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OKs Both Private Attorney, Public Defender for Weitzel |
Wednesday, May 29, 2002 |
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THE SALT LAKE TRIBUNE FARMINGTON -- Psychiatrist Robert Weitzel -- accused of killing five elderly patients with morphine overdoses -- can have a private attorney and his public defender. Although it is unusual to have a private attorney and one paid by taxpayers working together on a case, 2nd District Judge Rodney Page said Tuesday that the complicated homicide case is more work than one attorney can be expected to handle. Public defender Glen Cella was appointed by the court to represent Weitzel, who went broke two years ago while defending himself in an initial homicide trial. Private attorney Walter Bugden Jr. joined the defense team three months ago thanks to an anonymous donation of $100,000 to a defense fund -- money to which Weitzel has no access. But Davis County prosecutors recently asked for the removal of Cella, arguing that Weitzel was not entitled to more than one attorney. Bugden countered that prosecutors mounted a team of four attorneys at Weitzel's first trial. And Bugden noted that it was prosecutors who brought about the need for a second trial by withholding knowledge of a medical expert with a pro-defense opinion. Initially charged with five counts of first-degree felony murder, Weitzel in the July 2000 trial was found guilty of two lesser counts of second-degree felony manslaughter and three even lesser counts of misdemeanor negligent homicide. Weitzel was sentenced to 1 to 15 years in prison, but Judge Thomas Kay ordered a new trial six months later after learning prosecutors had withheld knowledge of the possibly crucial medical expert. Kay, who had scolded prosecutors during the first trial, was subsequently removed from the case for having an apparent bias against them. A second trial is scheduled to begin Oct. 30 before Page. Weitzel, 46, says he prescribed morphine as "comfort care" to patients who were at death's door when they were admitted to his geriatric/psychiatric unit at the Davis Hospital and Medical Center in Layton. Prosecutors say the five patients were relatively healthy until Weitzel weakened them with large doses of psychotropic drugs, then killed them with morphine. The five patients ranged in age from 72 to 93 and came to Weitzel for short-term treatment of loud and combative behavior stemming from senile dementia. |