A woman testified Tuesday in New London Superior Court that she saw David J. Grant, who is accused of fatally shooting one woman and wounding another at a Norwich restaurant in June 2012, shoot “aimlessly” into a crowd on the bar’s back deck. 

Ashleigh Hontz testified on the first day of Grant’s murder trial. The 35-year-old Grant is accused of murdering 45-year-old Donna Richardson and shooting her niece, 29-year-old Crystal Roderick, in the thigh. The women were at the Mai Thai Restaurant and Bar celebrating a birthday and were not Grant’s intended targets, according to police. 

Family members of Grant and Richardson watched from opposite sides of the courtroom as prosecutor Stephen M. Carney called witnesses to testify before a jury of 12 regular members and three alternates. 

Grant is charged with murder and first-degree assault. Judge Barbara Bailey Jongbloed will decide if he is guilty of criminal possession of a firearm. 

Hontz said she went to the bar with her mother. When it was last call, she went to her car, which was parked in the rear lot. She heard a scuffle on the back deck and saw Grant, who was known to her as “D,” pull a gun and fire two to three shots into the crowd. 

She saw Grant walk away and enter a car driven by a man she knew as Cuda, who is known to police as Steven Velez. 

Hontz said she didn’t stick around to tell police what she saw, but police found her the next morning and she gave them a written statement. 

Anthony Zemko testified that he and his wife were at Burger King in Norwich when his wife’s friend called and asked to be picked up at the Mai Thai. 

Zemko said he drove to the bar and parked in the back and was there for about 10 to 15 minutes. 

He said there were people on the deck when he saw two men come down the stairs. One of the men, he said, stumbled into the stair’s handrail when something fell onto the ground and made a “bang” noise. 

Zemko said he saw the man pick up a pistol and put it away. He said some of the people started to chuckle. 

“He pulled out the gun and pointed it to the crowd and started to shoot,” said Zemko. 

He said people started to scatter and run. He said he saw a car pick up the two men and flee the scene. 

Zemko said he saw two girls walking. One of the girls initially thought she just had blood on her before realizing that she had been shot, he said. 

“Oh my God, I got shot,” Zemko heard the woman say. 

Jurors also heard from police and emergency personnel. 

Patrol Officer Steven Schmidt said that, prior to responding to the Mai Thai call, he was at another call at the nearby American Legion. While there, Schmidt thought he heard a gunshot. Another officer with him also thought the noise was a gunshot. 

Shortly thereafter there was a call to dispatch to report a disturbance at the Mai Thai. Schmidt said he heard two more gunshots coming from the area of the restaurant, 0.3 miles away from the American Legion. Schmidt said he got to the bar within seconds. 

“For lack of a better term, I saw chaos,” said Schmidt. “People were running in the streets.” 

Schmidt said he drew his service weapon and flashlight and went up the back stairs to get inside the bar while the other responding officer went to the front. 

He first encountered the bar’s bouncer, who had blood on him, but was not injured. When he went inside, he saw Richardson on the floor face up. Schmidt said he immediately went to render first aid. Her pulse was faint and she was not responsive, he said. 

A paramedic from American Ambulance testified that when he got to Richardson, a co-worker was already performing CPR on her. She was unresponsive and had no pulse. 

Dr. Frank Evangelista from the state Office of the Chief Medical Examiner, who conducted an autopsy on Richardson, testified that the cause of death was a gunshot wound to the chest and the manner of death was homicide. He used an autopsy photo to show the jury that the bullet went into the left side of Richardson’s chest and traveled through her left lung and heart. 

Sgt. Darren Powers testified that he attended Richardson’s autopsy and collected bullet fragments after doctors extracted them from Richardson and Roderick. Powers said he and another detective found a key chain across the street from the crime scene and traced it to Devon Jarmon, who later admitted he fired one round from his 9 mm pistol into the air “in the chaos of the moment” after people came into the bar screaming that somebody had been shot on the bar’s back deck. 

Grant’s attorney, Sebastian O. DeSantis, began questioning Powers about a gun found near the scene that was traced back to Jarmon, but Carney, the prosecutor, objected because Powers was not directly involved with that part of the investigation. DeSantis said he would wait to pursue that line of questioning, presumably through another witness. 

Jurors also heard two 911 emergency calls. One caller pleaded for an ambulance, saying, “She’s bleeding. Please, please hurry.” 

After the jury left for the day, DeSantis noted a female jury member seemed as if she wasn’t paying attention to the testimony and had a “glazed look in her eyes.” Carney said he, too, had taken note of the woman’s demeanor and was “a bit curious.” The judge said they would “monitor the situation and see if any action needs to be taken.” 

The evidentiary portion of the trial is expected to last four to five days. In opting for a trial, Grant rejected the prosecutor’s offer to plead guilty in exchange for a sentence of 45 years. 

According to Norwich police, Grant has a glass eye as a result of being shot in the face on Talman Street in November 2010. He was attempting to shoot a man who had shot at a friend of his a year earlier, they said. 

A one-time resident of Norwich, Grant was arrested in Baltimore in December 2012 and extradited to Connecticut. He has been held in lieu of $2.5 million while his case is pending.

Day Staff Writer Karen Florin contributed to this story.

i.larraneta@theday.com

Twitter: @larraneta