Catherine Huttula got to know Ronda Liburdi — later to take the name Ronda Reynolds — and Ronda’s then-husband, Mark, while living across the street from them in Grays Harbor County with her then-husband Ron Reynolds and their five sons in the 1990s.
On Wednesday, in the third day of Lewis County’s inquest into Ronda Reynolds’ 1998 death, Huttula denied ever telling anyone she believed her son Jonathan had killed her after Reynolds, 33, married Huttula’s ex-husband.
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She said she believed her former friend had killed herself.
“She did mention suicide to me throughout the years,” Huttula testified.
Ronda Reynolds’ death was ruled suicide at the time.
The inquest follows a years-long crusade by her mother, Barbara Thompson, to have the case reopened.
In earlier testimony on Wednesday, Jerry Berry, a former Lewis County sheriff’s detective, said that in February 2010, while working as a private investigator, he developed leads that pointed to murder.
A man named Joshua Williams, in custody at the Lewis County Jail on a drug-related arrest and waiting to be sentenced to prison, had contacted Berry about Ronda Reynolds’ death, Berry said.
Williams told him that he and a man named Jason Collins, along with a couple of the Reynolds boys — Jonathan and Micah — conspired to murder her while partying at Ronda and Ron Reynolds’ house the night before she died.
Ron Reynolds, Berry said he was told, had come home at about 6 p.m. and offered beers to a couple of the boys before leaving to watch a school play in Toledo, Lewis County.
The party continued, and Ronda at one point asked the boys to quiet down.
Williams said later that he, Collins and the two Reynolds boys went to his place to use methamphetamine and smoke marijuana, according to Berry. When they returned to the Reynolds’ home, Williams brought a bottle of whiskey.
Sometime after midnight, Collins and Jonathan Reynolds disappeared, Berry said he was told. Williams later heard screams and someone yell “Oh help me!” before he left.
Collins appeared at Williams’ home at about 2 a.m., covered in blood, and said “It’s done, I took care of her,” Berry said he was told.
At 6:20 a.m. Dec. 16, 1998, Ron Reynolds called 911 to report that his wife had committed suicide.
According to investigators, she was on the floor of a closet between the master bedroom and bathroom.
Williams’ mother, Belinda Rodriguez, testified Wednesday that a couple of weeks later her son approached her with bloody clothes and asked her if she’d wash them, saying he’d been in a fight.
Berry said the clothes belonged to Collins, who had threatened to kill Williams if he told anybody about the slaying.
The sheriff’s office contacted both Williams and Collins for questioning after Berry told his former colleagues the story.
In March 2010, during a polygraph, Williams told investigators he knew nothing about Reynolds’ death.
“The test results show there was no deception indicated when he provided these answers,” Coroner Warren McLeod said Wednesday. Collins also passed a polygraph test.
Berry, who answered the coroner’s questions via speakerphone, did not push further any theory about Williams and Collins conspiring to kill Ronda Reynolds, but he remained adamant that her death was a homicide.
David Bell, who was supposed to take Reynolds to the airport the next day, was also at the Reynolds home to help her pack the night before she died. In her bedroom, Bell said, Reynolds handed him a revolver.
Out of force of habit, the current master sergeant of the Des Moines police department’s patrol division said he had unloaded the gun and put it back in its holster before handing it back to her.
Reynolds told him the gun belonged to her husband, he said.
Bell testified that he knew Reynolds was depressed but didn’t think she was suicidal — the two had been friends for years and had once been romantically involved.
After midnight, he testified, Reynolds called him to let him know she had a ticket. Investigators later discovered the gun found on Reynolds’ body had no fingerprints.
Bell said he believed his unloading of the gun earlier in the evening would have left his prints on it.
“I don’t believe it was a suicide,” Bell said. “I believe it was a homicide.”
Laurie Hull was also supposed to take her friend Reynolds to the airport, in Portland. She last spoke to Reynolds around 10:30 p.m. that night.
In a taped statement Hull said Jonathan Reynolds had once kicked one of her puppies and threatened her with a knife. She related another incident in which Jonathan Reynolds spied on Ronda while she was in the shower.
Hull said she wouldn’t be surprised if Jonathan had killed Ronda.
Later, Hull mentioned that Ron Reynolds had let her know that Ronda had charged his credit cards to “the tune of $25,000” after he had spent $1,300 on her car and bought a new dining-room set.
Hull, who had been friends with Ronda Reynolds for several years, said she knew that creditors had been after her friend after the dissolution of her marriage to Mark Liburdi and that when she married Ron Reynolds she was still taking out cash advances.
“She told me she was helping her mom pay off her property and was giving some to her grandma,” Hull said of the money.
However, Hull said Reynolds never mentioned if she was doing badly financially.
Later, the coroner asked Hull how she’d feel if someone had told her Reynolds committed suicide:
“Not surprised, but I’d want some proof,” Hull said.
