PERRY, Ga. — An emergency room nurse who cared for Maurice Glenn Turner the day before his death testified she thought it was unusual that his wife did not insist on better care for her sick husband when a doctor ordered him to be released.

"Family members will often press, saying, 'You haven't done anything for us,'" nurse Becky Russell said Tuesday during the murder trial of Turner's wife, Julia Lynn Turner. "Here's this guy who was sick for four or five days, there's not a real reason why he doesn't feel good, but nobody's pressing the issue."

Lynn Turner accompanied her police officer husband to the Kennestone Hospital emergency room in Marietta on March 2, 1995, at 2 p.m., after he complained of flu-like symptoms.

According to Russell, when Glenn checked into the ER, his heart rate was racing. "The normal rate is somewhere between 60 and 100 beats per minute," said Russell. "And his standing bpm was 146."

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Russell said that Turner received an IV bag of fluids for dehydration and medicine for his nausea and vomiting, but when his vital signs hadn't changed significantly, another IV bag was administered. He was released at 6:26 p.m. The next afternoon, Glenn was found dead in his bed at 31 years of age.

Lynn Turner, a former 911 operater, is accused of murdering her husband by feeding him antifreeze. She faces life in prison if convicted.

Turner is also a suspect in the 2001 antifreeze poisoning death of her lover, firefighter Randy Thompson, 32, with whom she was having an affair at the time of Glenn's death.

The cause of both men's deaths was initially deemed heart failure, but then later changed to homicide when medical examiners discovered that both had died from poisoning by ethylene glycol, a fatal substance in antifreeze. Because of the similarities, Superior Court Judge James Bodiford has ruled that jurors may hear evidence about Thompson's death even though Turner has not been charged with his murder.

Dr. Donald Freeman

Jurors also heard testimony from Dr. Donald Freeman, the emergency room physician who attended to Glenn. Freeman stated that on March 2, 1995, Glenn Turner did not present classic symptoms that would indicate "a single acute large ingestion" of ethylene glycol. He suggested that the police officer might have ingested smaller amounts of the poison over a period of days.

But during cross-examination by defense attorney Jim Berry, the doctor admitted he was speculating and did not know for certain how the poison was ingested or in what amounts.

Illicit affair

Turner's behavior during her relationship with firefighter Randy Thompson, whom she met in late 1994, was the main focus of testimony Tuesday morning, as prosecutors continued to develop a picture of a woman whose alleged scheme was to "entrap men by spending lavishly on them and taking them on cruises" and then "killing them," according to prosecutor Jack Mallard.

Members of Thompson's family said that Turner seduced the firefighter by wearing sexy lingerie and showering him and his relatives with expensive gifts.

In the latter part of 1994, Randy Thompson was living with his parents, Nita and Perry. Both testified that Turner, whom they believed to be divorced, first spent the night at their home on Dec. 17, 2001, after helping them celebrate a third birthday party for Thompson's son, Nicholas, from a previous marriage.

It was the first of many weekends she would be allowed to sleep over, but with one caveat: "Some people may call us old fogeys, I don't know, but she was not allowed to sleep with our son," Nita said. Turner was relegated to sharing a queen-size bed with Nita's daughter, Kimberly.

"After my parents would go to bed she would go in my brother's room," the sister, Kimberly Savage, later testified. "She was going in there to try and seduce him."

Her seduction remark got a rise from the unfailingly polite defense attorney, Victor Reynolds, who declared, "Goodness gracious, I object your honor. That is character assassination, it's not relevant and I object."

The judge agreed to strike the comment but allowed the questioning to continue, and jurors heard from Savage that Turner acted upset and angry when Thompson did not allow her to sleep in his room. She also said Turner liked to shop at Victoria's Secret and purchased Christmas gifts from the lingerie store for Kimberly and her sister.

Thompson died alone at home on Jan. 22, 2001, less than 24 hours after visiting the ER with flu-like symptoms, just as Glenn had done six years before.

In addition to his daughter Amber, who is now 8, Thompson and Turner had a son, Blake, 5. Turner received social security benefits for both children upon Thompson's death. She also received $36,000 from his life insurance policy.

The trial, which is expected to last two to three weeks, is being broadcast by Court TV.