Reclusive death penalty lawyer opens up about work

LOS ANGELES (AP) — Judy Clarke is in the business of cheating death, but she rarely talks about it.

Clarke, one of the nation's top lawyers and defender of the despised, broke her silence Friday in a speech at a legal conference, where she spoke about her work saving notorious criminal defendants from execution.

The names of her past clients — Susan Smith, Unabomber Theodore Kaczynski and most recently, Tucson shooter Jared Loughner — run like a list of the most reviled in American criminal history. But she did not say whether she would add to that list the latest name in the news: The suspect in the Boston Marathon bombing.

Clarke was reticent throughout her keynote speech and declined to take questions from the audience. Instead, she talked about how she had been "sucked into the black hole, the vortex" of death penalty cases 18 years ago when she represented Smith, who drowned her two children.

"I got a dose of understanding human behavior and I learned what the death penalty does to us," she said. "I don't think it's a secret that I oppose the death penalty. "

She saved Smith's life and later would do the same for Kaczynski, Loughner and the Atlanta Olympics bomber Eric Rudolph. All received life sentences instead of death.

Before an audience of lawyers, judges and law students at Loyola Law School's annual Fidler Institute, Clarke shared her approach in handling death penalty cases.

"The first clear way death cases are different is the clients," said Clarke, now a visiting professor at Washington and Lee University School of Law in Virginia. "Most have suffered from serious severe trauma, unbelievable trauma. We know that from brain research. Many suffer from severe cognitive development issues that affect the core of their being."

She added that they had another thing in common: When she first meets them, they do not want to plead guilty. Her job is to change their resolve, she said.

"They're looking into the lens of life in prison in a box," she said. "Our job is to provide them with a reason to live."

Connecting with the client by finding out "what brought them to this day that will define the rest of their lives" is the first step, she said. In most cases, she said she finds underlying mental illness. Kaczynski was ultimately diagnosed as schizophrenic and, on the eve of seating a jury, he agreed to plead guilty.

Clarke said a veteran lawyer once told her: "The first step to losing a capital case is picking a jury.

The San Diego-based attorney often appears in court as a federal public defender, and appealed to judges in the audience to provide sufficient funding for death penalty cases. She also told defense lawyers and students that death penalty clients deserve their loyalty.

"Our clients are different," she said. "We should enjoy the opportunity to step into their lives. It can be chaotic. But it's a privilege to be there as a lawyer."

View the original article here

Lawyer: Trauma drove woman who cut off man's penis

SANTA ANA, California (AP) — The defense attorney for a woman charged with severing the penis of her estranged husband said she "had a break from reality" the night of the attack.

"She's a shattered woman who tried to do the best she could," Frank Bittar, public defender for Catherine Kieu, said during closing arguments Thursday. But Bittar said Kieu's mental health woes increased and she broke, according to City News Service.

The jury received the case and is scheduled to begin deliberating Monday on charges of torture and aggravated mayhem for the July 11, 2011, incident when Kieu, 50, was accused of drugging her husband, cutting off his penis, and throwing in the garbage disposal.

Bittar said no one could condone what the victim went through. But he said Kieu had a childhood full of molestation and other trauma in war-torn Vietnam. He said that was compounded by her husband who constantly demanded sex in ways that put her in pain

The man is going only by his first name in court and is not being named by The Associated Press because of the nature of the attack.

In its closing arguments, the prosecution said Kieu was blinded by jealous anger after her husband asked for a divorce and began seeing an ex-girlfriend.

"They say anger is the wind that blows out the candle of the mind," Orange County Deputy District Attorney John Christl said.

The 60-year-old victim, who was not able to have the penis reattached, graphically described the attack during the trial and testified he felt as though he had been murdered.

Kieu could get life in prison without the possibility of parole if convicted.

View the original article here

Plea deal talks under way for U.S. soldier accused in Iraq killings: lawyer

By Eric M. Johnson

SEATTLE (Reuters) - A U.S. soldier charged with killing five fellow servicemen in 2009 at a military counseling center in Iraq is seeking a plea deal with Army prosecutors that would spare him from facing the death penalty, his lawyer told Reuters on Tuesday.

Army Sergeant John Russell, under confinement at Joint Base Lewis-McChord near Tacoma, Washington, is accused of going on a shooting frenzy at Camp Liberty, adjacent to the Baghdad airport, in an attack his lawyers have insisted stemmed from combat stress.

Jury selection for his court-martial had been set to begin this week.

But those proceedings were paused while negotiations continued between the two sides on a possible deal in which Russell would plead guilty to murder in return for prosecutors agreeing not to seek the death penalty, his civilian attorney, James Culp said.

"The pretrial agreement that we are working through would have John plead guilty to murder-two, intentional murder, where John takes responsibility for the intentional killing of five people," he told Reuters.

Army prosecutors declined to discuss the status of the case.

The prosecution, which has accused Russell of acting with premeditation, is likely to seek a sentence of life without the possibility of parole, Culp said. He declined to say what punishment he would recommend.

Assuming the talks lead to an agreement, the presiding judge in the case, Army Colonel David Conn, will question Russell next Monday in a proceeding known as a "providence inquiry" to determine whether the circumstances of the shooting support a guilty plea and that Russell believes he is guilty.

DEGREE OF GUILT

Even if the judge accepts the plea bargain, under the military justice system Russell would still face a court-martial - with opening and closing statements, testimony from witnesses and the presentation of evidence - to decide the degree of his guilt.

The choice then would be between a verdict of premeditated murder, or the lesser offense of intentional murder, and his prison term would hinge on that finding.

If no plea bargain is reached, or if the judge rejects such a deal, then Russell would face a lengthier, full-fledged trial in which the determination of his guilt or innocence would be at stake, as well as the question of a death penalty if he were convicted of premeditated murder.

His lawyers would also be free to pursue an acquittal through an insanity defense in that instance.

The state of Russell's mind has been the focus of legal proceedings over the past year and would remain a key factor in deciding whether he acted with malice of forethought or acted on impulse.

Defense attorneys have said Russell, who was attached to the 54th Engineer Battalion based in Bamberg, Germany, suffered a host of mental ailments after several combat tours and was suicidal prior to the attack.

An independent forensic psychiatrist, Dr. Robert Sadoff, has concluded that Russell suffered from post-traumatic stress disorder and psychosis at the time of the shootings. And Sadoff suggested Russell was provoked to violence by maltreatment at the hands of mental health personnel he sought for treatment at Camp Liberty.

"At the very last moment, the extreme despair became rage, and he killed people," Culp said. "He didn't have the mental wherewithal to be planning pre-meditated murder."

Conn will also decide after next Monday's providence inquiry whether Russell will be tried before a judge alone or a jury.

Jury selection, if a panel is to be needed, would begin on April 23, with the two sides slated to begin presenting their case at trial on May 6.

(Reporting by Eric M. Johnson; Editing by Cynthia Johnston, Steve Gorman and Lisa Shumaker)

View the original article here

Lawyer to celebs guilty in racketeering case

NEWARK, N.J. (AP) — A once-prominent New Jersey defense attorney whose clients included entertainers and rap stars was convicted Monday of operating a racketeering enterprise that included the murder of a witness and engaged in prostitution, drugs, and witness tampering.

A federal jury deliberated for a full day and parts of two others before coming back with guilty verdicts on all 23 counts against Paul Bergrin, a pugnacious former federal prosecutor who once represented an Army reservist charged in the Abu Ghraib prison scandal in Iraq in addition to celebrities Queen Latifah and Lil' Kim, and the group Naughty By Nature.

One of the counts is a murder count that carries a mandatory life sentence.

Bergrin, who represented himself during the trial, didn't say anything after the verdict was read. Lawrence Lustberg, an attorney who has been advising Bergrin through this trial and a previous one that ended in a hung jury, said afterward that his client would file an appeal. Lustberg called the verdict surprising.

"We thought the jury would take much longer given the number and complexity of the charges," he said. "We're concerned that all the nuances of the evidence weren't considered."

U.S. Attorney Paul Fishman, who worked briefly alongside Bergrin when both were assistant U.S. attorneys in New Jersey, said the verdict reflected a "stunning fall from grace."

"I take no joy from this verdict," Fishman said. "But his conduct over many years was a betrayal of his law enforcement colleagues and of the court."

One of the alleged murder plots was hatched in 2004, when Bergrin was representing a client in a drug case, prosecutors said. A potential witness, Kemo Deshawn McCray, was gunned down on a Newark street. Bergrin was alleged to have told his client's confederates, "No Kemo, no case."

Another plot allegedly involved a drug case in Monmouth County in 2008. In that one, Bergrin was recorded allegedly telling an informant posing as a hit man to "make it look like a robbery."

Bergrin has been in jail since his arrest in 2009 along with several other defendants, including another attorney. All have pleaded guilty, and several testified against him over the course of two trials.

A key turning point in the nearly 4-year-old prosecution came last June when the 3rd U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in Philadelphia took the rare step of removing the judge from Bergrin's first trial from the case, citing questions raised by prosecutors over his impartiality.

U.S. District Judge William J. Martini initially threw out the racketeering counts, but they were reinstated on appeal. He also severed two murder counts from the original indictment, and excluded some evidence from the first trial. That trial ended in a hung jury in the fall of 2011.

For the recent trial, U.S. District Judge Dennis Cavanaugh allowed the government to try Bergrin on all counts he faced, except several tax fraud charges that will be considered separately.

"This time the jury got to evaluate the full measure of all the conduct with which Bergrin was charged," Fishman said.

View the original article here

Lawyer to celebs guilty in NJ racketeering case

NEWARK, N.J. (AP) — A once-prominent New Jersey defense attorney whose clients included entertainers and rap stars was convicted Monday of operating a racketeering enterprise that included the murder of a witness and engaged in prostitution, drugs, and witness tampering.

A federal jury deliberated for a full day and parts of two others before coming back with guilty verdicts on all 23 counts against Paul Bergrin, a pugnacious former federal prosecutor who once represented an Army reservist charged in the Abu Ghraib prison scandal in Iraq, celebrities Queen Latifah and Lil' Kim, and the group Naughty By Nature.

Three of the counts, including two related to the murder of a federal witness in 2004, carry a mandatory life sentence.

Bergrin, who represented himself during the trial, didn't say anything after the verdict was read. Lawrence Lustberg, an attorney who has been advising Bergrin through this trial and a previous one that ended in a hung jury, said afterward that his client would file an appeal. Lustberg called the verdict surprising.

"We thought the jury would take much longer given the number and complexity of the charges," he said. "We're concerned that all the nuances of the evidence weren't considered."

U.S. Attorney Paul Fishman, who worked briefly alongside Bergrin when both were assistant U.S. attorneys in New Jersey, said the verdict reflected a "stunning fall from grace."

"I take no joy from this verdict," Fishman said. "But his conduct over many years was a betrayal of his law enforcement colleagues and of the court."

One of the alleged murder plots was hatched in 2004, when Bergrin was representing a client in a drug case, prosecutors said. A potential witness, Kemo Deshawn McCray, was gunned down on a Newark street. Bergrin was alleged to have told his client's confederates, "No Kemo, no case."

Another plot allegedly involved a drug case in Monmouth County in 2008. In that one, Bergrin was recorded allegedly telling an informant posing as a hit man to "make it look like a robbery."

Bergrin has been in jail since his arrest in 2009 along with several other defendants, including another attorney. All have pleaded guilty, and several testified against him over the course of two trials.

A key turning point in the nearly 4-year-old prosecution came last June when the 3rd U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in Philadelphia took the rare step of removing the judge from Bergrin's first trial from the case, citing questions raised by prosecutors over his impartiality.

U.S. District Judge William J. Martini initially threw out the racketeering counts, but they were reinstated on appeal. He also severed two murder counts from the original indictment, and excluded some evidence from the first trial. That trial ended in a hung jury in the fall of 2011.

For the recent trial, U.S. District Judge Dennis Cavanaugh allowed the government to try Bergrin on all counts he faced, except several tax fraud charges that will be considered separately.

"This time the jury got to evaluate the full measure of all the conduct with which Bergrin was charged," Fishman said.

View the original article here

Impostor's lawyer points to missing wife as killer

LOS ANGELES (AP) — A defense attorney told a Los Angeles jury Monday that the missing wife of a man slain a quarter century ago could be the real killer, rather than the Rockefeller impostor now on trial.

Attorney Brad Bailey, disclosing his defense for the first time, made his assertion after a prosecutor said he will prove a cold-case murder allegation against Christian Gerhartsreiter, a German immigrant who spent years moving through U.S. society under a series of aliases, most notoriously posing as a member of the fabled Rockefeller family.

The prosecution's opening statement offered no suggestion of a motive for the 1985 killing. It focused instead on the many identities and fabulous assertions of a man who posed for decades as Clark Rockefeller.

Bailey responded that every piece of circumstantial evidence outlined by Deputy District Attorney Habib Balian could point to Linda Sohus as the killer of her husband, John.

She vanished at the same time that he did in 1985 but no trace of her has been found. John Sohus' bones were dug up from the backyard of a home where Gerhartsreiter lived as a tenant on Sohus' mother's property.

Bailey said there are no witnesses to the killing or burial of Sohus and prosecutors have little more evidence than the bizarre behavior and multiple identities of Gerhartsreiter to paint him as a murderer.

"It's just as reasonable to conclude that John Sohus was killed by someone else...his still missing wife," said Bailey.

If jurors accept that theory, he said, that provides reasonable doubt of Gerhartsreiter's guilt.

He acknowledged that the defendant was "a strange guy," but he said Linda Sohus also acted strangely and may have had a motive to kill her husband.

The prosecution's outline, however, offered a web of circumstantial evidence.

Balian told of how Gerhartsreiter came to the United States, began inventing new identities and charmed his way into the lives of people from coast to coast.

At issue is what happened to the Sohus couple who befriended him in 1985 and vanished shortly afterward. The young husband's bones were eventually unearthed from his backyard decades later, but his wife has never been found.

Gerhartsreiter,52, has pleaded not guilty to the killing of John Sohus, a 27-year-old computer programmer.

Anticipating the defense theory, Balian told jurors: "Ladies and gentlemen, the evidence will show that John and Linda Sohus are dead."

The most mysterious evidence is a series of postcards from Linda Sohus sent to friends and family from Paris after she disappeared. The handwriting was analyzed as hers, but the stamps — which were subject to DNA analysis — were licked by a man who wasn't Gerhartsreiter, the prosecutor said.

Balian said that police earlier this year found a storage locker rented by Gerhartsreiter in Baltimore. Inside, they found postcards from international cities.

A possible explanation, said Balian, is that "the defendant has someone in Europe who mails postcards for him."

The prosecution's case is based on a bag of bones found buried at the property and the fuzzy memories of residents of San Marino, a wealthy Los Angeles suburb. The residents knew the defendant as Chris Chichester.

Testimony was to begin Tuesday.

A gaunt, bespectacled Gerhartsreiter listened quietly on Monday as Balian connected the dots of the defendant's later life.

Balian depicted him as a fabulist, a liar who made up extravagant stories about being a famous film director, the heir to a South African fortune and a descendant of British royalty. The defendant passed around business cards announcing himself as the 13th Baronet of England and once used the name Mountbatten, he said.

When police began asking questions about him, linking him to a truck owned by the Sohuses, he abandoned his $100,000 a year job as a Wall Street bond trader and went into hiding.

He was close to the end of a prison term for the kidnapping of his young daughter in a Boston custody dispute when the murder charge interrupted his chance to regain his freedom.

View the original article here

Florida teenager's shooter wears disguise: lawyer

(Reuters) - George Zimmerman, the man whose fatal shooting of unarmed Florida teenager Trayvon Martin a year ago captured the nation's attention, wears a disguise or body armor in public as he feels threatened, his lawyer said on Wednesday.

Zimmerman remains in hiding and "can't go out in public without wearing a disguise or body armor," defense attorney Mark O'Mara told CNN.

Zimmerman said he mistook Martin, who was 17, for a burglar and shot him in self defense after a confrontation on February 26, 2012.

After police initially questioned and released Zimmerman, citing Florida's so-called Stand Your Ground gun law, celebrity protests and nationwide public demonstrations prompted a re-investigation that led to his arrest for murder.

Martin's parents attended a one-year anniversary vigil in New York City late Tuesday, and continued their call for stricter gun laws nationwide.

Passed in 2005, Florida's Stand Your Ground law allows people to use lethal force in self-defense. Numerous states have since passed similar laws.

Critics of the law say it encourages vigilantes and fosters gun violence.

The uproar after Martin's killing led the local police chief to step aside and the governor to appoint a special prosecutor, who charged Zimmerman with second-degree murder.

The trial is scheduled for June.

O'Mara will ask a judge to dismiss the charges on the grounds of self-defense, at a much-anticipated pre-trial hearing on April 29.

O'Mara said Martin badly beat Zimmerman after a confrontation inside a gated community in Sanford, Florida.

"George didn't have an opportunity to retreat, so calling this a 'Stand Your Ground' hearing in not accurate," O'Mara told CNN Wednesday.

O'Mara said Zimmerman was "very stressed (and) very worried" about the trial and has remained in hiding for the past year.

Meanwhile, attorneys for the Federal Bureau of Investigation asked a Florida judge this week to re-consider her February 5 ruling ordering the agency to turn over all of its files on the case to defense attorneys, the Orlando Sentinel newspaper reported Wednesday.

O'Mara has claimed that he only received some of the FBI's case files, and that Zimmerman is entitled to review all the evidence against him, whether it was gathered by local, state or federal agencies.

FBI attorneys have countered that the agency is not obligated to adhere to the state court ruling.

(Reporting by Chris Francescani; Editing by Daniel Trotta, Bernadette Baum and Andrew Hay)

View the original article here