Jesse Matthew shuffled into Albemarle Circuit Court in a greenish-gray jail jumpsuit, leg shackles and a belly chain that attached his handcuffed wrists to the middle of his torso. That attire was the subject of one of 12 motions filed by his attorneys, who argued that his appearance in jailhouse garb was prejudicial to a jury in an already high-publicity trial.
Matthew faces capital murder charges in the death of UVA student Hannah Graham, whose September 2014 disappearance made international headlines. Matthew was charged with abduction with intent to defile, and was arrested on a beach near Galveston, Texas. Graham’s body was found in North Garden about five weeks after she was last seen on the Downtown Mall with Matthew.
Defense attorney Doug Ramseur told Judge Cheryl Higgins that Matthew had been in civilian clothes and unshackled with no problem during his June trial in Fairfax for a 2005 sexual assault, for which he was convicted. Ramseur pointed out that a sketch artist’s depiction of Matthew in the no-cameras-allowed Albemarle court showed his shackles, creating the impression that “he can’t control himself,” said Ramseur as four deputies were lined up behind the table where Matthew sat and a total of nine deputies were in the courtroom.
The commonwealth agreed that during the jury trial, Matthew could wear his own clothes and not be shackled, and called Sergeant Greg Davis with the Sheriff’s Office, who testified that the main reason to keep a prisoner in jailhouse clothes was “so they can readily be identified if they try to escape.”
Ramseur asked if more deputies would be required if Matthew was not shackled. “Absolutely,” replied Davis, who also said the normal quota for a felony jury trial was four deputies in the courtroom. At that point, 10 deputies were present. “Do you feel like cramming any more deputies in this room is going to make that any better?” asked Ramseur. Davis conceded that 10 were probably sufficient.
During the hearing, Judge Higgins was not moved to let Matthew wear street clothes, but she was concerned that he wasn’t able to take notes with his hands chained against his stomach, and allowed the waist shackle to be removed.
The defense had slightly better luck with its motion to bar tokens or insignias of support, claiming those could influence the jury. Ramseur pointed to a pin Lunsford wore at an earlier hearing with the initials “HG 2014.”
Lunsford objected to the motion, calling it “premature and overbroad” and said her pin was less than one-inch square. She said it was a “slippery slope” to try to distinguish between a button that was meant to influence the outcome and a button that has particular significance to the wearer.
Gil Harrington, mother of Morgan Harrington, the Virginia Tech student whose murder has been linked to Matthew, sat in court wearing an orange scarf, Graham’s favorite color.
“My intent is to honor the victim,” said Harrington outside the courtroom, adding that she would wear purple to honor Morgan, and pink to honor Alexis Murphy, the Nelson County teen who disappeared in 2013. “This is the fabric of my life,” because symbols are all that she has left of her daughter, said Harrington.
Judge Higgins denied the motion during pretrial hearings and said she’d take it under advisement at the trial.
Matthew’s defense team also moved that lawyers and law enforcement involved in the case be prohibited from talking about it outside the courtroom. Attorney Michael Hemenway entered examples of media coverage that included Albemarle Sheriff Chip Harding, who said, in pushing for legislation to obtain DNA in misdemeanor convictions, that if Matthew’s DNA had been collected in a 2010 trespassing case, his path never would have crossed Graham’s.
Hemenway pointed to statements Virginia State Police and Charlottesville Police Chief Tim Longo made about Matthew. “We want to make sure this case is not tried outside the courtroom,” he said. Three different law enforcement officers making statements about Matthew was “incredibly prejudicial,” he said.
Lunsford said some of the defense’s examples referred to the Morgan Harrington case, and noted that case was not being tried. “I don’t want to get into mixing these two cases up,” she said.
Higgins noted that law enforcement comments made in Fairfax, by the state police and by the city police chief were outside her jurisdiction, and she ordered the attorneys to adhere to rules of professional conduct, which forbid comments outside the courtroom that have a “substantial likelihood of interfering with the fairness of the trial by jury.”
The defense and prosecution agreed on two motions: that Matthew will be present at all stages of the case, except for procedural or scheduling matters, and that Lunsford will notify the defense if she intends to introduce criminal behavior for which he was never charged in the event of sentencing.
Matthew was accused but not charged with sexually assaulting students at Liberty and Christopher Newport universities.
Of the 12 motions, most of which were denied, “I didn’t see anything that shocked me,” said legal expert David Heilberg. “Those motions are pretty standard. The atmosphere in a capital courtroom is a sensitive matter if it goes to trial.”
A four-week trial is scheduled to begin on July 5, 2016.