Karen Ledford, the ex-wife of Serial Shooter suspect Dale Hausner, took the stand to talk about acts of violence during their stormy relationship. Pool photo
Live from the courtroom: Karen Ledford, the ex-wife of Serial Shooter suspect Dale Hausner, got a chance this morning to tell her story to the jury in the suspect’s ongoing eight-count murder trial. The testimony, in which she talked about violent acts during their relationship, was largely the same as what she told the judge on the witness stand yesterday.
Ledford talked of a time when Hausner chased her in his car, then ripped her clothes off in the middle of a city street. She told about another time when he took her out in the desert, pointed a long gun at her and asked “where I want it.”
Ledford was emotional and soft spoken on the stand. She often paused while overwhelmed by tears. She spoke deliberately about each incident as she answered questions from Maricopa County prosecutor Vince Imbordino.
“I’m standing there, and he gets a gun out the trunk, what looks like to me a shotgun, and he asks me where I want it, in my head or in my chest,” Ledford testified. She stopped, choking back tears. “I told him I wasn’t going to tell him where to shoot me.”
Ledford said she didn’t report either incident to the police.
Hausner heard some of the testimony yesterday and was so upset by it, he asked to be excused from the courtroom, then got up and exited. Yesterday’s testimony was essentially a test drive for Ledford. Judge Roland Steinle needed to decide whether her stories were relevant to the case. (He said they were.)