THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Thursday, May 25, 1995 TAG: 9505250472
SECTION: LOCAL PAGE: B1 EDITION: FINAL
SOURCE: BY ANGELITA PLEMMER, STAFF WRITER
DATELINE: NORFOLK LENGTH: Medium: 77 lines
Prosecutors say bloodstains on Derek R. Barnabei's bedroom walls and the headboard of his waterbed will prove he murdered an Old Dominion University student in 1993.
Barnabei went on trial Wednesday on charges of capital murder and rape in the slaying of Sara J. Wisnosky, a 17-year-old freshman from Lynchburg.
Police found her nude body floating face down in the Lafayette River on Sept. 22, 1993, after a passer-by told police in a nearby cruiser that a mannequin was floating in the water.
DNA testing showed that the bloodstains police found in Barnabei's West 48th Street bedroom were from Wisnosky, the jury was told during the opening statement by Assistant Commonwealth's Attorney Valerie Bowen.
A surfboard that Barnabei was storing for a friend also was stained with the young woman's blood, and sperm found in her body matched Barnabei's, Bowen said.
A slogan in Barnabei's bedroom read, ``Women just don't get it,'' Bowen said.
``Sara Wisnosky got it in the worst way,'' the prosecutor told the jury.
Wisnosky suffered from severe blows to the head, appeared to have been sexually assaulted and was strangled, Bowen said.
Barnabei, who could receive the death penalty if convicted, was well-known among members of the university's Tau Kappa Epsilon fraternity, where he had a reputation of being a ``rush machine'' for his aggressive attempts to recruit fraternity members, Bowen said.
Barnabei had smooth-talked his way into the college scene at Old Dominion, according to people who lived near him. The high school dropout claimed to be a Rutgers University graduate and a member of Tau Kappa Epsilon.
He had picked up the nickname ``Serf,'' and ``always had a line for the ladies,'' Bowen said.
Barnabei had seen Wisnosky a few times and had invited Wisnosky and her roommate out several times to attend fraternity parties.
On the night of her death, Wisnosky called her roommate and told her she was with Barnabei.
Bowen said Barnabei began acting strangely that night. About 2 a.m., he began loudly playing the song ``Head like a Hole'' by the group Nine Inch Nails, waking one of his housemates. He also asked another housemate to move the jeep that was blocking his Chevrolet Impala. Barnabei was in such a hurry that his car hit a house as he left, Bowen said.
Barnabei also called a TKE pledge in the early morning and asked for a blanket because he was cold. When the pledge arrived, he saw no linens on Barnabei's bed.
Barnabei disappeared a few hours before Wisnosky's body was found and shortly after borrowing $100 each from two fraternity members. Police arrested him three months later in Cuyahoga Falls, Ohio, where they said he was using a false name.
But defense attorney James Broccoletti said Wisnosky and his client had become intimate, and discounted the rape theory. If prosecutors cannot prove there was a rape, Barnabei cannot be convicted of capital murder. ``They were two adults that had a consensual, sexual relationship,'' Broccoletti said. ``Derek and Sara were lovers.''
Broccoletti implied that someone else could have killed Wisnosky, citing the area's high crime rate.
Broccoletti said that his client had moved to Norfolk in hopes of finding a job to pay debts from writing bad checks, so it was not unusual that he would often borrow money from friends. ILLUSTRATION: Photo
Derek R. Barnabei
Barnabei went on trial Wenesday on charges of capital murder and
rape in the slaying of the Sara J. Wisnosky, a 17-year-old freshman
from Lynchburg.
KEYWORDS: MURDER TRIAL RAPE ODU STUDENT by CNB