PITTSFIELD, Mass. — In the months before his death, David Glasser had turned into a nervous wreck.

“He was getting really scattered and frantic the past couple of weeks. He couldn’t even sit down. He’d pace. You could see the fear written across his face,” said Rick Reynolds, Glasser’s longtime friend. “He was openly, admittedly terrified.”

Glasser was to be a witness against a Hells Angel with a violent reputation who allegedly already had threatened to kill him for cooperating with police.

According to court records, Adam Lee Hall, a member of the Berkshire County chapter of the Hells Angels motorcycle gang, already had beaten Glasser with a baseball bat — and that was just when Hall thought Glasser had stolen a carburetor from him.

After that 2009 incident, authorities persuaded Glasser to become a witness against Hall on drug, gun and assault charges. That prompted more threats from Hall, who later was accused by police of setting Glasser up to take the fall for a bogus armed robbery in an effort to keep him from testifying.

Glasser’s body was found Sept. 10 along with two of his friends, buried in a boulder-covered trench on private property in Becket, Mass. Edward S. Frampton and Robert T. Chadwell, both of Pittsfield, were killed because they happened to be in the wrong place at the wrong time, according to authorities.

The discovery of the bodies came just nine days before Glasser was to testify against Hall in Berkshire Superior Court in connection with the assault and framing incidents.

Police since have arrested Hall, 34, of Peru, Mass., and two alleged accomplices — including Caius D. Veiovis, 31, of Pittsfield.

Police allege Hall enlisted Veiovis — an ex-Augusta, Maine, man formerly known as Roy Gutfinski — to help abduct, murder and dispose of the three men’s bodies. Police say Veiovis is not a member of the Hells Angels.

The three have been charged with three counts of murder, witness intimidation and kidnapping. A fourth suspect — David Casey, 62, of Canaan, N.Y. — has since been charged with using his excavator to help Hall bury the three men’s bodies.

Casey has told police that Hall intimidated and “scared” him into helping with the burial.

Glasser’s homicide has sparked an outcry from the victims’ families, who say the district attorney’s office and police didn’t do enough to protect their witness.

“They never did anything to help David,” said Donna Randolph, whom Glasser called “Mom” and talked with at least once a week.

Glasser was estranged from his family at a young age, according to Randolph, and no one in the family could be located for comment. However, Randolph and others close to Glasser said he had complained to them he had gone to authorities and asked for witness protection as recently as a month before his death.

“He came to my house right after he’d been to the police one of those times,” said Randolph, 67, of Pittsfield.

Randolph said Glasser, 44, had been told by officers that nothing could be done and to let police know if anything happened.

The Berkshire County district attorney said he never denied a “reasonable request for protection of a witness” and insists his office did everything it could to protect Glasser.

The terror that filled Glasser’s life is well documented.

According to court records, during the 2009 baseball-bat incident, Hall beat Glasser because of a missing carburetor — leaving his face black, blue and swollen — and forced him to sign the title of his truck over to Hall.

Then, according to the records, Hall made Glasser drive himself to Berkshire Medical Center in Hall’s Hummer, with Hall in the passenger seat.

Before Glasser got out of the car, Hall told him that if he went to the police, he would be killed, according to a transcript of an interview police conducted with Glasser.

In a police interview after being treated for his injuries, Glasser asked whether the state police had a witness protection program, and he told the trooper he was afraid of Hall retaliating against him.

According to the report, Glasser was escorted out of the barracks and told to contact “the police if anything further happened.”

Two days later, Glasser came in for a followup interview and again told police he believed Hall would kill him, according to police records.

Hall was arrested that day and was released three months later on a $50,000 bond. Glasser, meanwhile, was living in the Linden Street apartment he shared with Frampton.

Glasser’s name doesn’t appear in court records again until Hall allegedly framed Glasser for armed robbery in New York state on Aug. 14, 2010.

According to police, Hall and his associates planted a gun and other evidence in Glasser’s truck in an effort to connect him to the supposed robbery.

Pittsfield lawyer Alexander Schmulsky was appointed to defend Glasser against the charges.

“He was concerned for his safety,” Schmulsky said. “He was scared.”

A few days later, Schmulsky got a call from the District Attorney’s Office saying the charges had been dropped.

Schmulsky said Glasser was in the hands of the DA’s office after that and that he never heard from his client again.

Meanwhile, Hall was re-arrested. He was released on bail in March this year, on a $250,000 bond.

Even though Hall had been released pending his trial, Capeless said Glasser had stopped feeling unsafe when he started working with police as a witness, adding that law enforcement had been in “regular” contact with him.

Friends say Glasser was manipulated into testifying against Hall.

“He didn’t want to testify,” Reynolds said. “He said he was being pressured.”

Randolph, meanwhile, said her last visit with Glasser is burned in her memory.

“I didn’t see him but for a couple of minutes the last time,” she said. “He hugged me and I hugged him, and he said, ‘I love you, Ma,’ and I told him I loved him. I miss him — every day.”

Ned Oliver is a staff writer for The Berkshire Eagle in Pittsfield, Mass. He can be reached at noliver@berkshireeagle.com or 413-496-6240.