By: Jacqueline White
DELPHI, Ind. (Scripps News Indianapolis) — Delphi murders Judge and Indiana Attorney General have filed a response to a petition to the Indiana Supreme Court to reinstate Richard Allen‘s former defense team and remove the judge.
Richard Allen arrives for a hearing in the case against him for the 2017 murders of Libby German and Abby Williams along with former and new lawyers. (Scripps News Indianapolis)
Both Judge Fran Gull and Indiana AG Rokita asked the court to reject the petition due to it failing to meet the proper requirements.
Allen is charged with murdering Abigail Williams and Libby German in 2017.
According to Gull and Rokita, the ‘writ of mandamus’ the petition used to reinstate Allen’s former lawyers, Andrew Baldwin and Brad Rozzi and to remove Judge Gull from the case, is inappropriate. They state the proper avenue would have been for Allen to appeal, which he did not do.
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They also agreed that Allen, did not express a ‘clear and unquestioned’ right to reinstate his counsel and that his Sixth Amendment rights were not violated.
Judge Frances Gull announced that a scheduled hearing had been canceled and that Richard Allen’s attorneys had withdrawn from the case. (Court TV)
According to Judge Gull, she was protecting Allen’s Sixth Amendment right to have effective assistance of counsel by removing Baldwin and Rozzi for gross negligence.
Gull stated Balwin and Rozzi compromised Allen’s defense for multiple reasons, listing:
1. failing to safeguard confidential case materials
2. emailing confidential work to an unauthorized person and failing to report timely report the leak
3. making extrajudicial statements that were likely to prejudice the case
4. providing false information to the trial court
AG Rokita expressed a similar opinion, stating that Richard Allen’s right to choose counsel is not absolute and must be balanced with the need for a fair trial, which Gull argued was compromised by the negligence of his former lawyers.
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Rokita also says the request for the court to commence within 70 days was improperly presented to the court, as well as the request to remove Judge Gull.
This story was originally published by Scripps News Indianapolis, an E.W. Scripps Company.
