Ogden Standard Examiner News

But Davis officials continue to prepare for Weitzel retrial

Wed, Nov, 14, 2001

By NESREEN KHASHAN

Standard-Examiner Davis Bureau

LAYTON -- Davis County attorneys are ready for the retrial of Dr.

Robert Weitzel, but a plea offer rejected by the doctor this summer

points to the willingness of prosecutors to extract themselves from

the messy and expensive case.

Prosecutor Steve Major said Tuesday that the offer would have

reduced the charges the doctor faces to five counts of Class A

misdemeanor negligent homicide, each punishable by a maximum of one

year in jail.

Weitzel is currently being charged with three counts of negligent

homicide, Class A misdemeanors, and two counts manslaughter,

third-degree felonies each punishable by up to five years in prison.

The charges are in connection with the deaths of five elderly

patients during a 16-day period beginning in late 1995.

In the first Weitzel trial held last year, the doctor was found

guilty of the charges he now faces, but 2nd District Judge Thomas

Kay threw the conviction out on a technicality. Prosecutors had

initially charged Weitzel with five first-degree murder counts, but

jurors found him guilty on lesser included counts.

Major acknowledged the plea offer was made in part to dispense with

the protracted case that has already this year resulted in an

attempt by prosecutors to remove Kay as trial judge, as well as

criticism of Kay by relatives of the five patients. Both of those

issues eventually culminated in a higher court review. The issue of

whether Kay should be removed from the case is still pending.

"Well, it is a strange case," Major said. "We'd be willing to

negotiate given all the hassles of the case, but Weitzel has never

been willing to discuss it."

Even given the cumulative high price tag of the Davis County case

and the probability that any new sentence on state charges would

likely be highly reduced, Major said as long as the doctor

refuses to take a plea, prosecutors have little choice than to

plough forward with the second trial.

"We have an obligation to proceed on the charges," he said. "We'd be

shirking our duties as prosecutors and shortchanging the victims if

what we did was flat-out dismiss the case."

Davis County spent at least $60,000 prosecuting the first Weitzel

case, while Weitzel claimed to have spent upward of $500,000 on that

trial. Now that Weitzel is indigent, Davis County will have to shell

out his defense costs, as well as related costs on the prosecution's

side.

In addition, with the county strapped with paying for expert witness

fees for both sides, the trial could easily cost taxpayers at least

$100,000.

Weitzel, speaking from his Salt Lake City home, remained steadfast

in refusing to plea. He also questioned the decision of prosecutors

to retry the case when, by their own estimation, the county would

likely not succeed in extending the time he would spend behind bars.

"It's interesting that the state lawyers are willing to spend

hundreds of thousands of dollars on a retrial when they would be

willing to plea bargain it down to misdemeanors," Weitzel said.

Copyright ©2001, Ogden Publishing Corporation