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| Court: Utah Inmate Can't Be Convicted of Escape |
| By Salt Lake Tribune |
| Published: 07/03/2003 |
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The Utah Court of Appeals sided with a Utah State Prison inmate June 26 who claimed he could not be convicted of escape because he scaled only one inside fence -- not the second -- and never left the prison grounds. The three-judge panel, in a 2-1 decision, said if that behavior can be considered escape, 'we would leave prison officers, judges and juries to decide whether an escape occurred any time an inmate entered a restricted area or even left his cell when he was not supposed to.' It was the first time the court had considered the issue of when an inmate can be said to have escaped from custody. The case stems from a Feb. 5, 2000, attempt at freedom by Frederick Germonto, who is serving a sentence of up to life for robbing and murdering an elderly Salt Lake City man in 1989. Germonto was returning from chapel services when he broke away and scaled a 10-foot chain-link fence. A second 10-foot fence, topped with razor wire, was about a dozen feet away. Germonto was scaling the second fence when officers arrived and ordered him off. He dropped onto the ground and ran for a short distance before being apprehended. Germonto, 40, was charged with escape, a second-degree felony. In March 2002, he pleaded no contest but reserved his right to appeal a judge's decision to bind him over for trial. The court reversed that decision, effectively overturning Germonto's conviction. The state presented enough evidence for Germonto to be bound over to stand trial on the lesser charge of attempted escape, but not escape, Presiding Judge Norman H. Jackson wrote in the opinion. 'One reaches freedom when there are no further barriers,' said Joan Watt, Germonto's lawyer, last month. Watt could not be reached last week. In the opinion, Jackson wrote that if inmates completed an escape any time they were not where they were supposed to be, it would do away with the crime of attempted escape entirely and would run contrary to what lawmakers intended -- 'that an inmate leave official custody by leaving the confinement of the prison in order to commit a completed escape.' |
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