SANTA ROSA, Calif.-
The child pornography case against John Mark Karr, one-time suspect in the JonBenet Ramsey case, should be dropped because key evidence was lost, defense attorneys argued Wednesday.
Sonoma County Judge Cerena Wong agreed to consider whether to dismiss the five misdemeanor charges against Karr amid revelations that the sheriff’s department not only lost his computer that allegedly held the pornographic images, but also copies of its contents.
All that remains is reports from the 2001 investigation and new information about what was contained on Karr’s computers, prosecutors and the sheriff said.
Karr’s lawyer, Gayle Gutekunst, argued that without a crime scene, she had no way to properly defend her client nor would prosecutors be able to make a case against him.
“We can’t cross-examine this evidence,” Gutekunst said. “That makes us profoundly ineffective. The crime scene is gone.”
Karr rejected a plea deal and remains jailed on $200,000 bail. He chose not to attend Wednesday’s hearing.
Three hard drives, a laptop computer, diskettes and a zip drive were seized from Karr’s home when he was arrested in 2001, but he fled before his trial.
The judge, who sealed police records in the case because investigators said they were still examining the computer, criticized prosecutor Joann Risse for misleading her. Wong said she would reconsider unsealing the search and arrest warrants at another hearing Friday.
Karr, a 41-year-old former schoolteacher, was arrested in Thailand last month after suggesting he killed JonBenet, a 6-year-old beauty queen, in her Boulder, Colo., home in 1996. He was returned to the U.S., but the Ramsey case quickly collapsed after DNA failed to connect him to the crime.
Copyright 2006 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.
