DATE: Saturday, November 15, 1997           TAG: 9711150557

SECTION: LOCAL                   PAGE: B7   EDITION: FINAL 

                                            LENGTH:   60 lines

VIRGINIA - NEWS BRIEFS

CENTRAL

Grand jury indicts man in July slaying of Richmond judge

RICHMOND - A man already charged with attempted murder in another case has been indicted in the slaying of a Richmond lawyer and substitute judge.

Thursday, a Richmond Circuit Court grand jury indicted Keith Robinson, 26, on murder and firearms charges in the slaying.

Harold M. Marsh Sr., 59, was fatally shot on the afternoon of July 23 as he waited at a traffic light. Witnesses said the shooter was driving a brown Cadillac, but sped away before they could get a good look at him.

Theodore N. Tondrowski, who is representing Robinson on two attempted murder charges stemming from another shooting in Richmond, said Robinson knew he was a suspect in Marsh's murder, but maintains his innocence.

Marsh, brother and law partner of state Sen. Henry L. Marsh III, had sat as a substitute judge in Chesterfield County Juvenile and Domestic Relations District Court on the day he was killed.

PIEDMONT

Former teacher sentenced in indecent liberties case

PALMYRA - A former teacher at Fork Union Military Academy was sentenced to 3 1/2 years in prison Friday for conducting bizarre games with cadets involving spanking and bondage.

Gregory Allen Moyer, a former science instructor, was sentenced to two years in prison on each of the 14 counts of indecent liberties.

But Fluvanna County Circuit Judge John Cullen suspended all but 3 1/2 years and ordered Moyer to undergo counseling. Moyer remains free on bond pending an appeal.

Moyer, 42, had faced up to 70 years in prison. He started teaching at the school in 1993. The crimes occurred from 1994 to 1996.

Moyer was a respected teacher at the private, all-male school, according to testimony by several teachers and cadets. He headed the intramural sports program and was a Scoutmaster for the Boy Scouts.

Moyer's diaries seized by police provided a detailed picture of a secret society built on paddlings, bondage and buttocks tattooing. Photographs of naked students were included in the diaries.

Moyer said earlier that the various initiation rituals were wrong, but said he joined in at the urging of the cadets, then in their early to mid teens.

The cadets testified that it was sometimes their idea to run naked through the woods at midnight, cover each other with shaving cream and tie each other up with ropes. They were intended as macho tests of worthiness.

One of the boys, however, said he found the experience humiliating. Moyer appeared to be sexually aroused during some of the activities, he told the court.

Defense attorney W. Reilly Marchant argued earlier that there was no evidence to indicate that Moyer's actions had sexual overtones and that Moyer never touched the boys or made advances.

COMING UP

Today

NEW MARKET - Shenandoah Valley Battlefields Commission holds its first public meeting, 10 a.m., New Market Battlefield Hall.

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