Lawyers getting personal in bid for retrial

Bill Gang

Tuesday, Feb. 1, 2000 | 11:30 a.m.

The legal dispute over Jeremy Strohmeyer's bid to set aside his guilty plea in the killing of 7-year-old Sherrice Iverson has degenerated into a series of personal attacks by the lawyers.

Both sides are requesting that District Judge Joseph Bonaventure hand out financial sanctions at next Tuesday's hearing that will see Strohmeyer return to Las Vegas from the confines of his prison cell to testify about the events that led him to plead guilty.

The 21-year-old defendant escaped the possibility of the death penalty by agreeing to accept a life sentence with no possibility for parole.

His New York attorneys contend he was coerced and manipulated into pleading guilty by his high-profile Los Angeles attorney, Leslie Abramson, and Las Vegas attorney Richard Wright.

The claim is that Strohmeyer and his family weren't given accurate information about the laws and were misled into believing the best result under the best circumstances would still result in a life sentence with no parole.

Testifying with Strohmeyer at next week's hearing will be his mother, Winifred Strohmeyer, Abramson if she can be lured back to Las Vegas, Wright and Metro Police homicide detectives.

But the judge has ruled that there will be no testimony from the victim's father, Leroy Iverson, over his claim that Strohmeyer's buddy, David Cash, was the real killer.

Iverson said he bumped into Cash outside the women's restroom at a Primm casino on May 25, 1997, just before his daughter's body was found propped on a toilet seat.

The defense claim is that Iverson told police of the encounter, but that story was never relayed to defense lawyers as is required by law. Defense attorney Robert Preuss said it likely would have changed Strohmeyer's decision to plead guilty.

District Attorney Stewart Bell, who personally prosecuted Strohmeyer, talked Bonaventure out of taking testimony on the issue by saying that videotape evidence from surveillance cameras show Iverson simply was mistaken.

Bell said that the video shows two boys in the area, but he emphasized they were cleared by police of any involvement.

He chastised defense attorney Camille Abate for raising the issue without first doing her homework by viewing the available evidence and said she should be made to pay for the state's cost in defending the "absurd" allegations.

Bell told the judge that video evidence showed Cash was gone from the arcade and restroom area for nearly an hour before Iverson ever arrived.

In court documents filed Friday, Preuss charged that Bell is the one who has made "blatant misrepresentations of both (defense) counsel's claims and the factual record."

"Given his proud claim to be far more familiar with the facts of the case than defense counsel, one can only assume that (Bell's) distortions and misrepresentations were knowing and intentional and not the result of anything so mundane as lack of familiarity with the case," Preuss stated.

He said that evidence in the case shows Iverson repeatedly told police of coming across three boys, not two, and later realized the third boy was Cash after seeing his picture in news coverage of the murder.

"Iverson's statements that this third boy was Cash and that he informed law enforcement authorities of that fact are sufficient, if true, to require a new trial," Preuss stated.

Deputy District Attorney Bill Koot and Metro homicide Detective Philip Ramos have given affidavits stating they were unaware of Iverson making any such statements.

Preuss argued in court documents that the only way to resolve the issue is to let Iverson take the witness stand next week and testify.

Although Bell said Iverson's story was belied by the videos, Pruess said the defense could argue at a trial that Iverson's version is accurate and shows the videos might have been "tampered with or are otherwise inaccurate."

"The crucial issue is whether ... Strohmeyer would have decided not to plead guilty" had he known of Iverson's contention, the New York lawyer said.

Another issue is whether the Iverson statements legally were required to have been presented to the grand jury as so-called "exculpatory evidence" to cast doubts on the state's case or explain away the allegations.

"Evidence does not lose its character as exculpatory evidence merely because it is arguably impeached by other evidence," Preuss stated. "If that were the case, the state would never have to disclose exculpatory evidence since in almost every case that evidence is inconsistent with some evidence that does show guilt."

But at a Jan. 18 hearing, Bell snapped that, "The guilty guy got caught, that's what justice is all about. They're taking up the court's time on a whim."

Defense attorney Abate's allegation that Strohmeyer was led into the plea bargain by his attorneys when he didn't have a clear recollection of what he had done also defied what Bell said was clear evidence of guilt.

Abate's claim appeared to be based in part on Strohmeyer's guilty plea to sexual assault of a minor using a legal provision that did not require him to admit actual guilt. Strohmeyer conceded, however, that prosecutors could prove their case against him.

Abate contends that Strohmeyer has no recollection of what he was charged with doing and pleaded guilty based only on what he was told he did.

Bell said that in his 30 years of practicing law he has never seen a lawyer so unprepared for an argument.

He pointed out that Strohmeyer confessed in detail to police after his arrest and gave information that only the killer would know. He also admitted his wrongdoing to friends before his arrest as he sought funds so he could flee his inevitable capture.

Bell said Strohmeyer's "fuzzy memory" during the guilty plea about the sexual assault of the victim before her murder was a "self serving" tactic to avoid an issue that could be problematic during his years in prison.