Unfairly Prejudiced
On November 28, 2000, two men were convicted of the torture and murders of a mother and her son in their Barnegat, New Jersey home. However, about a year ago, their convictions were reversed by the Appellate Division of New Jersey. This occurred despite an overwhelming amount of evidence linking the two men to these murders. Defense attorneys argued that their clients were unfairly prejudiced because during trial, another incident of robbery and shootings at a barbershop had been brought up in which the defendants had taken part. The defense attorneys argued that this had unfairly prejudiced the defendants since there had been too much detail about the barbershop incident including the amount of blood on the floor, the victims that were shot, etc. during the trial of the murder of the mother and son. The gun that was used at the barbershop had in fact linked the two defendants to the murders that had occurred in 2000. For additional information on this case please refer to the Asbury Park Press article entitled “Ocean County prosecutors to court: Reinstate Barnegat murder convictions”
