Friends testify about Sarah Widmer's last days

LEBANON, Ohio - Two of Sarah Widmer's friends testified Friday that Sarah complained about not feeling well in the days before she died.

Prosecutors say Sarah was drowned by her husband in their Hamilton Township home.

Defense attorneys are trying to show an undetected medical problem led to the newlywed's death.

The defense spent Friday trying to show the jury that even though Sarah's medical records and autopsy show no signs of a cardiac or neurological problem, she did have health issues.

"She complained a lot for a young girl," said Patty Kroger, who worked with Sarah.

"Several times she complained of migraines. She'd come up to me and say, ‘Patty, there's something wrong.’ We'd put her in a little room and she'd sit there with the lights off. She did that on several occasions. Stomach aches, even on the week before she passed away," said Kroger.

"She was kinda doubled over on several occasions, Monday through Thursday, the four days, saying she did not feel well. On the Thursday, Ryan made a deep fried turkey and she said, ‘I just can't eat this. I just don't feel well,’" testified Kroger.

Amy Karabic talked to Sarah a few hours before she died.

"We talked briefly. She said she wasn't feeling well and we had planned to talk further that Friday," testified Karabic.

"She said she had a headache and her neck and shoulders were bothering her. She didn't get into detail. It was very brief," said Karabic.

Also a neighbor testified Friday that she heard the ambulance come to the Widmer home.

Mandy Antczak watched as emergency workers brought Sarah out on a stretcher. She also saw Ryan.

"He came out of the front door and was sort of pacing back and forth and then he walked in front of the ambulance and he was on his phone – sort of just shaking and talking to somebody," testified Antczak.

Later, detectives starting knocking on neighbors’ doors.

"They asked us questions like, were they fighting? Did we hear anything? Had we ever seen them fighting?," testified the neighbor.

Antczak said she didn't hear anything unusual that night and that she and her husband never noticed any problem between Ryan and Sarah.

The testimony is expected to get more technical again next week when the defense calls doctors as experts, including internationally known pathologist Werner Spitz.

Spitz testified in Ryan Widmer's original trial. Widmer is getting a retrial. The judge threw out the first verdict, which was guilty, because of juror misconduct.