Witness describes finding Columbus woman’s body during trial of registered sex offender charged with murder
COLUMBUS (WCMH) — The trial has begun for the man accused of raping, torturing and murdering a Columbus woman.
Anthony Pardon, a registered sex offender, is accused of killing Rachael Anderson in her apartment and leaving her body in a closet.
Anderson’s remains were found in late January 2018 when coworkers said she didn’t show for work.
In his opening statement, Franklin County Prosecutor Ron O’Brien laid out a timeline of the case, detailing a relative had last heard from Anderson the night before her body was discovered.
O’Brien said phone records and DNA evidence, which will be presented in the trial, will prove Pardon murdered Anderson.
“The defendant was in the apartment the night she was murdered,” he said. “The defendant’s DNA was in all the wrong places, and his phone was in all the wrong places.”
Pardon originally intended to represent himself in the trial, but has since decided to obtain Larry Thomas and Isabella Dixon as his attorneys.
Thomas encouraged jurors to consider all of the evidence before reaching a conclusion on guilt or innocence.
“You can not be influenced by sympathy,” said Larry Thomas. “You see what happened out here and everybody knows this is a human being. You can’t base your decision on how you view the evidence because of what happened to her.”
Four witnesses testified, on Tuesday.
Among them was a friend of Anderson’s who described what he saw when he opened her closet door and discovered her body.
“I pulled it and there was something tied around the door handle, so I pulled it out and here came Rachel,” he said, wiping away tears. “She was tied up and in the closet.”
Pardon has pleaded not guilty to charges including aggravated murder, aggravated robbery, and kidnapping. If convicted, some specifications on those charges are eligible for a death sentence.
Prosecutors plan to call 14 witnesses to testify at his trial.
Pardon had previously served 24 years in prison for an aggravated robbery, rape, and attempted murder conviction in 1982.