Daniel Paul Copple said he does not remember much from the morning of Feb. 16, but he does remember being in the Elbow Room Lounge, entering a fight with Mark Caudill who had a gun and at least one gunshot going off.
However, he does not remember firing the weapon and killing Caudill, 33, and James Bennett Mann II, 42, or holding a gun to the head of bartender Michael Ward.
The third day of the Elbow Room murder trial was highlighted by Copple, the defendant, taking the stand to tell his side of the story.
Caudill, of Birmingham, Ala., and Mann, of Columbus, died from a Feb. 16 shooting at the downtown Columbus bar. Copple, 44, of 31725 Kingly St. in Lucerne Valley, Calif., is charged with two counts of murder and one count of aggravated assault. Court documents state Caudill had a gun inside the bar, he and Copple engaged in an altercation and Mann tried to intervene.
Copple testified Wednesday that he was in Columbus for only three or four weeks up to the night of Feb. 15. He had been to the Elbow Room a couple of times before for a drink, but the visit in the early-morning hours of Feb. 16 was different.
“I came into the Elbow Room and walked into the front door,” Copple said. “I was probably at the corner of the bar, and the man drew a weapon … I caught him by his gun hand and the collar of his neck.”
Copple said he and Caudill got in a physical altercation and slid down the bar.
“He did discharge the weapon in my face,” Copple said, noting he does not recall much more afterward.
He said he remembered another person, Mann, entering the tussle and “he was pushing us to the ground.”
“I don’t know what happened. The man just fell out of the fight. And I was struggling with the other man for control of the weapon,” Copple said.
Then, he pulled the weapon away from one man, although he said he is not sure with whom he was fighting over the gun when he was on the ground and not sure whom he pulled the gun away from.
“I believe that I stepped on the gentleman and he fell to the floor, and I staggered back with the pistol in my hand,” Copple said.
Then, when he and another were on their feet, “the man was in a football stance like he was going to come at me and that’s the last thing I remember before walking out of The Elbow Room. I don’t ever remember pulling the trigger,” Copple testified.
When asked about what he thought Mann’s intention was, Copple replied, “I don’t know what his intention was at this point. I’m just doing everything I can to live.”
Copple told the court he does not remember much but does remember going outside “because the cold breeze hit me in the face.”
“I have very very little, few flashes of the barroom scene,” he said.
Elbow Room bartender Michael Ward testified Monday that Copple pointed a gun at his head and his arm tensed up as if he was pulling the trigger but nothing happened. Copple said during cross-examination that he does not remember that and does not believe he did it.
“You don’t know if you stuck a gun to a man’s head and pulled the trigger or not, do you?” District Attorney Forrest Allgood asked him.
“I would go with what my heart tells me, and I did not stick the gun in that man’s face in any form or fashion,” Copple said.
He also said he walked into the bar and the scuffle began without anyone saying a word.
“I didn’t even get a chance to order a beer,” he said.
During cross-examination, he acknowledged he was in the bar and said he assumes he shot the gun. Copple again said he has trouble remembering events and details from the incident. “There are gaps in my memory.”
Caudill had been in a car wreck in summer 2010, his fiancée Sonja Webb said, and had an injured shoulder from the wreck.
“His neck was extremely stiff. He was not able to turn or twist his head. If he wanted to make eye contact with someone right or left, he had to turn his entire body,” Webb told the court.
Allgood asked Copple if he was on any drugs and asked if, when placed in handcuffs and put in the back seat of a police vehicle, he was laughing and calling people names. Copple said, “I don’t deny it,” but responded to the question of drugs by saying, “Sir, if I was high then it was not my own doing,” implying someone slipped him a drug without his knowledge.
During redirect, defense attorney Steve Wallace asked him if he had a weapon out in the open. Copple said he did not. Wallace asked him if he was in a struggle for his life.
“This is a fact, sir,” Copple said.
Additional testimony
Susan Robinson, a paralegal for Chuck Easley’s Law Office, was Mann’s fiancé at the time of his death. Her night with Mann on Feb. 15 started out pleasantly with grilling hamburgers at their apartment. However, Mann wanted to go to the Elbow Room and see Ward, which was about two or three blocks away.
She testified she woke up at around 12:20 a.m. and went to the bar and asked Bennett to come home.
“He said he wanted to stay with Mike Ward and have another beer or two,” Robinson said, noting he asked her if she wanted to come inside for a drink. She said no.
She said she remembered seeing Copple walk behind Mann and enter the bar. She said he “gave me the harshest look I’ve ever had in my life.”
“He walked in behind (Mann) while we were talking and glares at me as hard as he can and opens the door and goes into the Elbow Room,” Robinson said.
About a minute later, she left the scene and Mann stayed She testified she did not hear anything or see any sort of commotion inside the bar after Copple left up until she entered her vehicle and left the scene at 12:30 a.m.
Caudill — the one who entered the bar with a gun — had the weapon because he and Webb were victims of an attack a month earlier.
Webb and Caudill were out the night of Feb. 15. They were celebrating Valentine’s Day a day late and “making plans for the future.”
“But I was tired. I was ready to go home,” Webb said. “He, however, bumped into someone he had not seen for a long time.”
When he insisted on going to the Elbow Room, Webb said she got upset.
“I left angrily,” she said. But he called and said he did not like the way the two parted, Webb said. She again asked him to come home, but he declined.
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