Day care murder victim's wife Andrea Sneiderman denies affair

The wife of a man gunned down outside their son’s day care took the stand Tuesday and was grilled for more than three hours about her relationship with the accused killer.

Channel 2’s Jodie Fleischer was in the Decatur courtroom where Andrea Sneiderman took the stand. Sneiderman discussed her relationship with the suspect, Hemy Neuman, who supervised her at GE Energy.

Neuman is accused of killing Sneiderman’s husband, Rusty, but he has pleaded guilty by reason of insanity. He said angels and demons resembling celebrities told him to kill Sneiderman to protect the Sneiderman children. Sneiderman said Neuman seemed to be stable and never told her about any hallucinations.

”He appeared to be an extremely normal individual, Sneiderman said in court.

Prosecutors believe the killing was motivated by an affair between Sneiderman and Neuman. She said she traveled with Neuman several times on business trips and discussed each other’s family lives, but said that was normal.

Andrea Sneiderman breaks down as prosecution details the events leading up to her husband's death

”There’s a lot of traveling, and you need to talk about who you are, Sneiderman said.

During opening statements, Neuman’s defense attoey showed a timeline of Sneiderman and Neuman’s alleged affair, including numerous alleged sexual encounters.The defense also said an affair was Neuman's motive, and that Andrea Sneiderman's inconsistent behavior contributed to Neuman's alleged menatal illness and the slaying of Rusty Sneiderman.

Sneiderman admitted Neuman told her he had feelings for her, but she said those feelings weren’t reciprocated.

”None of those feelings were ever retued, and I made myself completely clear, Sneiderman said.

But prosecutors pressed Sneiderman about the alleged affair, showing several seemingly affectionate emails between the two. In one conversation, Neuman told Sneiderman he wished he could be with her during a vacation with his family. She replied ,”Ditto.

In court, Sneiderman said she didn’t remember many of the emails. She denied any romantic relationship with Neuman and said she repeatedly denied his advances.

”I don’t remember every email that I’ve written, Sneiderman said.

Sneiderman said she was aware that Neuman left his wife and children shortly after they retued from a company trip to England, but she was not aware that he had purchased a gun.

"I now realize he did not have to go on these trips. He was only going on the trips to try to spend more time with me," Sneiderman said.

During an October 2010 visit to a bar, Sneiderman said the only physical contact she had with Neuman was when he twirled her on the dance floor. When the prosecution asked if she kissed him, she said no, but added that she assumed they had witnesses to testify to the contrary.

"In this case, when you're talking about alleged affairs and someone's husband being murdered, I think people tend to think they saw a lot of things,"  Sneiderman said.

The prosecution then began to ask questions about the day Rusty Sneiderman was shot: Nov. 18, 2010.

Sneiderman said her husband had a routine of taking their son to the Dunwoody Prep School every moing, and the only way Neuman would know that was if he had been following her husband. She said when the school called her, they only said there was an emergency unrelated to her son. She said they did not specify that the emergency involved her husband, but she assumed as much.

Sniederman testified that she made several calls on her way from her office to the school, including to her parents, her husband's parents and to Neuman.

”I don’t remember, but evidently I tried to call Hemy to tell him I had left the office ... A very normal thing for me to have done, to call my boss and tell him I had left the office," Sneiderman said.

Sneiderman said she did not call her husband because she assumed he would not be able to answer. She also said she did not know what specifically had happened to him until she got to the hospital.

”They took me into what I call the 'death room'. I sat in a chair, and someone, I have no idea who they are, came in and said he (Rusty) came in with multiple gunshot wounds and that he was dead. I don’t remember anything they said after that, Sneiderman said.

The prosecution then moved on to events in late December 2010.

Sneiderman admitted to telling Tammy Parker that she knew Neuman had killed her husband. She said she began to draft an email to police at that time, but became conceed that Neuman was tracking her email and decided not to send it. She was in Florida with family at the time.

She said it did not occur to her to use another email account and that she was waiting to contact police until she retued to Atlanta in order to protect herself and her children.

Sneiderman then said until Neuman was arrested on Jan. 4, 2011, it was "unfathomable" for her to think that he had killed her husband.

When the prosecution completed its line of questioning after more than three hours, the defense began its cross-examination.

The defense asked Sneiderman about her and her husband’s work history, including specifics about her day-to-day work as a project manager for the Harvard Business School.

Sneiderman testified about the transition in her home life when she was the only one working and her husband assumed many of the duties at home. She said they struggled with the transition and her husband would become annoyed with her travel for work.

The defense told the jurors that an affair may have been a motive for the shooting, but it was Sneiderman's inconsistent behavior that contributed to Neuman's alleged mental illness and the shooting.

"What she saw is that Hemy was played back and forth like a yo-yo by Andrea," said defense attoey Doug Peters.

The judge adjoued court at 5 p.m. Testimony resumes Wednesday moing. Sneiderman is expected to retu to the stand to complete cross-examination first thing on Wednesday moing.