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The mother of the Rockville man accused of murdering a popular athletic trainer said her son came to her crying and trembling about an hour after the shooting.
"It was almost like he was short-circuited," Dody Pierce, of Vienna, Va., testified in Montgomery County Circuit Court Tuesday. "He was shaking a lot. He was all over the place, with tears, with shaking." She also said she took him for a psychological evaluation a month before the shooting.
Michael Wayne Adams, 44, of Rockville is charged with first-degree murder in the shooting death of Jason David Hadeed, 33, also of Rockville. The shooting occurred Feb. 8 in Adams' King Farm neighborhood.
In a text message to Adams the morning he was shot, Hadeed wrote: "ur not a man of ur word. U will get what u dish out. Karma is a bitch," according to a private investigator who also testified Tuesday.
Adams' attorneys say their client was afraid for his life and shot Hadeed in self defense after Hadeed punched Adams twice and forced his way into the defendant's home to collect on an $18,000 gambling debt.
Prosecutors allege Adams shot Hadeed in the back while they were in Adams' apartment and then pursued his victim outside, where more shots were fired. The state rested its case Monday afternoon after three days of testimony in which the defendant's neighbors said they heard an argument and a pleading voice before hearing apparent gunshots.
Pierce said her son had money troubles. She loaned Adams $30,000 in 2007 and testified that he told her his business was going under and that people were after him for money. She also recalled her only meeting with Hadeed, which occurred in December of 2007 at Hadeed's home in King Farm.
"He indicated that he knew people that could hurt people," she said, "but that Michael was no good to them dead," implying that Adams could be harmed to elicit payment. She also said Hadeed tried to set up a payment plan for Adams where he would pay back the people he owed in $1,000 monthly installments.
Pierce said that after this meeting, Adams moved in with her for some time.
"Michael was afraid," she said. Concerned for his mental health, she took Adams to visit the Woodburn Center for Community Mental Health in Fairfax, Va., on Jan. 10. They spent about four hours being interviewed by psychologists there. She had not testified on the outcome of that evaluation by press time.
Other witnesses called on the first day of the defense case included Adams' brother Blair Adams, private investigator Warren Rineker and Jennifer Blackburn, the mother of Hadeed's two children.
Rineker told the jury about text and voice messages recovered from Adams' cell phone.
Text messages from Hadeed in the week leading up to the shooting indicated Adams was not returning calls or text messages, and Hadeed was becoming increasingly frustrated, Rineker said.
Hadeed had been demanding Adams' laptop and flat screen television as partial repayment, Rineker said. In a Jan. 10 message Hadeed wrote, "call me I want the TV."
In a voice message from the day before, Hadeed said, "I'm going to unplug the [expletive] TV, so be ready," according to Rineker.
Hadeed also called Adams that morning, leaving a message peppered with strong language, Rineker said.
The prosecution presented a transcript of a Jan. 15 phone message in which Hadeed, talking about repayment, said there was "not going to be any questions or violent [sic]."
The trial began on Nov. 12, and could last another three days before jury deliberations begin.
