Testimony wraps up in Brownsville homicide trial
A Brownsville man on trial for homicide took the stand in his own defense on Wednesday in Fayette County Court, telling jurors that although he did confront the alleged victim and participate in a fist fight, he had no intent to take the man’s life.
“I made a bad decision,” Johnathan Godines testified. “I chose to go back and confront the situation rather than retreat. I admit to my part in this. I admit I fist fought him.”
Godines, 37, told jurors that he had never spoken to 75-year-old John Eicholtz until his girlfriend Amber McDonald was in the hospital giving birth to their second child. That’s when Godines said Eicholtz made several phone calls to the hospital demanding to speak with McDonald, but Godines said he would not pass the phone calls to her.
Godines testified Eicholtz became increasingly upset over the course of the phone calls and finally told him, “I’ve lived my life, I’ll just go ahead and kill you. I’m gonna shoot you on sight.”
Godines said he hung up and reported the harassing phone calls to the nurse’s station, asking them not to patch through any more phone calls from Eicholtz.
The next time Godines said he encountered Eicholtz was two months later, on Nov. 15, 2011, outside the apartment building where Godines lived with McDonald on High Street in Brownsville. Godines told jurors that while he was standing outside, Eicholtz passed by in a white car, made a U-turn and passed by again, this time brandishing a handgun.
Asked why he followed Eicholtz around the corner and confronted the man in his car instead of retreating from someone he believed was armed, Godines said, “Now that I look back, I could have (retreated), but that’s not the decision I made. I wish now that I would have.”
Hoping to head Eicholtz off before he was able to park the car and get out with the gun, Godines testified he followed Eicholtz behind the building and began kicking the driver’s side door and window. Godines testified he and Eicholtz both opened the car door at the same time, and that as it opened, Godines struck the older man in the face. Eicholtz hit him back, Godines said.
“We was tussling, and he was swatting me with the gun,” Godines testified.
The car began to roll forward as they exchanged blows with Eicholtz still in the car, according to Godines, and the rear wheel nearly caught his leg. Godines said the movement of the car broke the altercation, and he turned and walked quickly back toward High Street, crossing over to the sidewalk in front of the Antique Bar and Grille.
Godines told jurors Eicholtz followed him, and that he turned and said to the older man, “Look, it’s over. I don’t want to fight. What the (expletive) is wrong with you?”
“I swing, I hit him about two times,” Godines testified. “He grabs hold of my hoodie, and as he’s going down, he’s taking me with him.”
Eicholtz pulled the hoodie off, Godines said, and, “When I get free, that’s when I kick him in the jaw.” Godines testified it was one kick, not 15, as a witness from inside the Antique Bar previously testified. After that, Godines said, he retreated farther up the hill, away from the bar.
“I just wanted to get away,” Godines told jurors. “He was crazed. I couldn’t believe at this point he hadn’t shot me.”
Godines testified he was angry for a number of reasons, but mainly he was angry because he believed that McDonald was buying prescription pills illegally from Eicholtz. Godines told the jury he had no idea Eicholtz had any underlying medical conditions that may have put him at risk for a stroke.
The prosecution contends the fight caused Eicholtz to have a stroke, which led to him being hospitalized and put on life support.
Eicholtz contracted pneumonia while in the hospital, which ultimately led to his death on Dec. 1, 2011, according to testimony from the forensic pathologist who examined Eicholtz’s body.
“It was a fist fight,” Godines reiterated. “I’m sorry Mr. Eicholtz lost his life. I thought I would die. He had the gun.”
Godines’ defense counsel also called Amber McDonald’s sister, Kimberly McDonald, to testify. She told the jury she also lives in the apartment building on High Street, and she was walking with her young son on the sidewalk the evening of the incident when she also saw Eicholtz brandish a weapon as he drove by.
Assistant Public Defender Benjamin F. Goodwin asked if she was 100 percent sure what she saw was a gun, and Kimberly McDonald said, “Yes.”
On cross-examination by Assistant District Attorney J.W. Eddy, Kimberly McDonald was asked what kind of gun she saw. “I wasn’t staring very long once I seen it,” she replied, adding that she gathered up her child and went inside immediately.
The defense also called Dr. Maxim Hammer, the neurologist who treated Eicholtz when he was admitted to UPMC Mercy Hospital in Pittsburgh. Hammer testified that the most likely cause of the stroke that led to Eicholtz being hospitalized, and ultimately contracting the acute bronchial pneumonia that caused his death, was an underlying hypertensive condition rather than blunt force trauma.
Assistant Public Defender Michael Garofalo asked whether pneumonia was treatable, and if so, would the prognosis be good.
“The overwhelming majority of patients respond to antibiotics,” Hammer responded. The doctor testified that recovery may take time and require the assistance of a ventilator, which could be necessary for days, weeks, or possibly months.
Hammer testified that the team of treating physicians who took over Eicholtz’s care had talked to the patient’s family, who determined that if Eicholtz couldn’t recover from the stroke, he should be given “comfort measures only,” meaning all medical treatment except pain management would be discontinued.
Garofalo asked whether Eicholtz could still be alive today if supportive medical treatment had continued.
“He could have survived, but with a major disability,” Hammer replied, including permanent paralysis of the left side of his body.
On cross-examination, Eddy asked whether Eicholtz’s pre-existing health conditions — hypertension, emphysema, hardening of the arteries and an enlarged heart — would have contributed to his ability to recovery.
Hammer told jurors that it would be difficult to predict. “Recovery tends to surprise us,” he said.
In his closing argument, Garofalo called the incident “a fist fight, with a very tragic result.”
“The Commonwealth must prove to you, ladies and gentlemen, that Mr. Godines was the direct cause of that stroke,” Garofalo said. “Neither one of those doctors can say what caused it to happen and why.”
Garofalo called Eicholtz’s death tragic and concluded by saying, “Let’s not put a tragedy on a tragedy by convicting Mr. Godines.”
Eddy, in his closing argument, refuted the defense’s claim that Godines had no specific intent to kill Eicholtz.
“There was jealousy,” Eddy said, referring to allegations the prosecution made that McDonald may have had a physical relationship with Eicholtz that upset Godines. “Jealousy is the oldest motive there is.”
According to Eddy, the jealousy elevated Godines’ state of mind to the level of malice as defined in the criminal statute pertaining to homicide. “That cruelty, that malice, that wickedness of disposition, that hardness of heart, is what makes this murder.”
Eddy also addressed the fact that Eicholtz’s family agreed to the “comfort measures only” order, saying the defense wanted the jury to believe, “It was (Tim Eicholtz’s) fault. It was the family’s decision to let him go.”
Eddy referred to Hammer’s testimony that Eicholtz would have been paralyzed, and may have required a ventilator and possibly a surgically-inserted feeding tube for an indeterminate period of time.
“Having said all that, Mr. Eicholtz was already dead,” Eddy told the jury. “It’s a stretch, to say the least, to expect — if not require — the family to let that continue.”
Jurors were excused following closing arguments, and will return this morning for jury instructions from President Judge John F. Wagner Jr. before they begin deliberating.