Twenty-one oddities went unanswered in the 1998 death of former Washington State Patrol trooper Ronda Reynolds in Toledo.

    So said former Lewis County Sheriff’s detective Jerry Berry, who testified Tuesday in day two of a jury trial that will decide if the coroner’s ruling that Reynolds committed suicide is accurate.

    Reynolds’ mother, Barbara Thompson, filed a lawsuit against Lewis County Coroner Terry Wilson to dispute the ruling, years after police found Ronda Reynolds fatally shot on the floor of her walk-in closet with a blanket over her on Dec. 16, 1998.

    A jury of eight women and four men looked on as Reynolds’ close friend and Des Moines Police Officer David Bell was first called to the stand. Bell said he was one of the last people to see Reynolds before her death, and testified that she never used the word “suicide” in their conversations leading up to the incident.

    Bell told the jury he’d been helping Reynolds pack to move away from her husband Ron Reynolds, whom multiple witnesses said she was in the process of divorcing.

    “I was there to help her get out of there,” Bell said. “She made arrangements to fly to Spokane the next morning, and asked if she could get a ride to the airport.”

    She asked Bell to call her the morning of Dec. 16 to make sure she woke up in time for the ride, Bell said. When he called, he learned from Ron that Reynolds was dead.

    Bell and other witnesses who were called to the stand compared Ron’s demeanor that morning to “discussing the weather,” with no apparent emotion or grief.

    Next, former Lewis County Sheriff’s Deputy Robert Bishop took the stand. He was on the scene on the morning of Reynolds’ death, and said he also saw red flags that brought the suicide into question.

    Bishop said it appeared the right side of the couple’s bed was made that morning — the side Ron said Reynolds was sleeping on until about 6 a.m. when she got up and pulled the trigger in a nearby room. Ron’s side of the bed was disheveled and consistent with his story, Bishop said.

    Ron told officers he didn’t hear the shot from the room about 10 feet from the bed because two doors and a pillow separated the noise from Ron, who was sleeping, Bishop said.

    Bishop said he saw Reynolds’ body with the hand that held the gun underneath a blanket that was over her. He also said moisture and humidity in the air led him to believe someone had taken a shower that morning in the bathroom adjacent to the closet.

    The closet door, Bishop said, couldn’t have been opened as Ron said because the body was right in front of the open door.

    Wilson’s attorney John Justice cross examined Bishop, leading him to add that he didn’t take photos or administer measurements or tests on the door. Bishop also said he didn’t find signs of a struggle and left the scene as detectives took over.

    The next witness was former sheriff’s detective Jerry Berry, who was once the lead detective on Reynolds’ case. He said he raised 21 questions that should have kept the case undetermined until they were answered, and alleged that bullying and haste from the department led to the suicide ruling and his eventual resignation.

    Berry said one of those oddities, lipstick scrawled on the mirror in Reynolds’ bathroom, read “I love you, call me …” and gave an Eastern Washington phone number.

    “Clearly not a suicide note,” Berry said. “Any one of those things in and of itself wouldn’t have been an issue, but things were starting to add up.”

    He later added he thinks it was a staged suicide, and actions were taken to cover up a murder.

    Justice questioned Berry’s motives when he entered the scene that day. He also asked Berry about various life problems Reynolds was facing before her death, including financial struggles and depression medication.

    Justice said Monday that Coroner Wilson stands by his determination, which has changed three times since it was originally made.

    Andy Campbell: (360) 807-8208

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Testimony About Ronda Reynolds’ Death

By The Chronicle

    Three witnesses gave full testimony in day two of a civil trial questioning the accuracy of a coroner’s ruling that Ronda Reynolds’ 1998 death was a suicide. Here are the key points they gave:

David Bell

Ronda Reynolds’ close friend and Des Moines police officer

    • Reynolds was packing up to leave for Spokane before divorcing her husband Ron, who was at the scene of her death on Dec. 16.

    Bell said she had asked him to call her on the morning of the incident to make sure she was awake for a ride to the airport. Bell called to learn she was dead.

    • Bell said he helped Reynolds pack up her stuff, and that she handed him a gun that belonged to Ron. He refused, and said he unloaded the gun before Reynolds put it in a dresser. The point was addressed later in the hearing, when a detective alleged the gun had been wiped clean after the incident.

    • The two had a conversation about the divorce on a drive Dec. 15, and said Reynolds gave no indication that she was depressed or wanted to kill herself. Coroner Terry Wilson’s attorney John Justice said Ron had a later conversation with Reynolds where she talked of suicide.

Robert Bishop

Former Lewis County Sheriff’s deputy who responded to the scene

    • Bishop said Ron told officers he opened the door into the closet to find Reynolds’ body with a pillow and blanket over her. Bishop said the door couldn’t have been opened without moving the body because it was so close to the door.

    Bishop also said her hand — the one that apparently held the gun — was clutching the fabric underneath the blanket when he arrived on the scene, a fact which he called odd.

    • Ron also told officers he didn’t hear the shot, even though it was 10 to 12 feet away from the room where the bullet was fired, Bishop said. Ron said he was sleeping and that two doors and the pillow muffled the noise.

    • Bishop said, however, that he saw no signs of struggle and that he left the scene early while detectives took over.

Jerry Berry

Once the lead detective on the case, formerly with the Lewis County Sheriff’s Office.

    • Berry noted 21 “red flags” he noticed that went unanswered due to bullying within his department and hasty actions by his superiors. He noted that Ron was never tested for bullet casing residue, and that there were no fingerprints on the gun when detectives tested it.

    • He agreed with the first two witnesses, and added that the amount of blood pooling in Reynolds’ corpse — a loose definition for the medical term lividity — was consistent with pooling that would have taken place over eight to 12 hours. Still, he told attorney John Justice, the fact didn’t completely rule out suicide.

    • Berry said Ron was the only person who ever said the death was a suicide, that the coroner based Reynolds’ time of death on Ron’s statements, and that blood should have smeared on her face when he checked her pulse. Justice disagreed, saying that EMTs who responded also checked Reynolds’ pulse.