News & Politics - Judge dismisses Karr's kid porn charges

mcdreamylover · 10-05-2006, 05:12 PM

From Judge dismisses Karr's kid porn charges - Yahoo! News

Quote:

Judge dismisses Karr's kid porn charges
By KIM CURTIS, Associated Press Writer
7 minutes ago

SANTA ROSA, Calif. - A judge dismissed child pornography charges Thursday against former JonBenet Ramsey murder suspect John Mark Karr after prosecutors said they didn't have enough evidence to take the case to trial.

ADVERTISEMENT

Sonoma County Superior Court Judge Rene Chouteau ordered Karr released immediately, bringing an end to his two-month odyssey in the U.S. criminal justice system after he was extradited from Thailand on suspicion of killing the 6-year-old beauty queen.

Karr, 41, was returned to California last month to face the five-year-old pornography case after DNA evidence cleared him of killing the girl in her Boulder, Colo., home in 1996.

The misdemeanor pornography case fell apart almost as quickly, as investigators admitted losing vital computer evidence that was seized from Karr in April 2001 when he was working as a substitute teacher in Sonoma and Napa counties.

Defense lawyers tried twice unsuccessfully to get the charges dismissed and were seeking to have evidence barred from trial when prosecutors gave up. They said they couldn't establish when the child porn images had been downloaded on Karr's computer.

"The impression that we've had all along is that the prosecution had every intention of getting this case to trial, regardless of the evidence," said defense lawyer Robert Amparan. "I am pleasantly surprised by them having done the right thing."

Prosecutors acknowledged that if Karr were convicted he would not have served any additional time in jail, because he spent several months behind bars awaiting trial in 2001. They said they were seeking to have him register as a sex offender.

Karr was not in court for the hearing. He was expected to be released from jail later in the day. It was not immediately clear where Karr would go or what he might do.

Karr had fled the state after being released from jail in 2001 and had been on the lam until his arrest in Bangkok, which caused a sensation when he told reporters he was with JonBenet when she died.

Karr, who moved to California from Alabama with his wife and three sons, first came to the attention of Sonoma County officials after an informant told authorities about alarming e-mails he had been sending her.

Investigators looked at Karr in connection with the unsolved 1997 murder of 12-year-old Georgia Moses, whose body was found dumped along a highway in Sonoma County, Karr's lawyers said.

The sexually explicit pictures of children were later found during a search of his home, authorities said.

His arrest led school officials to strip him of his teaching credential, and his marriage ended in divorce later that year.

In hearings over the past two weeks, the defense accused prosecutors of misconduct for failing to alert the judge sooner that evidence was missing, and they questioned the strength of the evidence that remained. The defense also said the search warrants were based on an unreliable witness with a history of mental illness.

Sheriff Bill Cogbill said he accepted the prosecutor's decision to drop the charges.

"We do acknowledge that there were some performance issues five years ago when we worked this case," Cogbill said in a statement. "We're conducting an internal affairs investigation into these issues, and we're continuing an audit of our evidence handling procedures."

So that sicko is just free? Excuse me while I go thow up.

-Kelly- · 10-05-2006, 08:07 PM

I just heard about that

it's wrong.

Lain · 10-05-2006, 09:50 PM

Great! Even if he had no "involvement" with the whole JonBenet case, they at least have to do something with his kiddy porn scheme.

Though this is not the best thing to say, if they let him go free, they should let my friend (who was arrested early this year for the same kind of crime) go free as well and not haul him to the states to await his trial. Ahh! This is just irritating right now!

clone · 10-06-2006, 11:52 AM

They should "dismiss" his ball sack.

S.A.S.H.A. · 10-06-2006, 05:07 PM

Joy, the government lets loose yet another freak on California streets.

Sasha


Fan Forum > General Discussion > News & Politics > Judge dismisses Karr's kid porn charges