April 27, 2007 9:40

Phil Spector trial: Day 2

Ex-girlfriend says producer pulled a gun on her

The second day (April 26) of the Phil Spector trial saw one of the producers former girlfriends testify that he once threatened her with a revolver and shotgun after night of getting drunk of vodka.

The woman, Dorothy Melvin, was the first witness called at the producer’s trial for the murder of Lana Clarkson more than four years ago.

Prosecutors called her to the stand to bolster their claim Spector had a history of pulling guns on women.

Melvin told jurors that during a alcohol-fueled confrontation with Spector in 1993, he brandished both a revolver and a shotgun, struck her twice in the head and tried to make her strip at gunpoint.

She told the court: “I was sobbing and I said: ‘Why are you doing this Phillip?Why are you doing this?'. I was crying. I was terrified…He took his right hand that was holding the revolver and smacked me on the side of the head, and at that point I knew I was in trouble.”

However, during her cross-examination by Spector’s attorneys, Melvin conceded that she never pressed charges and maintained contact with him for a decade afterwards.

Meanwhile defence lawyers have said that scientific evidence will prove his innocence.

Bruce Cutler said that evidence would show the shot that killed Clarkson was a: "classic self-inflicted type of injury."

He added: "The gun was in her mouth, put there by her...There's no evidence that a gun forced in her mouth. There were no broken teeth in."

Co-counsel Linda Keeny-Baden said evidence showed Spector was too far away from the actress to have killed her.

She said: "He was too far away to be holding the gun and get GSR (gunshot residue) on his clothes...It's not supposition, it's not hypothesis, it's scientific fact."

The trial is set to continue on Monday (April 30) and is expected to last for up to three months, reports Reuters.