ROANOKE TIMES
Copyright (c) 1997, Roanoke Times
DATE: Friday, April 25, 1997 TAG: 9704250058
SECTION: VIRGINIA PAGE: B-1 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: JAN VERTEFEUILLE THE ROANOKE TIMES
John Kennett Jr.'s bid to have the indictment against his client dismissed or two prosecutors removed from the case was one of several motions made in court Thursday.
Attorney John Kennett Jr. said he was "just floored" when he got home from the first court appearance in his client Joseph Abbott's racketeering case last month and turned on the late-night news.
One of the stories was the U.S. Attorney's news conference about the indictments against what they called a Roanoke organized crime family. Kennett called the conference inappropriate and "gross." To back up his argument, he subpoenaed a tape of the news story from WDBJ (Channel 7) and played it in the courtroom Thursday.
"Maybe when I see it again, it won't look as gross as it did when I got home from the bail hearing and saw the 11 o'clock news," he said before playing the segment for U.S. District Judge Samuel Wilson.
Because the U.S. attorney held a news conference, Kennett asked Wilson to dismiss the indictment for "prosecutorial misconduct" or remove U.S. Attorney Bob Crouch and Assistant U.S. Attorney Tom Bondurant from the case. He also asked that a gag order be imposed on the lawyers in the case.
Meanwhile, the prosecutors asked that Wilson consider removing Kennett from the case because he was a witness to one of the incidents in which Abbott is charged.
Wilson said he would take the requests under advisement and issue a written opinion.
Both sides agreed that the case has had extensive publicity, and at least one lawyer already has filed a motion to move the trial to another venue. The attorneys are concerned that it would be hard to seat an impartial jury if potential jurors are exposed to extensive news reports about the case. Wilson said he would look more closely at the pretrial publicity issue when he considers moving the trial.
The coverage, Kennett said, has incited the public into thinking "these guys have got to go to jail for the rest of their life."
Much of the news coverage, however, has been prompted by the many court hearings held since the indictment was unsealed in early March, and not by comments from the prosecutors.
Bondurant told the judge that prosecution comments at the news conference did not go beyond describing what was in the indictment. He said the only other public statement made by the U.S. Attorney's Office was to say investigators had no evidence the defendants sent money to Middle East terrorist groups.
Newsday, a Long Island, N.Y., newspaper, reported soon after the indictment that the government had evidence that some of the Roanoke defendants had wired money to Palestinian terrorist organizations. Newsday cited only anonymous government sources in Washington. The report contributed to "fanning [bad publicity] more and more," Kennett told Wilson.
Joe Abbott and his brother Abed Jamil, the alleged leaders of the Abed crime family, emigrated years ago from the West Bank, in what is now part of the Palestinian Authority. They are now U.S. citizens, and their four sons who have been indicted were born in the United States.
The prosecution asked Wilson to look at whether Kennett can represent Abbott because Kennett might have witnessed one of the incidents that led to a racketeering charge. Abbott is charged with threatening a woman during a business dispute over the ownership of Sonic Mart on Brambleton Avenue.
When Elizabeth Carroll arrived at Kennett's office for a deposition in the case last summer, Abbott told her he should never have tried to resolve the problem "the legal way" and that he was "going to go call my boys and have them come take care of you," according to the indictment. Kennett said he was in the room the whole time and that the threat was never made. But he said he would not need to be called as a witness because the court reporter and his secretary could testify about the incident.
Bondurant said the court reporter was not there and that Kennett's position as a witness could become important at trial. Legal ethics mandate that a lawyer cannot serve as both a witness for his client and his advocate in a proceeding.
Wilson said he has never had reason to doubt Kennett's veracity and that because of that, Kennett might become an important witness to bolster Abbott's case. Abbott, however, has said he will not call Kennett as a witness because he wants to keep him as his attorney.
LENGTH: Medium: 82 linesby CNB