Kaufman County Murder Trial: Day 2 Updates
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Update: 11:25 am
In the weeks and months before a Texas DA, his wife and a prosecutor were gunned down in Kaufman County, the man accused of killing them inquired about how to get rid of part of a high-powered weapon, according to testimony today.
In the second day of Eric Williams' capital murder trial, someone he knew testified that Williams asked him in early January 2013 how to make the upper part of an AR-15 rifle "disappear."
Scott Hunt, who knew Williams when both of them were in the Texas State Guard, said they met at a Dallas restaurant nearly three months before Kaufman County District Attorney Mike McLelland and his wife Cynthia were killed in their home in Forney.
Williams is on trial, charged in the deaths of the McLellands, who were gunned down by an AR-15 weapon. Their bodies were found on the eve of Easter 2013.
FULL COVERAGE OF THE KAUFMAN COUNTY MURDERS
Prosecutors say Williams was planning ahead when he asked Hunt to meet with him, over a beer at the Angry Dog restaurant.
"I found the conversation to be akward, somewhat forced," when Williams first asked about armored-piercing bullets, and then turned the subject to the AR-15, Hunt told the jury.
He said he told Williams he would not help him get rid of the upper chambers of the weapon.
Hunt also said he worried that Williams, a justice of the peace who had lost his job and a lawyer's license after a felony theft conviction, may hurt himself.
"Don't do anything stupid," Hunt said he told Williams as they left the restaurant.
Williams and his estranged wife, Kim, are charged with killing the McLellands, and before that prosecutor Mark Hasse, on Jan. 31, 2013, out of revenge.
Prosecutors say Williams was driven by anger over the DA and Hasse having prosecuted him months earlier for the felony theft of county computer equipment.
LIVE VIDEO: KAUFMAN COUNTY MURDER TRIAL
In other testimony, FBI agent Diana Strain talked about computer equipment and guns, including an AR-15 weapon, found at Eric Williams' home in Kaufman and at a rented storage shed in Seagoville.
[tweet https://twitter.com/cbs11jack/status/539815606028369920]
Other items found in the storage shed included a homemade explosive device, consisting of a dog toy taped to a lighter fluid container, a crossbow, a bulletproof vest, a "Sheriff" patch with Velcro, and a "police surplus" Ford Crown Victoria, Strain said.
Investigators have said the patch and the Crown Vic May have been used by Williams to impersonate a police officer as he approached the home of the unsuspecting McLellands.
[tweet https://twitter.com/cbs11jack/status/539819430507974656]
It is unknown whether Kim Williams will take the stand against her estranged husband. A trial date has not been scheduled for her.
There has also been no scheduling of a trial, or whether one will take place, in connection with the capital murder charges against Eric and Kim Williams in the death of prosecutor Hasse.
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