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| Court Ruled Fla. Inmate Had Ineffective Counsel |
| By Vero Beach Press-Journal |
| Published: 07/30/2003 |
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Death row inmate Harold Lee Harvey does not merit a new trial, the state Attorney General's Office has told the state's highest court. In a motion to the Florida Supreme Court late last week, Assistant Attorney General Celia Terenzio said the high court misread Harvey's trial record and misapplied case law in reaching its decision to overturn Harvey's conviction after 17 years. For those reasons, she said, the court should grant the state a new hearing. An Indian River County jury found Harvey guilty of gunning down William and Ruby Boyd, a prominent elderly couple, during a robbery in February 1985 at their 1,500-acre dairy ranch north of Okeechobee and voted 11 to 1 to impose the death penalty. Now, the high court, which upheld Harvey's conviction and sentence in 1988, has ruled that Harvey had ineffective assistance of counsel during the guilt phase of his trial and deserves another chance. 'We find that trial counsel conceded Harvey's guilt to first-degree murder by stating...that Harvey acted with premeditation and that the murder was committed during a robbery,' the court said in its 5-2 opinion earlier this month. Terenzio has countered that 'the only fair reading of the entire record...demonstrates that (Harvey's defense attorney) was arguing against a finding of first-degree murder, hoping to give the jury a reason to find him guilty of second-degree murder.' Harvey's Chicago-based defense team has 10 days to submit a response, Terenzio said. If a rehearing is not granted, the state will seek a U.S. Supreme Court review, she said. |
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