THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Tuesday, May 16, 1995 TAG: 9505160289
SECTION: LOCAL PAGE: B1 EDITION: FINAL
SOURCE: BY JOE JACKSON, STAFF WRITER
LENGTH: Long : 116 lines
The key prosecution witness in the capital murder case of Dennis W. Stockton - sentenced to death in 1983 for the murder-for-hire of a teenager in Southside Virginia - has once again changed his story, claiming he did not recant the testimony that sent Stockton to death row.
This newest about-face by Randy G. Bowman, 40, comes as Stockton's appeals have nearly run out and he faces execution in Virginia's death chamber. Stockton has said he believes he will be executed in mid- to late summer.
On Monday, the state attorney general's office asked a federal judge in Roanoke to deny a plea by Stockton's lawyers for a new hearing to review the evidence. A sworn affidavit by Bowman, dated May 8, was included in that brief.
``Based on nothing more than an erroneous newspaper report, death row inmate Dennis Stockton again seeks to . . . impair the efficient administration of justice,'' the brief stated. ``Because all his claims are wholly without merit as well as procedurally barred . . . this Court should summarily deny Stockton any relief.''
At issue is Bowman's recantation on April 20 to a reporter with The Virginian-Pilot and The Ledger-Star during an interview in his apartment in Mount Airy, N.C. During that interview, Bowman said he never heard the murder-for-hire deal take place.
On May 3, Stockton's lawyers also filed a plea for a final review of the case by the U.S. Supreme Court. The state attorney general has 60 days from that date to file a response.
Stockton, convicted in 1983, was charged with the 1978 murder of Kenneth Wayne Arnder, 18, whose body was found near Mount Airy. Arnder was shot in the head and his hands were hacked off above the wrists.
According to the state, Stockton killed Arnder in Virginia, then moved his body to North Carolina. No physical evidence linked Stockton to Arnder or the murder to Virginia, and no weapon was found.
But during the trial, Bowman testified that he heard Stockton accept $1,500 from Tommy McBride, another felon, to kill Arnder over a soured drug deal. Prosecutors were able to seek the death penalty because Bowman claimed it was a contract killing. Bowman was the only witness who said he had heard the deal.
Stockton's lawyers have said since 1990 that Stockton deserves a new hearing because the state failed to disclose evidence that could have helped during his trial, including details of an alleged deal that prosecutors made with Bowman in exchange for his testimony.
Then, on April 20, Bowman said he left McBride's house before ever hearing Stockton accept $1,500 to kill Arnder.
``I don't know if they (McBride and Stockton) made a deal,'' Bowman said. ``I was in there to sell something. The subject came up . . . how he (McBride) would like to have him dead, so I'm out of there. I've never said I heard - I didn't hear Stockton say, `I'm going to do it.' ''
Questioned several times about the apparent contradictions between his 1983 testimony and his new claim, Bowman repeatedly said he left immediately after McBride made the offer.
At one point he said, ``I don't recall hearing Stockton make (the deal) - it's been several years.'' Later, he added, ``I left. . . . I never heard Dennis take the deal.''
According to Bowman, ``the only thing I was involved in was such a little bit,'' maintaining that his testimony could not have convicted Stockton. ``What I heard wasn't a lot,'' he said.
During the interview, Bowman questioned the integrity of law enforcement officials in Virginia and North Carolina.
``I don't believe nobody knows the whole truth - I don't know if Dennis got a fair trial,'' he said. ``I wouldn't pull the switch on him. He might be guilty or he might not.''
But in the May 8 affidavit, taken before Michael Bass with the Virginia State Police and Ron L. Perry with the North Carolina State Bureau of Investigation, Bowman denied making the April 20 recantation.
``I didn't tell the reporter I was changing my testimony,'' Bowman said. ``I did not tell the reporter that I didn't hear Stockton say `I will do it, I need the money.'
``I am making this statement of my own free will,'' Bowman added. ``No threats or promises have been made. The above statement is true as I remember it.''
Both Stockton and his lawyer disputed Bowman's statement that he did not feel threatened.
``The law's gotten to him and threatened him,'' Stockton said Monday from his death row cell in Mecklenburg Correctional Center. ``I'll tell you what they've done to Randy . . . they've told him they'll give him X number of years for perjury if he sticks by what he said (on April 20). He's scared to death.''
Steve Rosenfield, Stockton's Charlottesville lawyer, said: ``It is not uncommon for police officers to reach a witness who has recanted and remind them of the penalties for perjury and to scare them about the criminal justice system handling perjury charges. The intent is not to seek justice, but rather to make sure the witness understands the effect of his now telling the truth.''
On May 4, the investigators contacted Bowman and asked if they would talk to him. Bowman agreed and dictated his statement to Bass ``because apparently his hands were screwed up and he couldn't write,'' said Don Harrison, spokesman for Attorney General James Gilmore. ``He could barely sign his name.''
The investigators took a typed copy of the statement back to Bowman on May 8. Bowman signed it and it was notarized, Harrison said.
Bowman's hands were not injured when the reporter talked to him on April 20. Harrison could give no explanation for Bowman's injuries. ``He just told them his hands were all broke up,'' Harrison said.
On May 9, a reporter again attempted to contact Bowman at his Mount Airy apartment. Bowman's mother, Stacy Vestal, said the police had talked twice with her son. She said Bowman was not home; she did not know where he was, she said.
Contacted a second time that day, Vestal said her son did not want to talk. ``He didn't give a reason,'' Vestal added. ``He just said he didn't want to talk to you no more.'' ILLUSTRATION: Randy G. Bowman
Dennis W. Stockton
by CNB