OSUsushichic
Fired up! Ready to go!
This kid is completely incapable of making a good decision.
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Typical. Now that Clarett's in the big paypacket league, he's probably trying to stall so he can pile some money up before serving time, just in case!
And Rugby, keep your attention focused on the future Mrs Rugby, not the charge of the light brigade!
On another note.....Maurice just became a father 10 days ago.
The HitMen have two players on the roster. (Neither is named Fat Tony).
Motion to move Clarett trial out of Columbus is rejected
Despite well-known defendant, jury can be seated, judge says
Saturday, August 05, 2006
Bruce Cadwallader
THE COLUMBUS DISPATCH
</IMG> Former Ohio State football player Maurice Clarett, accused of robbing two victims on Jan. 1, is to go to trial Aug. 14.
A judge denied a request yesterday by attorneys for Maurice Clarett to move his trial on a charge of aggravated robbery out of Columbus, where they don’t think an impartial jury can be found.
"I am confident we will be able to seat a fair and impartial jury in this case," Franklin County Common Pleas Judge David W. Fais told the attorneys. "If we run into some kind of obstacle, we’ll deal with it then."
The request was one of seven motions discussed during a contentious hearing between an assistant prosecutor and the attorneys, whom Clarett recently hired after firing his first two attorneys.
Fais scolded him for being 45 minutes late for the hearing. Clarett was delayed in Youngstown because he was taking care of his daughter, born 17 days ago to his girlfriend, said one of his attorneys, Michael Hoague. The child was born prematurely and went home from the hospital today.
Hoague and Richard Piatt, Clarett’s other attorney, also challenged a photo array Columbus police showed the robbery victims. In it are five black men wearing jail clothes and frowning and Clarett smiling in street clothes.
"I’m sure his distinctive, boyish smile is recognized in this community," Hoague said of the former Ohio State University running back.
Fais agreed to hold a hearing on that issue with the witnesses and a police detective on the day of trial, which is set for Aug. 14.
Hoague and Piatt also asked the judge to tell prosecutors to give them the home address and phone records of the two people who told police Clarett robbed them in an alley on Jan. 1.
One of the victims said the robber took his cell phone, but Assistant County Prosecutor Tim Mitchell said he does not have the records for that phone number.
Hoague repeatedly asked him to provide the details, causing Mitchell to ask angrily, "Am I to believe I am repeatedly being called a liar? I can’t turn over what wasn’t sought."
Hoague, who took over Clarett’s defense on July 27, said he was "shocked and dismayed" that the phone records don’t exist. After the hearing, he told reporters, "What are they hiding? You do an investigation and you don’t find if the phone has been used after the robbery? "
Fais granted a defense request to have jurors visit the alley behind the former Opium Lounge at 346 S. High St. where the incident took place. Hoague described it as a "seedy area with rat traps."
Hoague also wanted more specifics from prosecutors on the gun and how the robber showed it to the victims.
"We don’t want a trial by ambush, your honor," Hoague told the judge, which caused Fais to bristle.
"There is no such thing as a trial by ambush in this courtroom, and I’ll tell you that right now," he said.
Clarett also is charged with robbery and carrying a concealed weapon. He has pleaded not guilty.
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he wants to "head in a different direction."