Witness says Bradenton woman on trial for murder claimed man was beating her, so she ‘stuck him’
Roberta Gail McDonald, on trial for murder in the 2019 death of her boyfriend, told a friend that the man was beating her, so she “stuck him.”
The trial of McDonald, charged with second-degree murder in the death of Anthony Bernard Wilson, got underway on Monday with jury selection. McDonald was arrested and charged in the case hours after Wilson was found dead inside his Bradenton apartment on April 12, 2019.
Wilson, 56, died on the floor of his East Bradenton home after being stabbed several times.
The state began presenting its case against McDonald on Tuesday morning, calling several witnesses including her childhood friend, Titinysha “Pie” Scott.
Scott was driving down the street earlier the morning Wilson was found when she spotted McDonald and stopped to ask how she was doing. McDonald asked her for a ride to an apartment at the Treesdale Apartments, 1818 Ninth Ave. E., Bradenton.
After waiting outside for a few minutes, she said that McDonald came back out, got back into her van and said, “He was beating me, he was beating.”
“We were talking about something totally different before and then that’s what she she said,” Scott testified.” I didn’t know who the ‘he’ was.”
McDonald went to explain that she was talking about her boyfriend, adding, “I just stuck him and he told me to just to ‘Go baby, go.’”
McDonald admitted to stabbing Wilson after her arrest, claiming it was in self-defense. But McDonald gave Bradenton police detectives various accounts of what led up to the stabbing. Jurors on Tuesday watched a recording of the interview.
The jury — made of five women and two men, including an alternate — watched as they followed along with a transcript. At one point, McDonald said, “I loved him but he beat me,” before crying.
Among the explanations offered by McDonald was that they had been drinking and smoking crack and he got mad with her when they ran out of drugs. One crime scene technician testified finding the stem of a crack pipe in the home.
Law enforcement officers and crime scene technicians testified that they searched Wilson’s home but could not find a knife.
This was not the first time that McDonald was alleged to have stabbed Wilson. Five months before, Wilson reported to police that she had stabbed him on four different occasions and thrown a VCR at him. During the most recent incident, Wilson told police she held a knife to his neck and told him, “I’m gonna kill you” and “I’m gonna get you.”
McDonald was charged with four counts of aggravated domestic battery with a deadly weapon and one count of aggravated domestic battery but the State Attorney’s Office declined to file formal charges.
This story was originally published June 15, 2021 at 3:42 PM.
