Earnest trial: Victim’s co-worker beat police to crime scene: Maysa Munsey arrived at Jocelyn Earnest’s house before investigators did, a defense attorney said. [The Roanoke Times, Va.]

Apr. 1--BEDFORD -- Attorneys defending Wesley Earnest against charges of murdering his estranged wife called one of her best friends to the witness stand Wednesday in hopes of convincing jurors that the friend, not Earnest, was the killer.

But Maysa Munsey, who worked with Jocelyn Earnest at Genworth Financial in Lynchburg, described a close relationship that seemed to offer little motive for her killing the 38-year-old Bedford County woman.

Munsey said that she and Jocelyn Earnest went shopping together, spent nights at each other's homes, constantly exchanged text messages and did chores for each other -- nothing, in short, that would lead to murder.

"We were friends," said Munsey in Bedford County Circuit Court. As she testified, a tearful Munsey clutched a small photo of Jocelyn Earnest and frequently caressed it with her thumbs.

The testimony came during the seventh day of Wesley Earnest's murder trial, where prosecutors are trying to convince jurors that the former assistant principal at Great Bridge High School in Chesapeake drove from his home there to his estranged wife's house in Forest on Dec. 19, 2007, shot her, and then staged the killing as a suicide. A .357-caliber revolver was found by her side. A suicide note lay nearby.

Wednesday was the first day that the defense had an opportunity to put on evidence, and attorney Joseph Sanzone tried to move jurors' attention away from Wesley Earnest and onto Munsey. Munsey was the second person to arrive at Jocelyn Earnest's house on the morning of Dec. 20, when her body was discovered by another co-worker, Marcy Shepherd.

Under questioning from Sanzone, Munsey testified that, on the morning of Dec. 19, Jocelyn Earnest accompanied her to the Amherst County Sheriff's Office, where Munsey was charged with a misdemeanor count of identity theft. (An Amherst County investigator had testified earlier that Munsey apparently stole the Social Security number of a co-worker with whom she was feuding and used the number to shut off the rival's electricity.)

In court, Sanzone suggested that Munsey might have stolen the Social Security number from a personnel file at Genworth, and she therefore wanted Jocelyn Earnest dead because Earnest knew of the theft and was in a position to have her fired for it. Munsey testified she could not remember how she obtained the Social Security number.

Sanzone also emphasized for jurors the fact that both Munsey and Shepherd were at Jocelyn Earnest's house before investigators arrived. Shepherd had earlier testified that she went to the house on Dec. 20 because Jocelyn Earnest had abruptly stopped text-messaging her about 7:30 p.m. on Dec. 19.

Shepherd said she went to the home, could not get in, and called Munsey for the code to the alarm system before opening the door and finding Earnest's body. Munsey arrived after Shepherd called 911, Shepherd testified.

Sanzone noted that Munsey's knowledge of the alarm code gave her the means of getting into Jocelyn Earnest's home and killing her.

Bedford County Commonwealth's Attorney Randy Krantz declined to cross-examine Munsey. He called Sanzone's contention that one of Jocelyn Earnest's friends killed her an unbelievable story that sprang "from Mr. Sanzone's head."

In the previous six days of the trial, Krantz and Deputy Commonwealth's Attorney Wes Nance introduced evidence that Wesley Earnest's fingerprints were found on the suicide note, and that the box for the revolver that killed his estranged wife was found in the Campbell County home of Earnest's girlfriend. The girlfriend, Shameka Wright, also testified that she couldn't reach Earnest on his cellphone the evening that prosecutors say he was driving to Forest to kill Jocelyn Earnest.

On Tuesday, a Chesapeake businessman testified that Wesley Earnest told him he would be out of town on Dec. 19, the day Jocelyn Earnest was killed in Forest.

Also, a Great Bridge teacher testified that his pickup truck was borrowed by Wesley Earnest on Dec. 17. Earnest returned it days later. He then borrowed it again and put four new tires on it, even though the ones already on it were only 15 months old and in excellent condition, the teacher testified.

Nance suggested that Earnest used the truck to drive to Forest and changed the tires -- buying the new ones under a fake name -- because he was worried that he had left tracks near his estranged wife's home.

The trial continues today.

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