Photo: Keith Srakocic/AP/Shutterstock
The estranged wife of leading Senate candidate Sean Parnell spoke under oath in Pennsylvania court on Monday about what she described as his harrowing history of violence toward her and their three young kids — which he adamantly denies.
“He tried to choke me out on a couch and I literally had to bite him” to get free, Snell reportedly told the judge. “He was strangling me.”
“The truth is I love my family and I love my children more than anything,” he said. (His attorney and campaign did not immediately respond to a request for comment; a court official said the transcript from Snell’s testimony — which anInquirerreporter and others attended — wasn’t yet available.)
Parnell, a decorated Army veteran who served in Afghanistan, announced hiscandidacy for the Senatein May. He’s seeking the seat of fellow Republican Sen. Pat Toomey, who won’t run for re-election next year.
He and Snell began dating in 2008, according to her testimony on Monday. She also claimed in court that Parnell’s disturbing behavior began in the first few months of their relationship, when he threw a chair across the kitchen in reaction to her mentioning an ex-boyfriend,thePittsburgh Tribune-Reviewreports.
“When he started hitting the kids in 2018, that was the final straw,” Snell reportedly testified. That was when the couple separated.
Snell has filed a petition for sole custody of the children, who are 12, 11 and 8.
She also said she considered calling the police, but her husband warned her not to because the family depended on his image to earn income as a public speaker, author and commentator. “We were all walking on eggshells,” said Snell, who also claimed her husband was diagnosed with PTSD after his service in Afghanistan, where he was involved in combat.
Snell’s brother likewise testified about Parnell’s explosive episodes and witnessing him have a “PTSD episode,” according to theTribune-Review.
Courtesy of the Committee on Arrangements for the 2020 Republican National Committee via Getty
According to his campaign bio, Parnell “spent 485 days of fierce fighting along the Afghan-Pakistan border in 2006-2007, where he honed his unique leadership skills” and earned a Purple Heart and a Bronze Star for valor during the deployment.
Snell told the judge that Parnell would sometimes hold her down and scream at her in what she called “Sean-a-logues,” theInquirerreports.
His anger was also directed at their children, she told the court. “As I would parent, he would tell them not to listen to me,” she said, according to theTribune-Review’s report. “He would just rage at them. He would scream and scream, and you couldn’t stop him.”
Parnell was reportedly in court for his wife’s testimony but has not taken the stand yet himself in the custody case, and Snell was not cross-examined in Monday’s hearing.
“Let me emphatically state: I have never raised a hand in anger towards my wife or any of our three children,” Parnell said in his statement Monday, according to the local news reports. “What happened today in court was not justice, nor did it have any basis in fact or truth.”
source: people.com
