The Freedom Bulletin

On Wednesday, Christian Karl Gerhartsreiter, AKA Clark Rockefeller, learned that he will face a murder trial for the death of his landlord’s son in California. A preliminary hearing took place over five days last week and the week before in Alhambra Superior Court, CA, during which prosecutors presented their case and successfully convinced a judge that there was enough evidence to send Rockefeller to trial.

The young German immigrant, whose legal name was Christian Gerhartsreiter but who at the time went by Christopher Chichester, lived in a guesthouse owned by an older lady named Didi Sohus in San Marino, CA. Her son, John Sohus, and his wife, Linda Sohus, went missing in 1985. His remains were discovered on the property in 1994, cut up wrapped in plastic bags, and stuffed in a box; hers have yet to be found. Meanwhile, Chichester moved from place to place, taking on new names, creating increasingly elaborate and prestigious background stories for himself, and getting by either on the generosity of others or by doing the best he could at various jobs, given that he possessed few of the qualifications he claimed to have. This life unraveled in 2008, when, known as Clark Rockefeller and living in Boston, he was arrested for kidnapping his 7-year-old daughter, Reigh, after a bitter custody dispute with his ex-wife, Sandra Boss. After being convicted of kidnapping and beginning his sentence in a Massachusetts jail, he was indicted in the old murder case and sent to California.

Confused yet? Here is a recap of what we learned during the preliminary hearing:

Wednesday, January 18: Jose Perez, who was digging a pool at the former Sohus property in 1994, testified that his father uncovered a bag of bones, which he initially thought was the remains of a dog. Judith Day of the coroner’s office described how the bones, still clothed, were all separately wrapped in plastic. And Medical examiner Dr. Frank Sheridan said that Sohus’s death was caused by fractures on the right and front sides of the head, made by three blows with a rounded object such as a baseball bat.

Thursday, January 19: San Marino patrolman Thomas LeVeque testified that Didi Sohus believed her son and daughter-in-law were in Paris on a top-secret mission and would not tell investigators anything more, saying that doing so could put them in danger. As time went on and Chichester mysteriously moved away, Didi became more worried and even began drinking, according to her friend, Marianne Kent. She received a postcard that was supposed to be from Linda in Paris, but Lili Hasdell, another former police officer, testified that the handwriting did not match. And Judge William Stewart, who was an attorney and friend of Chichester, testified that he lent him a chainsaw. However, defense lawyers raised the possibility of another suspect, a real estate agent who helped Didi Sohus to sell her house and also did grocery shopping for her, drove her around, and spent a lot of time with her.

Friday, January 20: According to forensic scientist Lynne Herold, four bloodstains were found on the floor of the guesthouse where Chichester lived. The blood showed “wiping patterns,” but it was impossible to determine, with the technology available at the time, whose it was. Additionally, a t-shirt found with John Sohus’s remains had cuts that appeared to have been made by a sharp object.

Monday, January 23: John’s friend, Patrick Rayermann, testified that during a conversation shortly before his disappearance, John spoke of tensions with his mother, and feeling torn between staying with her and moving out with Linda. He also described John as “faultlessly reliable and said that neither he or Linda spoke of any definite plans to go off on their own. Lydia Marano, the owner of the bookstore where Linda worked, said that their relationship “made the rest of us smile” and called her “the most trustworthy person I had working for me.” Harry Sherwood, Didi Sohus’s grandson, said that he found John and Linda’s belongings strewn about, not consistent with a couple who were making a planned, long-term move. An acquaintance, Robert Brown, said that Gerhartsreiter asked him where to dispose of drums of toxic chemicals, saying he used them for his job at USC film school. And other witnesses said that he tried to sell them an oriental rug with a bloodstain on it.

Tuesday, January 24: Mihoko Manabe, who was Rockefeller’s girlfriend for 7 years in New York, when he went by the name Christopher Crowe, testified that he became paranoid after a detective called in 1988, looking for him. He grew a beard, had her die his hair, insisted on not walking with her in public, and planned to leave the country with her, telling her to stop communicating with friends and family and to receive mail at P.O. boxes.  He began to use the name Clark Rockefeller after discovering how respectfully he was treated when he used it. After he lost his job as a bond salesman due to his fake identity being discovered, Manabe supported him and got him a credit card under his new name. She described him as someone with “a temper, but not in a physically violent way…He could be very mean.” On the same day, his next-door neighbor in San Marino, Mary Cologne, said that she saw black smoke coming from his chimney one day, which smelled “terrible.” He said he was burning carpet.

The Boston Globe also has an interesting account of Rockefeller’s interview with the FBI after he was arrested in the kidnapping case.

With Sohus’s death taking place so long ago, some witnesses seem to have fuzzy memories, and it is doubtful there will be a lot of forensic evidence in this case. It will be interesting to see whether the circumstantial evidence, which was determined to be enough to establish probable cause, will be enough to convince a jury of his guilt beyond a reasonable doubt.

The Middlesex County D.A.’s office filed their brief in the appeal of Neil Entwistle, the British man convicted of killing his wife and baby daughter in 2008. They tried to refute the claims that Entwistle made in his appellate brief, arguing that police acted reasonably by entering his Hopkinton, MA home without a warrant and that pretrial publicity did not bias the jury selection process.

The Boston Herald has the full text of the prosecution’s brief here.

You can read more from the Herald and the MetroWest Daily News.

Yesterday, final arguments took place on Thomas Mortimer’s suppression motion. Mortimer, the Winchester man accused of murdering his mother-in-law Ellen, wife Laura, and children Finn and Charlotte, is trying to get the court to throw out evidence that police seized from his home after entering without a warrant to perform a well-being check.

I couldn’t be in court for yesterday’s hearing because it was the first day of my new job, but according to news reports, Judge Leila Kern indicated that she will probably deny the motion. ”It’s very hard for the court to find that there was no ample evidence that either the entry was OK at the time or there was an inevitability of discovery,” she said, adding that Laura’s concerned sister would have eventually broken into the house and discovered the bodies anyway.

Mortimer’s attorney, Denise Regan, argued that the police and firefighters “had no bad intentions, but they did enter the home. For that reason, their misconduct is severe.” But prosecutor Adrienne Lynch said, ”It would contradict the response of an emergency if they were to do a full investigation before entering the home.”

The judge won’t make her decision official until January 13.

Sources: Winchester Patch and Winchester Star

I just realized I never blogged about the Amanda Knox case…probably because I never followed the trial too closely. Even though it’s been a little while since she won her appeal and returned home to America, I figured I would post my thoughts after reading up on the case.

Knox, an American exchange student, and her boyfriend, Raffaele Sollecito, were convicted of sexually assaulting and murdering Knox’s roommate, Meredith Kercher, in Perugia, Italy. A drifter and drug dealer, Rudy Guede, was also convicted of playing a part in her death; he says he was there but Knox and Sollecito did it.There appeared to be DNA evidence linking Knox and Sollecito to the crime, but it turned out to be contaminated and unreliable. Knox also looked suspicious when she tried to pin the murder on her employer, Patrick Lumumba, who ended up not being at the scene of the crime. And it didn’t help when she initially told police she was present in the apartment when Meredith was killed, but later said she wasn’t. But due to the unreliability of the evidence, an appellate judge and jury overturned the convictions of Knox and Sollecito and set them free.

Andrea Peyser at the New York Post compared Knox to Casey Anthony, saying that both young women were “too pretty to convict.” These two cases do have similarities, the main one in my opinion being that while both defendants lied to investigators and behaved suspiciously in some ways, there just isn’t quite enough evidence to be sure they are guilty. Peyser, who sure seems to be anti-Knox, even admits, ”the truth is murkier than a Florida swamp,” and writes, “it’s never been clear that Guede acted alone.”

Perhaps, but it’s never been clear that Guede didn’t act alone, either. If the truth could go either way, then the legal system needs to err on the side of giving the defendant the benefit of the doubt. Knox was convicted of defamation for her statements about Guede, for which she received credit for time served, just as Anthony was sentenced to time served for misleading investigators about what happened to her daughter, Caylee. They were both freed not for their looks but because there wasn’t sufficient evidence to prove their guilt beyond a reasonable doubt. I was happy to see Knox and Sollecito regain their freedom – especially after reading about how horribly Amanda was treated in jail – for the simple reason that no one should have their freedom taken away when there is a pretty good chance they are innocent.

The suppression hearing in the Thomas Mortimer IV case finished up today with testimony from four state troopers who executed search warrants in the quadruple murder case. To sum up, on Friday we learned that officers made three warrantless searches of the Winchester, MA home where Mortimer lived with his wife, Laura Stone Mortimer, mother-in-law, Ellen Stone, son Thomas “Finn” Mortimer V, and daughter Charlotte Mortimer. The first was to conduct a well-being check at the request of Laura’s sister, Debra Stone Sochat, the second was to remove Ellen’s dog from the home, and the third was a more thorough sweep of the home to make sure there were no injured people or a suspect. Mortimer’s defense lawyer, Denise Regan, filed a motion to suppress all evidence gathered as a result of these searches because they took place before any search warrants were issued. She also filed a motion to suppress evidence that was gathered after search warrants arrived but was outside the scope of the warrants, and it was that motion that was the focus of today’s testimony.

Witness by witness, here’s what the court heard today:

Trooper David Twomey of the state police searched Mortimer’s home in the late afternoon of June 16, 2010, pursuant to a warrant. He found five “separately designated,” typed copies of a letter that Mortimer allegedly wrote, confessing to killing his wife, children, and mother-in-law. One was in the trash in the kitchen, along with bloodstained napkins, Quaker granola bar boxes, batteries, and a bluish pill. Another letter was on the coffee table in the family room, where Laura’s and Finn’s bodies were found, along with more pills, two glasses, and a can of Red Bull. Another letter was on the kitchen counter, and yet another was on the kitchen table. Additionally, in the basement, near the door leading from the house to the garage, were plastic bags with “what appeared to be vomit and clothing,” which Twomey indicated were large enough to fit over an adult’s head. A red Lexus in the garage had a garden hose hooked up from the exhaust pipe to the window, as well as a hammer and a knife in the passenger seat, and in the laundry room was more prescription medication. During cross-examination, Twomey was asked if he read the letter on the coffee table, and he admitted, “I did peruse through it, but my primary function was to document the scene.” He also said that the letters in the trash weren’t ripped up and weren’t visible until he went through the trash.

Trooper Jeffrey Saunders, also of the state police, kept a record of all items seized during the search of the home. He found typewritten letters in a wastebasket in the basement, near a computer and printer, which he read and which “appeared similar” to the others found in the house.

Sgt. Robert Manning was in charge of the search of the house and was the one who actually brought the search warrant applications to a superior court judge. (He was familiar to me because he questioned Neil Entwistle and testified in his trial.) After getting a search warrant for the home at 4:40 p.m. on June 16, he obtained a warrant for Mortimer’s arrest in the early morning hours of June 17. Cell tower records indicated at one point that Mortimer was near Andover, MA, and his cell phone was found in the trash at a gas station in that area. A bulletin was sent out to the public to be on alert for him, and Manning was informed of Mortimer’s arrest after police received a tip from the small town of Bernardston, MA. That evening he obtained and executed additional warrants for the three computers in the Winchester home and for documents and financial records. In the home he noticed three pieces of evidence consistent with a suicide attempt: the hose attached to the car exhaust pipe, the bag with clothing with vomit on it, and the prescription drugs on the coffee table, which he described as a sleep aid in Ellen’s name. There were also receipts, a bank statement, and an unemployment assistance form.

Trooper Scott McCormack described the search of the home. In the laundry room, “there was a considerable amount of blood on the floor, as well as two handbags that were strewn about.” He also mentioned the pieces of evidence that were consistent with a suicide attempt, adding that the clothing in the plastic bag was men’s clothing. Additionally, he searched the car that Mortimer was driving when he was arrested, a Toyota Highlander. His wallet was in the front driver’s side, containing less than $100 cash, two TD Bank cards in Tom’s and Laura’s names, Tom’s Brookline Bank debit card, Laura’s American Express, and two Simon gift cards, one of which had a phone number on it that was found in the phone records of Ellen’s landline. Right before this call, at 7:22 a.m. on June 15, the same phone had called both Tom’s employer and Finn’s day care, and interviews with those two places indicated that Tom had called himself and his son in sick. McCormack said of this evidence, “I believe that they showed that…Thomas Mortimer needed some sort of financial means to maintain his existence on the run, on the flight.” A lottery ticket in the car, with a date of June 12, was, according to him, “a chance at financial means to be gained after the homicide.” Batteries, a water bottle, and a flashlight were in the console, and a PowerAde, a roll of toilet paper, strewn-about clothing, and a gallon of water were in the back seat. A backpack in the wayback contained wipes, water bottles, plastic silverware, and Quaker granola bars, and a duffel bag contained gauze pads, ointment, a sewing kit, and more clothes. According to a receipt in the car, Mortimer used his wife’s American Express card to purchase Peppermint Patties at Hess Express in Winchester at 7:44 a.m. on June 15.  All these items, McCormack said, “showed…Mr. Mortimer’s actions after the murders. Obviously flight was his intention, which would again go to consciousness of guilt.”

It looks like Mortimer may have tried to kill himself in four different ways…but (obviously) none of them worked.

After a very brief recess for a court procedure in another case, prosecutor Adrienne Lynch said that she would have called another witness, Trooper Jay McCartney, but because he was unavailable, both sides stipulated to what he would have testified: that he executed a search warrant in the house and car, could describe the contents of the trash and car, saw bloodstains, and photographed all this evidence.

On Friday, there were mentions of two defense witnesses who would be called today, but they never ended up taking the stand. After the defense files a supplemental memorandum, the next court date, for oral arguments on the suppression motions, will be October 24 at 9:00 a.m.

More from the Winchester Patch and Winchester Star.