ROANOKE TIMES
Copyright (c) 1996, Roanoke Times
DATE: Wednesday, November 13, 1996 TAG: 9611130081
SECTION: VIRGINIA PAGE: C-4 EDITION: METRO
DATELINE: RICHMOND
SOURCE: Associated Press
A state appeals court upheld Norman Hoverter's first-degree murder and abduction convictions Tuesday in the fatal beating of his girlfriend's 12-year-old daughter, Valerie Smelser.
The Virginia Court of Appeals rejected Hoverter's claims that the prosecution tricked him into pleading no contest in July 1995 and that the state should have paid for his psychological evaluation before sentencing.
``The commonwealth dealt openly and honestly with Hoverter in negotiating the plea agreement,'' Judge Jere Willis Jr. wrote for the three-judge panel.
Hoverter, 51, is serving a life sentence for Valerie's slaying in January 1995 in Frederick County. The girl died after Hoverter beat her and flung her down a staircase because she spilled a cup she was forced to use as a toilet, prosecutors said.
Authorities said Hoverter hit Valerie so hard that her head broke through the kitchen wall of the run-down house where she was kept a prisoner for weeks before her death, prosecutors said. She slept amid her own excrement in an unheated basement and was starved until she weighed only 51 pounds at her death. Her naked body was dumped along a road.
Valerie's mother, Wanda Smelser, pleaded no contest in August to second-degree murder and abduction and was sentenced last month to 12 years in prison.
Hoverter tried to withdraw his no contest pleas a month after he entered them on grounds that prosecutors misled him. He said he made the plea agreement because he understood prosecutors planned to try him for sodomy. That could have brought another life term or even the death penalty if prosecutors proved the sodomy and murder took place at the same time.
Hoverter alleged that Frederick County Commonwealth's Attorney Lawrence Ambrogi later said at a news conference that he lacked enough evidence to try Hoverter for sodomy. Ambrogi said his remarks were reported incorrectly.
The appeals court agreed with Frederick County Circuit Judge James Berry's ruling to uphold the pleas.
``Hoverter's pleas were freely and voluntarily made, were entered by him without a semblance of coercion and without fear or duress or any kind. Hoverter alleged misrepresentation, but his proof failed to support that allegation,'' the appeals court said.
The appeals court also denied Hoverter's claim that denying him state funds to hire a mental health expert violated his constitutional right to due process. The court said Hoverter alleged no mental illness and had no absolute right to the state-paid evaluation.
Ambrogi said he expected the convictions to be upheld. ``I'm glad for the family, especially the children. Obviously, this has been a terrible ordeal for them.''
LENGTH: Medium: 57 linesby CNB