As mentioned in this blog last week and as reported by Mark Reiter in The Blade, Gerald Robinson's attorney filed a motion asking that the priest be released on parole pending his appeal of the murder conviction.
Today, the state of Ohio responded with a motion to deny the request.
Dean Mandros, assistant Lucas County prosecutor, made a strong point right away, with his opening eight words: "Convicted murderer Gerald Robinson has filed a motion..." Not Father Robinson. Not just Gerald Robinson. It is "convicted murderer Gerald Robinson." And that description is an indisputable fact.
Mandros cites five legal factors to be weighed in determining whether a convicted criminal should be released pending an appeal, and then expounds on each of the five why Robinson should not set foot outside of the grounds of Hocking Correctional Institute in Nelsonville, Ohio.
Perhaps the most noteworthy point is the argument against the priest's sworn statement that he did not kill Sister Margaret Ann Pahl. It would have been more credible if Robinson had made that statement on the witness stand, where he would have had to undergo cross-examination. As presented in the affidavit, such a statement is meaningless, Mandros argues.
The motion to deny the release is a deftly crafted document that includes some strongly worded statements and some subtleties. For example, it states that Robinson "was only 42 years old when he engaged in a cold and calculated course of conduct wherein he strangled and butchered a 71-year-old Catholic nun ..." -- nothing subtle about that. It also states that "at the time she was murdered, Sister Pahl weighed 134 pounds, was five-feet-two-inches tall, wore glasses, and was hard of hearing." This appears to me to be a subtle reference to, and rebuttal of, Robinson's inclusion in his statement that he is 5'8, 130 pounds, which was completely irrelevant.
The State's motion cites the overwhelming evidence presented in court -- to the point where the jury deliberated just six hours before reaching a unanimous guilty verdict.
With judo-like wordplay, Mandros also turns Robinson's own statement against him: that his supporters are willing to raise money for his defense. "The State is very concerned that Defendant's supporters could either knowingly or unwittingly provide money to Defendant which would be used to facilitate his flight from this Court's jurisdiction," Mandros writes.
He also points out that, contrary to Robinson's motion, the State never presented a theory during the trial that Sister Margaret Ann was killed in a satanic ritual.
There is a lot more involved in this legal wrangling, but one of the interesting revelations is that cold-case investigators, in conducting at least three "garbage pulls" on Robinson's home searching for evidence, found "numerous liquor bottles" in his trash. Along with the murder conviction, it raises questions about the priest's character and mental condition, the motion states.
In sum: The State of Ohio's motion to deny Robinson's release is tactful, precise and persuasive. It is my own personal presumption, however -- not based on any interviews or inside information -- that prosecutors had a good deal of fun making their arguments, kind of like a cat toying with a mouse, because Robinson's arguments were so legally tenuous.
I get the impression that the motion is about as persuasive as if the priest had handed the judge a "Get Out of Jail Free" card from a Monopoly game and said, "Please?"
October 23, 2006, Toledo, Ohio