An End to the Baumgartner Saga as Jury Convicts Disgraced Judge

A federal jury in Knoxville, Tennessee voted to convict former Knox County criminal court judge Richard Baumgartner, who was charged with lying to cover up a scheme that provided him with painkillers and sex.

The verdict meant that the former judge was found guilty on five counts of misprision of a felony and acquitted of one charge. Prosecutors were successfully able to convince the jury that Baumgartner had lied to cover up a conspiracy involving a defendant from his court supplying him with pills and sex. Baumgartner’s defense conceded he was an addict and adulterer, but unsuccessfully argued that his actions were not a federal crime.

The jury foreperson later spoke about the deliberations and said that jurors were never deadlocked on any of the counts as they debated their verdict, despite a few questions that led some observers to believe they were.
Deliberations lasted nearly 20 hours and many observers wondered what was taking the jury so long. The jury led some to believe they were going to end up deadlocked given a few of the questions they had for the judge. One question asked what they should write on the verdict form if they did not agree. The foreperson said that the question was not asked because of any actual deadlock, but instead asked preemptively, so that she could plan ahead in the event that unanimity was not possible.

The foreperson said that the reason for the delay was the complexity of each count that they had to decide on. For each charge, the jury of 12 people had to come to an agreement on four distinct elements: First there was a drug conspiracy. Second, Baumgartner had full knowledge of it. Third, he failed to report it. Fourth, he then worked to conceal the felony.

Some of the counts were easier for the jury to agree on than others and they ultimately acquitted Baumgartner on Count Two. The foreperson said the reason for that decision was because the crime of misprision deals with lying to federal officials and Count Two involved an incident at St. Mary’s hospital. The jury decided that there were not any federal officials present at the hospital and thus cleared Baumgartner on Count Two.

Read: “Richard Baumgartner Guilty: Jury Convicts Ex-judge In Drug Conspiracy Cover-up,” by The Associated Press, published at HuffingtonPost.com.

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The defense says DA knew of Judge Baumgartner's misconduct

by Lee Davis


The Christian/Newsom case saw another development today as defense attorneys Tom Dillard and Stephen Ross Johnson responded to the prosecution’s motion to have Judge Blackwood removed due to supposed unethical conduct. The defense fired back with a motion of their own accusing district attorney Randy Nichols and his staff of hiding information about Judge Baumgartner’s misconduct while he was still presiding over the case.

The defense counsel’s motion said that they agree that a motion to recuse was appropriate and should have been granted, however, the motion should not be against the current judge. “A motion to recuse should have been filed years ago in this case concerning Judge Baumgartner.”

The current controversy involves the decision by Judge Blackwood to order new trials of the defendants in the Christian/Newsom murder case following news that Judge Baumgartner was addicted to narcotic pills and abused his position to win sexual favors from some of those that he presided over. An investigation by the TBI showed that many of the crimes were committed while Baumgartner was presiding over the Christian/Newsom murder trials.

Previous releases of information have made clear that others were aware of Baumgartner’s misdeed. For instance, two prosecutors who were working on the Christian/Newsom case reported seeing Baumgartner swearing his way down I-40 following jury selection in Nashville for Vanessa Coleman’s trial. It was also revealed that District Attorney Nichols confronted Baumgartner about such behavior and that the judge admitted to drinking a bottle of wine every night to help him sleep.

The defense attorneys brought forward not only these known instances of prosecutorial awareness of Baumgartner’s problems but another not previously made public: “During this visit, former Judge Baumgartner told Mr. Nichols that he was drinking a bottle of wine a night while at the same time going to the Bradford Rehabilitation Clinic (an outpatient center in Knoxville) and Alcoholics Anonymous meetings.”

Not only did Nichols allegedly know this information, but he also kept it secret from the defense attorneys in the Christian/Newsom case. The defense said that there were many other cases before Judge Baumgartner at the time and that attorneys across the region with clients before the judge would have wanted to know about his conduct. The motion said that despite this “extraordinary step of an ex parte direct inquiry of Judge Baumgartner about his problems…” nothing was ever disclosed by Nichols or his office.
For his part, Nichols’ special counsel, John Gill, responded to the allegations saying that the District Attorney’s meeting with Baumgartner had nothing to do with any particular case and therefore was not ex parte contact.

Ex parte communication refers to any contact between a judge and one party of the case without the presence of the other party. Such communication is frowned upon. The prosecution has hinted that the current judge, Blackwood, has engaged in such contact with unidentified people and has complained that it is objectionable. The defense denies any such one-sided communication with the judge, as has Blackwood.

Read: “DA Randy Nichols hid signs of ex-judge Richard Baumgartner's misdeeds, attorneys contend,” by Jamie Satterfield, published at KnoxNews.com.

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Baumgartner’s Attorneys Get Three Months to Prepare

The Knoxville case involving disgraced former judge Richard Baumgartner moved forward last week with news that his defense attorneys, Don Bosch and Ann Short, filed a motion before U.S. Magistrate Judge Clifford Shirley asking that he declare the case “complex.” 

Though the name may seem odd and beside the point, it’s important to a case’s timeline. If a case is declared “complex” it will give the defense more time to review discovery submitted by the prosecution, postponing the currently scheduled July 18 trial. 

Bosch and Short told Judge Shirley that they had only begun to scratch the surface of the voluminous discovery turned over by the government. Moreover, for them to do their jobs properly they’ll need additional time to review everything and properly brief their client. They state that the July 18 date currently set for trial is inappropriate given the amount of work still left to do.

Federal prosecutors disagreed, saying that the defense was only seeking a delay for delay’s sake. They raised that Bosch and Short represented Baumgartner back in 2011 when he pled guilty to one count of official misconduct. The TBI had initiated an investigation of him in 2010 and after news came to light of his misdeeds the government offered a deal to avoid further damage to the Knox County criminal justice system. Given that both Bosch and Short reviewed all the evidence at the time, the prosecution now says their claims of unpreparedness are ridiculous. The prosecutors wrote, “It is unlikely that defense counsel would have advised defendant to plead guilty to a felony in state court without first evaluating the evidence against defendant.”

The defense counters saying that the investigation against their client was continued by the TBI after the plea deal was accepted and that, as a result, mountains of new information remains to be reviewed. Interviews were conducted and filed were gathered, none of which were available the first time around. 

It was announced later last week that Judge Shirley approved a deal struck between the two sides granting a three-month continuance, so that trial is not set to begin until October 23^rd. This amounts to a victory for both sides. The defense received a delay and longer time to review and prepare their case. The prosecution avoided having the trial labeled “complex” and kept the case subject to the federal speedy trial act. 

Though Baumgartner pled guilty to avoid further prosecution just like the one currently proceeding, further allegations of misconduct that he was not initially charged with have since been unearthed. These include his doctor shopping, using his mistress (one of his own Drug Court graduates, Denna Castleman) to get pills, using his influence to help her avoid trouble with prosecutors and judges, lying about being her lawyer and helping her hide a failed drug test. His actions with Castleman are at the heart of the current federal case filed in May. Baumgartner is currently charged with and scheduled for trial on July 18^th for seven counts of misprision of a felony. Each count accuses him of either covering up Castleman’s crimes or failing to report them to the proper authorities. Misprision of a felony carries a maximum prison term of three years. 

Yet another interesting twist occurred earlier last week when, on Wednesday, U.S. District Judge Thomas Phillips, who was scheduled to preside over Baumgartner’s trial, recused himself. Phillips has not released any word as to why he asked to have the case reassigned and the decision now rests in the hands of Chief U.S. District Judge Curtis Collier to assign Phillips’ replacement.

Source: “Baumgartner seeks delay in his federal trial,” by Jamie Satterfield, published at KnoxNews.com.

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Baumgartner Debacle and District Attorney Nichols

by Lee Davis

photo KnoxNews.com

As discussed in a post last week, prosecutors in the Christian/Newsom case are attempting to have Special Judge Jon Kerry Blackwood recuse himself from the case. Matters took a heated turn this week. Knox County District Attorney Randy Nichols started a screaming match with the judge and at another point he was faced with a contempt of court threat.

The exchange occurred as a result of Judge Blackwood’s refusal to step down from the case. Rather than permit additional oral argument by the prosecution, Judge Blackwood carefully explained his reasons for not stepping down and then ordered the court to take a short break. After returning to the bench he read aloud a section of law regarding what comments attorneys are permitted to make about judges. The purpose of the reading was to highlight a comment that we discussed in our last post by John Gill accusing Blackwood of engaging in private communications to avoid media scrutiny. These allegations by prosecutor Gill appear to be baseless and are contempt of court if untrue. 

The exchange got heated very fast as reported by the Knoxville News Sentinel. Blackwood said: “If you have one blooming email to support that charge that this court has been dealing with ex parte communications with these defense attorneys, you better bring it forward or the person who made that statement needs to self report.” Nichols then jumped to his feet and demanded to know whom Blackwood was referring to. The judge responded by saying prosecutor “John Gill.” 

District Attorney Nichols then attempted to cut off Blackwood and the judge had enough, ordereing, “You’re going to sit down.” Nichols remained standing and told the judge that the prosecution objected to him saying anything more. Blackwood then ordered Nichols, “I told you to sit down. If you stand up one more time, you will be in contempt of court. Do you understand?” After that the judge stood up and left the bench. 

Nichols’ made the request for Blackwood to recuse himself after he granted new trials for a second time in the Christian/Newsom case. Though the high court raised questions with the initial decision it did not bar him from coming to the same conclusion the second time around. Instead, the justices said that if Blackwood believed he was not able to serve as the 13^th juror in place of Richard Baumgartner then he would have no choice but to grant new trials. Blackwood decided he did not believe he could serve that role. 

Prior to the blowup by Nichols, the judge said he would reconsider his decision regarding a new trial for the ringleader, Lemaricus Davidson, and his brother, Letalvis Cobbins. The reason for his reconsideration is that both men had DNA evidence linking them to the rapes of Christian. Blackwood was firm that he would not reconsider his decision regarding George Thomas for whom no forensic evidence existed linking him to the slayings. 

Read: “Judge Blackwood threatens DA with contempt, refuses to recuse self in Christian/Newsom retrials,” by Jamie Satterfield, published at KnoxNews.com.

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