Widow won’t speak at killer’s sentencing

OSSIPEE, N.H. – As Michael Woodbury prepares to plead guilty to fatally shooting three men outside a store in Conway, the widow of one of the victims says she’s trying to wrest Woodbury out of her mind.

“He’s nobody. He’s just another one of the thousands of horrible people we see on the news every day doing terrible things,” said Tessa Walker in an e-mail statement to The Conway Daily Sun.

James Walker, 34, of Denmark, Maine, was the manager of the Army Barracks store, one of the three men gunned down in an apparent robbery attempt on July 2.

Tessa Walker has been forced to deal with the loss with their two children, Alex, 8, and Rudy, 17 months.

“It breaks what’s left of my heart every time Rudy points to the sky and says ‘Daddy, Sky’, because he’s too little to understand heaven,” Walker said.

Woodbury admitted to reporters to killing James Walker and two other men, William Jones, 25, of Walpole, Mass., and Gary Jones, 23, of Halifax, Mass., best friends returning from a camping trip in Maine.

Woodbury has agreed to plead guilty in return for his choice of state prisons, said Kenny Jones, father of William Jones. Woodbury was moved to the state prison in Concord.

A hearing has been scheduled for Friday in Concord, at which time Woodbury is expected to receive three life sentences.

Even though family members will have an opportunity to speak Friday, Tessa Walker said she will stay home to avoid seeing Woodbury’s face.

“I just don’t want his face burned into my memory,” she said. “The only face I want to remember is my husband’s.”

Woodbury, of Windham, Maine, has complained publicly about his treatment by authorities while mocking people, police and the media.

“Jim was my best friend and the love of my life,” Tessa Walker said. “I loved him more than I could ever express. I’m 32 years old, and I know I will never have that again. I will never feel that again. I have no intention of trying to explain what I’ve lost in a courtroom full of people I don’t know, and certainly not in front of the man that took it from me.”