Illinois
Man freed after 1994 murderconviction tossed
WAUKEGAN, Ill. (AP) — A 58-year-old northern Illinois man who spent nearly half of his life behind bars after being found guilty of killing his ex-wife walked out of a prison Tuesday after a judge vacated his conviction.
Herman Williams of Gurnee was freed from the downstate Sheridan Correctional Center following nearly 29 years of incarceration after Lake County Judge Mark Levitt threw out his conviction for killing Penny Williams, whose body was found in a Waukegan pond on Sept. 26, 1993.
The Navy veteran’s exoneration came after work by his attorneys affiliated with the Illinois Innocence Project and then confirmed and acknowledged by the Lake County state’s attorney’s office.
Innocence Project attorneys Lauren Kaeseberg and Vanessa Potkin argued Williams’ 1994 conviction was based on scientifically unsupported testimony regarding his ex-wife’s time of death. They also said new, advanced DNA testing did not find Williams’ DNA on key biological evidence.
Williams was convicted of murder after a jury trial in 1994. But, citing “scientifically unsupported evidence’ presented during the trial, new DNA results, and failure to tender critical scientific material to the defense, Lake County prosecutors stated they no longer had any faith in the original verdict.
Prosecutors at the time argued Williams killed his ex-wife so he could take his children to California, where he was being restationed.
California
Elizabeth Holmes seeks new trial, cites key witness’ regrets
SAN FRANCISCO (AP) — Disgraced Theranos CEO Elizabeth Holmes requested a new trial Tuesday, asserting in a court filing that a key witness for the prosecution now regrets the role he played in her conviction for investor fraud and conspiracy related to her failed blood-testing startup.
The petition centers on the reliability of testimony provided by former Theranos lab director Adam Rosendorff, who said he repeatedly raised concerns about the accuracy of bloods tests that were being administered to patients during his tenure in 2013 and 2014.
Prosecutors highlighted Rosendorff’s testimony during their closing arguments to a jury that convicted Holmes on four felony counts of investor fraud and conspiracy earlier this year after a nearly four-month trial. The same jury acquitted Holmes on charges of fraud and conspiracy against patients who had their blood tested by Theranos.
Rosendorff, reached via LinkedIn, said he had no comment, adding “Do not contact me.”
Holmes, 38, is currently free on bail, but is facing up to 20 years in prison at a sentencing hearing scheduled for Oct. 17 in San Jose, California.
Her lawyers argued in a 17-page filing that Rosendorff is now expressing misgivings about his testimony, based on recent actions described in the court document.
The filing states that Rosendorff appeared at the home Holmes shares with her partner, William Evans, on the evening of August 8 in an attempt to meet with her. Evans intercepted Rosendorff, according to the document, and asked him to leave.
Before departing, according to the filing, Rosendorff told Evans that during his trial testimony “he tried to answer the questions honestly but that the prosecutors tried to make everyone look bad” and now feels like “he had done something wrong.” Before he appeared at Holmes’ residence, the document said, Rosendorff left a 30-second voicemail for one of her lawyers asking for a face-to-face meeting with Holmes because he thought it could be “quite healing” for both of them.
In their filing, Holmes lawyers said they had not been able to ask Rosendorff for further information about his reflections on his trial testimony for ethical reasons. The lawyers proposed an Oct. 3 hearing to discuss why they believe Rosendorff’s recent actions merit a new trial.
Also on Tuesday, U.S. District Judge Edward Davila formally rejected a request to set aside the jury’s verdicts in Holmes’ trial. Davila’s decision cited Rosendorff’s testimony in support of his ruling.
North Carolina
Appeals court says fisheries challenge can continue
RALEIGH, N.C. (AP) — Coastal recreational anglers can keep suing the state of North Carolina over accusations that government regulators have devastated near-shore fishing stocks in violation of the state constitution, the state Court of Appeals ruled Tuesday.
The Coastal Conservation Association of North Carolina and more than 80 individuals sued the state in 2020, alleging it had failed its fiduciary duty to protect the state’s fisheries from overfishing. Their complaint cited constitutional provisions giving people the right to hunt and fish and making it the state’s policy “to conserve and protect its lands and waters for the benefit of all its citizenry.”
The constitutional right to hunt, fish and harvest wildlife was approved by voters in November 2018. The “conserve and protect” language cited in the lawsuit was added to the constitution in 1972.
In particular, the anglers blamed the state Division of Marine Fisheries and state Marine Fisheries Commission for allowing excessive for-profit commercial fishing and certain fishing methods that they say have led to dramatic declines in certain fish stocks since 1997. The plaintiffs want a court to declare violations have occurred and to force the state to make changes.
Superior Court Judge Bryan Collins refused last year to dismiss the lawsuit. He rejected arguments by state Department of Justice attorneys that individual rights haven’t been violated in the challenged constitutional provisions, which in part only clarifies state policies and functions. The state attorneys also said the state hasn’t waived sovereign immunity, which exempts state government from lawsuits unless an agency consents to be sued.
The state appealed Collins’ ruling. Court of Appeals Judge Toby Hampson wrote Tuesday that state courts hadn’t previously ruled until now whether sovereign immunity bars someone from suing to enforce the state’s “public trust” obligations.
The public trust doctrine states that natural resources are held in the government’s trust to benefit current and future generations. But Hampton said a review of North Carolina law by the three-judge panel hearing the case determines that sovereign immunity doesn’t bar such claims.
“The doctrine of sovereign immunity will not stand as a barrier to North Carolina citizens who seek to remedy violations of their rights guaranteed under the North Carolina Constitution,” Hampson wrote in the unanimous opinion. And he said the plaintiffs’ alleged wrongs — the inability to protect public waters and to carry out the right to harvest fish — can’t be addressed through any other means.
The Coastal Conservation Association of North Carolina praised Tuesday’s decision, which also was agreed to by Court of Appeals Judge Hunter Murphy and April Wood.
“We look forward to proving our case on the merits and ensuring that sustainable coastal fisheries will be there for our children and grandchildren,” David Sneed, the group’s executive director, said in a statement.
Division of Marine Fisheries spokesperson Patricia Smith said state attorneys were reviewing Tuesday’s decision and considering whether to appeal it to the state Supreme Court.
The complaint was filed in November 2020. It said fisheries regulators have “continued to allow — and even facilitated — several commercial fishing practices that result in substantial wastage of coastal fish stocks or their prey species, or result in critical habitat destruction.”
Those practices included shrimp trawling in estuarine waters heavily populated by young fish, unattended gill nets, and chronic overfishing of popular species, according to the association. Fish stocks that have declined markedly include weakfish, Atlantic croaker and river herring, the conservation group says.
Alabama
Prosecution: Man admits killing girlfriend, son
DADEVILLE, Ala. (AP) — A man charged in the deaths of his live-in girlfriend and her son, whose dismembered bodies were discovered in central Alabama after a 12-year-old girl escaped captivity in a rural mobile home, has admitted to killing the two, prosecutors told a judge.
José Paulino Pascual-Reyes, 37, gave self-incriminating information about the deaths of Sandra Vazquez Ceja, 29, and her juvenile son in more than one statement, Tallapoosa County authorities said in a court document filed Tuesday.
Prosecutors revealed the statements in a motion that asked a judge to order the man to provide a DNA sample for comparison with evidence found at the home where hacked-up body parts were found in August.
Defense attorneys appointed to represent Pascual-Reyes did not immediately return an email seeking comment Wednesday.
Jailed without bond on charges including capital murder, kidnapping and corpse abuse, Pascual-Reyes has yet to enter a plea. He could be sentenced to death if convicted.
Authorities found remains of the two after a girl escaped a home where investigators said she was held against her will for days at the same location where her mother and brother were killed and dismembered. A motorist stopped along a country road to pick her up, leading to a search of the home where she’d lived with her mother, brother and Pascual-Reyes, police said.
The girl was taken captive in the mobile home around the time of the killings, authorities have said.
Reyes, who is from Mexico, was in the country illegally after being deported and returning without proper documentation, Tallapoosa County Sheriff Jimmy Abbett has said. The man speaks Spanish and needs an interpreter to understand court proceedings, the defense said in a request that was approved by a judge.
The mobile home was located near Dadeville, about 60 miles (97 kilometers) northeast of Montgomery.
Indiana
Softball coach gets 30 years for molesting girl, 13
SOUTH BEND, Ind. (AP) — A northern Indiana softball coach faces a 30-year prison sentence after pleading guilty to molesting a 13-year-old girl who had played on one of his travel teams.
A St. Joseph County judge sentenced Michael Feltz to 40 years in prison Friday but suspended 10 years of his sentence, the South Bend Tribune reported. He will face five years of probation after his release and must also register as a sex offender.
Feltz, 45, was the head coach and president of the OC Crush softball league. He pleaded guilty in August to one count of child molesting.
Prosecutors said he molested the girl for about five months. The girl’s mother found sexually explicit messages and nude photos of Feltz on her daughter’s cellphone in late March and alerted police, according to court documents.
Feltz was arrested in April and charged with possession of child pornography and dissemination of material harmful to a minor, but prosecutors dismissed those charges as part of his plea agreement.
The victim, who was 13 at the time, told investigators that Feltz had been molesting her since October. The girl also said Feltz molested her in his car parked in a store’s parking lot on multiple occasions, court documents say.
The judge who sentenced Feltz also ordered him to pay $1,900 in restitution to the victim’s family, according to court records.
