Andrea Sneiderman may once again converse with the man prosecutors claim is her lover, the judge presiding over the Dunwoody widow’s upcoming murder trial ruled late Tuesday.
DeKalb County Superior Court Judge Gregory A. Adams had hinted as much last month during a hearing in which attorneys representing Sneiderman — accused in the November 2010 death of her husband, Rusty — argued that she was entitled to some type of companionship in advance of her trial, scheduled to begin July 29.
She hadn’t been allowed any interaction with Joseph Dell since last November, when prosecutors added him to the state’s witness list. The mother of two — now living with her parents under house arrest — faces one count each of malice murder, felony murder and aggravated assault, along with seven counts of perjury and four counts of giving false statements. She also was indicted on one count each of concealing material facts and hindering the apprehension of a criminal: Hemy Neuman, her former boss at GE Energy.
Sneiderman has denied any involvement in her husband’s death and insists she did not have an affair with her former supervisor, as prosecutors allege.
Neuman was found guilty but mentally ill last year and sentenced to life in prison for Rusty Sneiderman’s death.
Last fall, former DeKalb County Deputy District Attorney Don Geary said the state suspected Andrea Sneiderman had her husband shot to death so she could be with Dell, yet prosecutors had not interviewed him as of late February.
“I am satisfied there is nothing that Joseph Dell could possibly testify to … that would have anything to do with any issue in this indictment,” defense attorney Tom Clegg told the court last month.
DeKalb District Attorney Robert James, noting 58 phone conversations between the two during Sneiderman’s three-week incarceration last August, argued it wasn’t up to the defense to decide Dell’s relevance.
According to Clegg, Dell provided “invaluable assistance” to his client prior to their court-imposed separation.
Sneiderman will be arraigned March 15 on the reworked, 16-count indictment.
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