Columnist Jeff German: Binion poll packs surprises

Saturday, Feb. 10, 2001 | 12:03 p.m.

Jeff German is the Sun's senior investigative reporter. He can be reached at (702) 259-4067 or by e-mail at german@lasvegassun.com

IT'S THE poll that defense lawyers in the Ted Binion murder case don't want you to see. And I've got more results for your reading pleasure.

So you want to know which attorney in the case fared the best. Well, let me tell you.

It wasn't Milwaukee hired gun James Shellow, who was paid $130,000 by the defense team just to cross-examine famed New York pathologist Michael Baden, the prosecution expert who testified that Sandy Murphy and Rick Tabish had suffocated Binion.

Marvin Longabaugh's 623-member electronic jury found that Shellow drew the lowest marks of all the lawyers, primarily because of his in-your-face and sometimes condescending style.

Only 47.7 percent of those questioned gave Shellow a favorable rating.

"More than one of the electronic jurors referred to Shellow as a mean Ben Matlock," Longabaugh wrote in an analysis of his poll that he hopes to get published in the UNLV Law Review.

The poll, which has a 4 percent margin of error, was taken at the close of the high-profile murder trial after Longabaugh had terminated his relationship with the defense team. He had conducted two earlier surveys for the defense.

Other defense lawyers had much higher approval ratings than Shellow.

Louis Palazzo, who represented Tabish, edged out Murphy's lawyer, John Momot, even though the hard-working Momot was believed to have done a much better job in court.

Palazzo earned favorable marks from 67.4 percent of those interviewed compared to Momot's 63.4 percent.

Maybe Palazzo scored higher because of his courtroom request to hit his client over the head with the yellow pages. The request, which even surprised Tabish, was denied, though many observers wanted to see Tabish get clobbered.

Two defense lawyers called in at the end of the trial, the folksy Thomas Pitaro, and the hard-charging Robert Murdock, received favorable ratings of 57 percent and 53.5 percent respectively.

Longabaugh concluded they would have done much better had they not played such limited roles in the case. The electronic jurors likened Pitaro, who now is handling Murphy's appeal, to the beloved actor Wilford Brimley -- a much younger Brimley, of course.

Prosecutors David Roger and David Wall came away with the best favorable ratings of all the lawyers.

Wall outpolled Roger, earning the praise of 73.4 percent of those questioned to Roger's 71.4 percent.

If the survey had been taken after closing arguments, the two prosecutors might have scored even higher. Both wrapped up their case with strong performances.

But if you're looking for the one Binion player who rose above the crowd, it would be District Judge Joseph Bonaventure, the no-nonsense, blue-collar jurist who presided over the well-publicized trial.

Longabaugh reported that 81.4 percent of those surveyed had a favorable impression of Bonaventure, who charmed a live local and national television audience for nearly two months.

Some of the more interesting results were those that focused on the charges.

Of those questioned, 55.9 percent believed that Binion was murdered, but only 49.4 percent said they would have voted to convict Murphy of killing him. A total of 54.1 percent said they would have convicted Tabish.

The poll also showed that 30.8 percent believed that Binion, a known heroin abuser, had died of an accidental drug overdose, and another 10.3 percent thought he had committed suicide.

During the trial, prosecutors theorized that Murphy and Tabish pumped the 55-year-old Binion with drugs and then suffocated him.

Today, defense lawyers are trying to stop Longabaugh from publishing all of his poll results in the UNLV Law Review.

They don't want you to see the fruits of his labor.