SKOWHEGAN – Frequently closing his eyes and hanging his head, which bobbed occasionally from side to side, Richard Reynolds of Waterville made his first appearance in Somerset County Superior Court on Tuesday, facing a new charge of murdering his estranged wife, Rhonda Wakefield-Reynolds, 37, of Fairfield.

Wakefield-Reynolds had planned to file for divorce on Friday, Jan. 12, the day she was shot, according to court records. She died the next morning at Eastern Maine Medical Center in Bangor. Reynolds initially was charged with aggravated attempted murder after turning himself in to authorities on the day of the shooting. After the woman’s death the charge was upgraded in paperwork filed before Tuesday’s proceeding.

Court documents indicated that Reynolds planned the shooting. The night before the shooting he obtained the gun he used from his son, who is believed to be the offspring from another relationship. Reynolds also left a note for the couple’s young children taking responsibility for the shooting and saying he was protecting them.

“I don’t need an attorney,” Reynolds told Justice Joseph Jabar at Somerset County Superior Court, indicating he was likely to plead guilty to shooting Wakefield-Reynolds last Friday.

A bail hearing was set for 9 a.m. Thursday, Jan. 18. Reynolds is being held at Somerset County Jail.

Attorney John Alsop, who represented Reynolds on Tuesday, said the man “was extremely despondent.” Alsop also said Reynolds may have a different attorney by his next court appearance. “I was just standing in for today,” he said after the brief hearing.

In a navy blue jail jumpsuit, his feet and hands in chains, Reynolds appeared almost to be sleeping before the hearing. His eyes remained closed for lengthy periods of time and his head hung down.

Upon entering the courtroom, the victim’s grandfather, Kempton Wakefield Sr., stood and stared at Reynolds for a long time, prompting Maine State Police Detective Abbe Chabot to take Wakefield outside the courtroom for a while.

Wakefield was allowed back in for the hearing, but he and several other people were prevented from leaving until Reynolds had been removed by Somerset County Jail personnel.

After the hearing, all those in the courtroom declined to comment.

According to an affidavit Chabot filed with the court, Reynolds planned the attack on his wife after she moved into her brother’s home in Fairfield on Thursday, the day before the shooting. The couple had been separated since before Christmas, and Wakefield-Reynolds obtained a protection from abuse order against Reynolds on Thursday, the day before she was shot.

Reynolds arrived at the Waterville Police Department about 8:30 a.m. Friday, Jan. 12, minutes after reportedly shooting his wife, according to the affidavit.

He confessed to police that he had shot his wife and said he had obtained a handgun from his son the night before, stored it in his car and went to the Bunker Avenue home after the victim’s brother Kempton Wakefield Jr. and his wife, Debra, had left for work.

Earlier, Reynolds said he left work and penned a note to his children which indicated he was “doing this to protect them.”

Reynolds told police he found his wife in a bedroom sitting on a bed. He said he took the .40-caliber handgun he had hidden in his sweat shirt and shot her in the head.

According to witnesses and family members, Reynolds then carried his two sons, ages 4 and 6, to his car and took them to his fiancee’s home.

At some point, Reynolds called a co-worker, Swan Sinclair, and said he had shot his wife. Sinclair called police and Wakefield-Reynolds’ family members. Wakefield-Reynolds’ brother discovered her, fatally wounded.

In an interview with the Central Maine Morning Sentinel, Kempton Wakefield Jr. said Reynolds had assaulted his sister before Christmas and that she had stayed at a Family Violence Project location until she moved in with her grandmother in Fairfield Center. She and the children stayed there until going to the Wakefields’ home on Thursday.

Wakefield said Reynolds knew where Wakefield-Reynolds was going to be living because she gave the address out loud to the court during the protection from abuse hearing the day before she was shot.