Councilman’s Sister-in-Law on Trial : Abuse by Husband Led to Killing, Woman Testifies

The 36-year-old sister-in-law of City Councilman Robert Farrell, charged with murdering her husband, testified Friday in Superior Court in Van Nuys that her husband’s jealousy and physical abuse led to his Oct. 1, 1981, shooting death.

Alice Wallace, who is employed by Farrell, said that, after an early-morning argument with her husband, Julian, 44, in the couple’s Panorama City condominium, she picked up a .25-caliber pistol to protect herself. But, after he grabbed her, the gun accidently fired, killing him, she testified.

During the trial, which will enter its seventh day Monday, defense attorney Leslie Abramson has argued that Wallace was a virtual prisoner in the couple’s Ventura Canyon Avenue residence.

During her opening argument, Abramson said that Julian Wallace, who was a quality control director for a Burbank company, often refused to allow his wife to use the family car, discouraged her from talking on the telephone and often accused her of infidelity.

While testifying Friday before Superior Court Judge Darlene E. Schempp, Alice Wallace said that, on the day of the slaying, her husband carried her from the couple’s bathroom and held her above the stairway.

Wallace testified that her husband told her: “You don’t believe me that I’ll throw you down these stairs.”

She told the jury that “his eyes were bulging out and he was trembling. He looked crazy.”

Couldn’t Call, She Says

He then carried her into the bedroom and threw her onto the bed, she said. After she pleaded with him to leave her alone, Wallace said, her husband went downstairs to the kitchen. She then tried to make a phone call but realized that the telephone had been disconnected by her husband, Wallace said.

She said she then picked up a pistol hidden in a bedroom dresser and walked to the condominium’s first floor.

Looking downcast and speaking softly, Wallace said that, when she went downstairs, her husband grabbed her arm. When she pulled away, the gun accidently fired, hitting her husband in the upper left torso, she said.

When paramedics arrived, Julian Wallace was pronounced dead, a police report says. After police arrived, they said, Wallace told them that she had shot her husband with the pistol, which was registered under her name.

Wallace, who was 33 at the time, was taken into custody and subsequently released on $15,000 bail. Court documents say she has been employed by Farrell, who represents the 8th District, in various administrative capacities since November, 1981, one month after the slaying. She is the sister of Farrell’s wife, Essie Bea.

Under questioning by Deputy Dist. Atty. Phillip Rabichow, Wallace said that her husband had choked her several times during the couple’s 10-month marriage, although he never hit her.

If convicted of second-degree murder, Wallace, who now lives elsewhere in Los Angeles, faces a possible sentence of 17 years to life in state prison.

Rabichow said that he intends to call a son of Julian Wallace by a previous marriage as a witness, and that he will testify that his father was not a violent person. The prosecutor said he expects the trial to last about 10 more days.