By Meghan McCormick
A blind Navy veteran described how he attempted to revive his wife's lifeless body minutes after she had been shot inside their Norman home at 1517 Oklahoma Ave. on the afternoon of Sept. 4, 2007.
"When I tried to do CPR, her windpipe was blown in half," Joseph "Brent" Link said.
Link's wife, Tami Link, suffered a shotgun blast to the side of her face. Then Link took his right hand and reached underneath her head.
"The back of her head was gone, just gone," Link said.
Link, who has been legally blind since 2000, testified Monday at the triple murder trial of his brother-in-law, William Eugene Davis, 52, of Norman. Prosecutors are seeking the death penalty.
Link testified for nearly 2 1/2 hours Monday afternoon at the Cleveland County Courthouse.
Cleveland County Assistant District Attorney Christy Miller asked Link about the events on Sept. 4, 2007, just prior to the shooting.
Link said Sheila Ellis came over to the home he shared with her sister. He helped Ellis with some paper work.
"She was more excited than I'd ever seen her," Link recalled.
At about 3 p.m., Tami Link went and picked up Davis to bring him to her house. Link said he was Davis' Social Security payee, and he was in charge of helping Davis with his finances.
When Tami Link and Davis arrived, Link said Tami told him that Davis seemed agitated and she smelled alcohol on his breath.
"Did you know where the defendant was?" Miller asked.
"No," Link said.
Link said Ellis had planned to take Davis to Shawnee later that day and visit their mother.
"I went to the restroom and when I came back into mom's sitting room, I could hear Tami on the phone with our son," Link said.
"When you went out to the garage what were you going out for?" Miller asked.
Link said he went and grabbed two bottles of water and then wanted to speak with Davis, who he believed was on the front porch.
"I used my cane to get on the porch. He wasn't there. He wasn't in the gazebo," Link said.
Link said he walked to the front door and it was ajar.
"It frightened me. It's a rule we don't leave doors ajar. I just thought that's not right," he said.
Link said he walked inside the house and turned to the left. He could hear Tami and Ellis talking.
All of the sudden, Link said he heard a loud explosion.
"What did you think?" Miller asked.
"I jumped back," he said. "The first thing I thought was a gas explosion. After that, my mind was just I got to get back there and head to make sure the explosion hadn't gotten to them."
Link said he took another step and heard another shot.
"I could recognize it was gun fire," he said. "I ran at the noise."
Letannah Bishop, Link's mother, lived with the couple.
"I heard my mom say off to my right, 'Please don't shoot me, please don't shoot me,'" Link said.
He heard another shot.
"I never heard my mom say another word after that," he said.
Link said he ran toward the gunfire and the person shooting.
"I got the barrel and the stock. As I was doing that, he took it, swung the barrel down," Link said.
Link and the gunman got into an altercation. At one point, Link said the gunman took the weapon and hit Link on the back of the head.
Link said he still didn't know who he was fighting. He then felt the barrel between his lips and nose.
"Then I heard the shooter say, 'I'm going to kill you too...,'" Link said.
Link said he recognized the voice.
"Without a shadow of a doubt, it was William Davis," he said.
Link said he struggled for the gun, then began to hit Davis numerous times on the face with his fists. The altercation moved to the front porch. Once he subdued Davis, Link went back inside to check on the injured women.
"I grabbed Sheila. I reached out to take her pulse and it was just gone. She had no throat left," he said. "She was just gone."
Link attempted to revive his wife but had no success.
He picked up a cordless phone.
"I grabbed the phone and made my 911 call to try and get help," Link said.
In the meantime, his son, Stephen, was working in the backyard near a building. Link called for his son to help.
"I told him to go check Bill and make sure he wasn't going to bother us," he said.
As Link and his son cared for the women, police and emergency workers arrived a short time later.
Under cross examination, defense attorney Craig Corgan questioned Link about statements he made to police regarding the shooting.
"You said the person with the gun hit you on the back of the head?" Corgan asked.
"Yes," Link said.
"Neither the statement on Sept. 4 or Sept. 21 did you give that info," Corgan said.
"No, I may not have. The interview on Sept. 21 was a specific interview," Link said.
Norman Police Master Officer David Watson was the first person that testified Monday. Watson said Stephen Link came running out of his home on Oklahoma Avenue the afternoon of Sept. 4, 2007, yelling to police that his uncle had shot everybody in the house and shot himself.
"He was very urgent and hysterical," Watson said of Link. "He said his uncle shot everybody in the house and shot himself," Watson said.
Watson said he was the first officer on the scene at the Oklahoma address on Sept. 4, 2007.
He said he worked the day shift and was headed home a little after 3 p.m. when a police dispatcher told police they were needed at 1517 Oklahoma Ave. Watson was in his patrol car at the intersection of Boyd Street and Classen Avenue when the call came over the radio.
"They gave out this call as a Signal 32, which stands for officer needed, nature unknown," he said.
Watson, who was within blocks of the address, drove up to the area, but parked a distance away to keep his vehicle and himself concealed. Watson explained he followed department policy regarding "nature unknown calls."
"Did you see any other officers?" Miller asked Watson.
"No," I was the first one on the scene," Watson said.
He said nothing appeared out of the ordinary.
"There wasn't anything that alarmed me at first," Watson said.
He said additional officers began to arrive. Watson asked the police dispatcher to call the residence and have someone step outside the home.
Watson said a white pickup pulled up the street and as an officer went to tell the driver to leave, a man burst out of the front door at the Links' home. The man later was identified as Stephen Link.
Watson said several minutes later when officers entered the home, they found the victims inside and Watson walked upon Link giving his mother CPR.
