American Sniper Trial Day 6: Proposals, showers and murder focus of ex-girlfriend testimony

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Eddie Ray Routh's girlfriend Jennifer Weed testifies during Routh’s capital murder trial Wednesday in Stephenville. || Pool Photo by Mike Stone/AP

By JESSIE HORTON

TheFlashToday.com NEWS & SPORTS – FREE & LOCAL

STEPHENVILLE (February 18, 2015) — In the hours before he shot American Sniper Chris Kyle and Chad Littlefield, Eddie Ray Routh traveled a roller coaster of emotions.

According to her testimony in the 266th Judicial District Court Wednesday, Routh proposed to his girlfriend, Jennifer Weed, the night before, then told her to “eat a peanut and die” when he kicked her out early the next morning.

“We were in the kitchen, and I was getting his medication from the cabinet and when I turned around, he was on his knee and he asked me to marry him,” Weed told the jury. “I said yes and he wrapped his arms around my stomach and cried. Then he ate some of Jodi’s (Routh’s mother) spiced crackers, and we went to bed.”

“He just asked you to marry him out of the blue?” Tim Moore with the defense asked Weed on Wednesday.

“Yes,” she said. “He asked before, but it was when he was in the VA and I told him no, he couldn’t ask me until he was allowed to have shoelaces.”

Weed, along with Routh’s mother, Jodi (who testified Tuesday), his uncle, James Watson, and Gains and Laura Blevins (his brother-in-law and sister), painted an interesting picture for the jury from the stand. Weed said she and Routh argued frequently about his drug usage and tobacco use.

“He was smoking marijuana a lot and it was becoming an issue for him,” she said Wednesday afternoon. “He told me he’d get clean, so when I got there (to Routh’s home in Lancaster) Friday night late and he was out back smoking with his friend, Greg, I was pissed.”

Eddie Ray Routh's girlfriend Jennifer Weed testifies during Routh’s capital murder trial Wednesday in Stephenville. || Pool Photo by Mike Stone/AP
Eddie Ray Routh’s girlfriend Jennifer Weed testifies during Routh’s capital murder trial Wednesday in Stephenville. || Pool Photo by Mike Stone/AP

She testified to the court that Routh was staring off into space, at a corner, and told her he was seeing and hearing things. His paranoia seemed to get worse as the evening wore on.

“He said they were listening to us,” Weed testified. “When I would try to talk, he would cover my mouth because he didn’t want them to hear what we were saying.”


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Weed said Routh “definitely” had a paranoia about the government. He got upset and told her his mother was moving out and abandoning him, but when she asked if he’d taken his pills, Weed told the jury, he admitted he hadn’t.

“I told him to come in the kitchen and we’d get them for him to take,” she said. “I thought it would calm him down.”

It was a fitful night and Weed said they rose early on the morning of the murders. Getting up, the two took a shower, Routh’s first in days.

“He was going weeks without showering,” she told the court. “The only way he would shower is if I would get in and wash his hair for him. There would be times when he was really ripe.”

She said the problems began again when Routh came out of the kitchen with a dip of snuff in his mouth. She threw away the spit can and began arguing with Routh again. That fight ended with Weed leaving the house after texting James Watson (Routh’s uncle), who was on his way to the house, ‘hurry up or I’m going to kill your nephew.’

Not that she meant it, Weed said.

“I was angry, he was mad and when I left I said something like, ‘call me when you’re done being a dick,'” she said Wednesday in court. “I didn’t know I wouldn’t see him again. I had no idea.”

But she did. Weed came to Stephenville and visited Routh in the Erath County Jail, but of  course, things weren’t the same. Despite the fact that she testified Routh had weapons around her, smoked too much marijuana and that they argued a lot, Weed said she would do just about anything to help Routh. She also told the court they are no longer a couple.

“I loved him,” she said at one point. “I was never worried about my safety with Eddie. Even when he was holding us in the apartment (a reference to an incident in January 2013 – days before the murders – when Routh used a sword and kitchen knife to keep Weed and her roommate in their apartment and was taken again to Green Oaks), he was doing it because he wanted to keep me safe.”

Screen Shot 2015-02-09 at 9.15.35 AMThe Donald R. Jones Justice Center will open its doors at 8 a.m. Thursday for the media and public, and the trial will get back underway at 9 a.m. Road closures around the building will continue from 6 a.m. until 6 p.m.

There are lots of ways to keep up with the trial locally without fighting the traffic, closed streets and security, including online right here on The Flash, by listening to KWBY or on either of our Facebook or Twitter accounts (FB – Flash || KWBY; Twitter – Flash || KWBY).


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