Ex-boyfriend grilled in murder trial

WILMINGTON - Defense attorneys for a former Wharton student accused of fatally bludgeoning a romantic rival almost three years ago took aim at a key prosecution witness yesterday: the defendant's ex-boyfriend.

Robert Bondar - the man who prosecutors say drove Irina Malinovskaya, 25, to murder Irina Zlotnikov, a 24-year-old Temple University pharmacology major from Northeast Philadelphia - spent most of the day testifying as a hostile witness for the defense, denying suggestions that he was dishonest, heartless, conniving, and self-absorbed.

Prosecutors in New Castle County Superior Court are trying Malinovskaya for the third time after two hung juries.

Police said that, in December 2004, Malinovskaya drove to the North Wilmington apartment of her ex-boyfriend Bondar, 35, a Widener University law school graduate.

They said the former Moscow resident, who had a scholarship to attend the University of Pennsylvania, was obsessed with Bondar, who had dated both women. Prosecutors, led by Paul Wallace, have maintained that Malinovskaya was incriminated by considerable circumstantial evidence after police found Zlotnikov's battered body in Bondar's apartment.

They contended that Malinovskaya stalked Bondar after he ended their relationship, and later spied on him and Zlotnikov, his new girlfriend, the weekend of the murder.

Bondar, then a 31-year-old student at Widener Law School, returned home from a part-time job at a law firm to find Zlotnikov's naked body on his kitchen floor. Malinovskaya has maintained her innocence.

Although Malinovskaya initially denied being in Delaware on Dec. 22 and 23, 2004, rental-car records and witnesses forced her to admit that she had followed the couple to a movie and staked out Bondar's North Wilmington apartment for hours the day of the murder.

Defense attorneys Joseph Hurley and Eugene J. Maurer have emphasized the lack of evidence and witnesses linking their client to the inside of the apartment.

During several hours of questioning yesterday, Hurley pointed to inconsistencies in Bondar's previous testimony. Twice, Hurley interrupted his questioning of Bondar to call other witnesses: police officers whose written reports differed from Bondar's recollections.

Hinting that Bondar was overeager to help convict Malinovskaya, Hurley quoted some of the Soviet native's earlier statements: "I want this girl to go down. . . . I'm going to help you make your case. . . . Ask me the right questions."

Bondar, who grew up in Northeast Philadelphia, said he regretted making those remarks.

He repeated his belief that he did not find Malinovskaya physically attractive, a sentiment that Hurley juxtaposed with Bondar's X-rated e-mail instruction to Malinovskaya: "Write to me openly as dirty as you can."

The defense attorney also took issue with Bondar's suggestion that he was "devastated" by Zlotnikov's death, showing him laughing with police officers during videotaped interviews. Testimony will resume tomorrow and is expected to continue into next week.