Crime & Safety

Trial Update: Husband Says Wife's Depression Peaked Before November Murder

Mary 'Kat' Ogdoc describes watching her mother throw 2-year-old Angelyn Ogdoc over a walkway at Tysons Corner Center last November.

Update 6:30 p.m.: The Carmela dela Rosa murder convened on Wednesday afternoon after Rebecca Rush, dela Rosa's older sister, left the stand.

Rush, who lives in Washington, D.C., testified she was like a mother-figure to Carmela and said, "That's not the same sister that I know that did that act."

Rush also testified that she visited dela Rosa regularly in prison. During one visit, shortly after dela Rosa was incarerated and charged with her granddaughter's murder, Rush said that her sister expressed that she felt like "she was spinning around...in the middle of a car crash."

Find out what's happening in Viennawith free, real-time updates from Patch.

Like other family members who have taken the stand during the past two days, Rush said she noticed marked changes in her sister when dela Rosa experienced waves of depression. She isolated herself, she withdrew from company and did not socialize outside her house.

"She was avoiding me," Rush said. "When I called their home, they'd say she's sleeping. She doesn't want to talk to you."

Find out what's happening in Viennawith free, real-time updates from Patch.

The fourth day of trial resumes Thursday at 10 a.m. in Fairfax.

Update 4 p.m.: When Leandro dela Rosa first married his wife and they began a family, she was happy, interactive. "Normal." A good mother.

But in the past 10 years, Carmela dela Rosa had transformed into a moody woman who experienced periodic episodes of depression and an increasing fear of being left alone, he said in court Wednesday, the first defense witness in his wife's murder trial.

Leandro was at Tysons Corner Center with Carmela and the rest of his family when Carmela lifted their 2-year-old granddaughter Angelyn over the railing of a pedestrian walkway last November, watching as the toddler fell 44 feet to the ground.

Dela Rosa pleaded not guilty by reason of insanity Monday.

Leandro said his wife's depression peaked last fall, when Carmela dela Rosa attempted to overdose on pills twice, cut her wrists once, and drove her car down the side of a steep embankment.

At times, she tried to hide his keys to prevent him from leaving to go work in the morning -- on one occasion that fall she pulled a knife on her husband as he tried to leave the house.

“I just grabbed it," he said. "There wasn’t a lot of struggle. That was a surprise, she had never done that.”

Though he described his wife’s behavior as becoming increasingly severe last fall, Leandro thought she was acting normally on Nov. 29, 2010 when he and their son David returned from a short vacation in Ocean City, Md.

“She was upbeat” later that afternoon, when the couple went to Tysons Corner Center for dinner with their son David, their daughter Mary "Kat" Ogdoc and their granddaughter Angelyn.

“Everything was normal,” Leandro said, describing how he and Carmela shared a kabob platter and flatbread, and enjoyed frozen yogurt after dinner.

Just minutes later, however, the situation rapidly changed when Carmela picked up her granddaughter and threw her off a pedestrian walkway as they were returning to the parking garage.

“I thought I saw a blur to the side,” Leoandro. “It happened so fast.”

 As Leandro dela Rosa exited the courtroom on Wednesday afternoon, he embraced his son-in-law James Ogdoc, who testified as one of the prosecution’s witnesses on Tuesday morning.

 

--

UPDATE (1:30 p.m.): The prosecution has rested its case. The defense is scheduled to call its first witness at 2 p.m.

----

Carmela dela Rosa sat with her forehead resting in her hands at the defense table while her daughter gave a tearful testimony for prosecutors Wednesday morning.

Mary Kathlyn Ogdoc, nicknamed “Kat," testified for the prosecution on the third day of her mother's murder trial, describing the day last November she watched dela Rosa throw her 2-year-old daughter Angelyn off of a 44-foot pedestrian bridge at Tysons Corner Center.

Dela Rosa has pleaded

Throughout her testimony, Kat Ogdoc never referred to Carmela dela Rosa as her mother, instead referring to her as her “birth mother,” “Carmela,” or "the defendant."

Her testimony became emotional when she started describing the events leading up to her daughter’s death

“[Dela Rosa] picked up Angelyn and then I turned around again … and I saw her on the railing, and I didn’t see Angelyn," Ogdoc said. "Her hands were over the railing."

After Kat, her brother David and her father Leandro ran down six flights of stairs to where the infant had fallen, several bystanders had started congregating around the child, blocking Kat from seeing her.

“They told me not to get close to her. They wouldn’t let me look at her," Ogdoc said. “When I got down, I don’t know when, I looked up and I saw the defendant just leaning over the rail. … She didn’t have any expression on her face.”

Kat rode in the front of the ambulance as it carried her daughter to Inova Fairfax that night.

“I could hear her crying but not saying anything," Ogdoc said.

On Tuesday, prosecutors played a police interrogation video of the 51-year-old grandmother who made dela Rosa want to hurt her. She also said she had not taken several medications prescribed to her to treat depression in about a week. Later today, the defense will begin its attempt to prove dela Rosa was unable to distinguish right from wrong at the time of the crime.

Fairfax County Circuit Court Judge Bruce White called a recess at 11:40 a.m, before public defender Dawn Butorac is expected to begin her cross-examination of Kat Ogdoc.

The defense is expected to call its first witnesses this afternoon.

Check with Patch throughout the day for more updates to this story.

For background on the case:

Day 1:

Day 2:


Get more local news delivered straight to your inbox. Sign up for free Patch newsletters and alerts.

We’ve removed the ability to reply as we work to make improvements. Learn more here

To request removal of your name from an arrest report, submit these required items to arrestreports@patch.com.