Court hears friend of victim's account of Rutland slaying
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By BRENT CURTIS Rutland Herald Staff - Published: December 5, 2009
RUTLAND – Steven Carey tried to talk his friend, John Baptie, out of following Jonathan Bruno behind a store two years ago, but he told jurors Friday he couldn't prevent the fatal rendezvous.
"I told him to get back in, it wasn't worth it, he was just a punk and we were at his mother's work so it was the wrong place and the wrong time," Carey said while testifying in Rutland District Court during a second-degree murder trial for Bruno.
But he said the 24-year-old didn't listen and followed Bruno to the rear of the Rutland Walmart. Moments later, Carey said Baptie staggered toward his truck as blood spurted from a deep wound in his neck.
"I realized right there I was not going to be able to save my friend," Carey said. "I tried to tourniquet his neck …. I sat there and watched my friend die in my arms."
Carey was one of seven witnesses who testified Friday about what they saw on Nov. 1, 2007, when Baptie was killed. But Carey's testimony was more comprehensive than the accounts of the law officer, EMT and other witnesses who took the stand Friday because Carey brought Baptie to the Rutland Shopping Plaza that day and recounted the interactions he saw between Baptie and Bruno leading up to the fatal incident.
Prosecutors in the case say Bruno, 26, deliberately and viciously attacked Baptie in the parking lot with a knife. But Bruno's attorney, Kerry DeWolfe, told the jury Thursday that a combination of cocaine-induced mania and paranoia and a fear of Baptie's father, who she said threatened to shoot Bruno, led to a panicked and misguided attempt at self-defense on Bruno's part.
Baptie was reportedly alone when he followed Bruno, but DeWolfe told the jury her client believed Baptie's father was also at the plaza and he believed a security guard in the area was also pursuing him.
But Carey said Friday that Bruno knew Baptie's father wasn't in the area when Bruno talked to Baptie outside the TD Banknorth drive-through on the perimeter of the plaza.
Carey said he and Baptie — who worked for Carey's masonry company — came to the bank site after work to visit Baptie's mother who worked in the drive-through.
While there, Carey said Bruno walked behind his truck and began talking to Baptie. Carey, who was in the truck, said he couldn't hear what was said until Bruno walked around the front of the vehicle and pointed toward the back of the Walmart building on the other side of the plaza's parking lot.
"He said 'Let's go behind Walmart and settle it right here, (expletive). Your father's not around to call the police this time,'" Carey said.
Carey said he followed Bruno and Baptie in his truck but lost sight of the pair when a tractor trailer drove in front of him. Carey said he didn't know what happened while the truck obstructed his view, but when the vehicle had passed he saw Baptie clutching his neck as blood jetted from it.
Witnesses with a better view included Charles Hillier, who was driving the truck that blocked Carey's view, Kevin Benware, who was walking his dog near the Amtrak station, and Jon Gilbert, who was walking home from work when the incident occurred at about 4:20 p.m.
All three testified on Friday that they saw or heard Bruno and Baptie arguing in the parking lot.
Hillier said Baptie threw the first punch but missed. The swing that Bruno followed with appeared to be a glancing blow to the neck that the truck driver — who couldn't see a weapon in either man's hand — said he didn't think was serious until he heard that a man had died in the parking lot.
Benware said he too didn't think the swing he saw Bruno take at Baptie was a serious strike.
"It was a lunging, reaching swing, like a scared lunge out. Like a slap swing as if he was trying to avoid getting close," Benware said.
But the result of the quick strike, allegedly carried out with a blade that police recovered later that day, was devastating, according to testimony by a city police officer and an EMT.
"It was perhaps the largest amount of blood I've seen from a victim in my career," said retired police Cpl. Edward Larson who was the first law enforcement officer at the scene, where three people were trying to staunch wounds to Baptie's throat and a serious laceration on his left forearm.
Denis Kitchen, an EMT for Regional Ambulance Service, said paramedics were unable to find a pulse for Baptie when they arrived, and pronounced him dead before reaching the hospital.
"The wound started in the front and went around to the back and was very deep," Kitchen said of the cut to Baptie's neck. "It cut through the carotid artery right through to the bone."
Throughout the day, prosecutors presented photographs of the scene to the jury and played a number of videos recorded by cameras in the police cruiser, on the Walmart building and in the bank's drive-through window that showed different episodes of events leading up to the incident.
The trial will start again on Monday and is expected to last all week.
brent.curtis@rutlandherald.com
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