens of calls a day.
The couple called themselves "The Double Ds, Donna and Damian." She lavished more than $20,000 worth of gifts on him, paid nearly $900 a month to rent him an apartment and bought him a 2002 silver Chevrolet Trail Blazer.
Prosecutors say Bradford was driving that vehicle when he followed the Moondas from Hermitage into Ohio, where the doctor was killed in what appeared to be a random highway robbery.
Prosecutors contend Donna Moonda and Bradford began plotting the murder in December 2004. They contend there was even a failed attempt when Gulam Moonda was attending his weekly Muslim worship service at a Youngstown mosque.
Cell phone records and text messages show Donna Moonda and Bradford spent the day before the killing together and she sent him a number of text messages throughout the night from her marital home, calling him "daddy," herself "your baby girl" and telling him she would fall asleep "counting little Damians."
"They fell in love. Donna fell in love with Damian, and Damian fell in love with Donna's money," Synenberg said, arguing Bradford acted alone in the killing.
Bradford has pleaded guilty to interstate stalking and firearms charges and is cooperating for a sentence that will allow him to walk out of prison 14 years from now.
Others on the witness list who could be called this week are Gulam Moonda's attorney and an attorney who police have said was in the process of making changes to the physician's will at the time of the murder.
The will, made in 1992, gives Donna Moonda 20 percent of his estate as well as a vehicle of her choice and the home.
Prosecutors said a prenuptial agreement limited Donna Moonda to $250,000 if the couple divorced. But Synenberg told jurors that Gulam Moonda knew of his wife's infidelities and offered her a $1 million divorce settlement, suggesting other witnesses will come forward when the defense opens on behalf of Donna Moonda.
Jurors have heard from about two dozen of the 63 potential witnesses identified by lawyers.
