Judge finds Delphi defense team ‘sloppy’ but not in contempt

CARROLL COUNTY, Ind. — A judge has found the defense lawyers for the man accused of killing two Delphia, Indiana, girls “sloppy, negligent, and incompetent” but declined to hold the pair in contempt.

Special Judge Fran Gull’s latest ruling stems from a March 18 hearing where Carroll County Prosecutor Nicholas McLeland filed a motion to hold defense attorneys Andrew Baldwin and Bradley Rozzi in contempt citing an evidence leak tied to the attorneys along with alleged violations of a gag order.

Rozzi and Baldwin represent Richard Allen, the man accused of killing Abby Williams and Libby German near the Monon High Bridge in Delphi seven years ago.

Rozzi and Baldwin were originally thrown off the case by Gull after she called the pair “negligent” after the evidence leak. An evidence leak that led not only to one man’s arrest but played a part in another man taking his own life.

The Indiana Supreme Court eventually reinstated Baldwin and Rozzi to the case after deciding that Allen had the right to choose his counsel, even if the judge found the counsel to be a detriment to his own defense.

Gull has mulled over McLeland’s call for holding the pair in contempt since the March 18 hearing and finally released her decision Wednesday.

Gull stated that McLeland “proved by a preponderance of the evidence that defense counsel was sloppy, negligent and incompetent in their handling of discovery material.”

But despite once again calling the pair negligent and incompetent, Gull ruled that the prosecutor did not prove “beyond a reasonable doubt” that the defense team was “willful and intentional” in their so-called “sloppy” actions.

Gull also agreed with the defense team’s previous remarks that the pair weren’t violating a gag order when speaking out about the case in the past because their statement was made before the gag order went into effect.

With the defense team skirting past the contempt charge, the team can now focus on the upcoming trial scheduled to start in less than two weeks.

Gull has set a pretrial hearing for Tuesday, where the defense and the prosecutor can discuss some of their concerns about the upcoming trial scheduled to begin May 13.