Preliminary Hearings

The Supreme Court ruled yesterday that the public and the press have a constitutional right to attend preliminary hearings in criminal cases. Chief Justice Warren E. Burger declared for the majority of the justices that courtroom doors may be closed only when there is a "substantial probability" that an open hearing would produce publicity damaging to a defendant's right to a fair trial, or when reasonable alternatives to closing the hearing could...

The first of more than two dozen scheduled preliminary hearings for the 18 alleged drug dealers arrested during an April 27 drug sweep in West Chester was held last week before District Justice Dawson R. Muth. Charges against seven of eight defendants, each of whom are charged with various counts of selling cocaine, were bound over to the Chester County Court of Common Pleas. The seven were: Charles Jaramillo, no age given, of the 300 block of West Gay Street. Hector Otero, 30, of the first block of Oak Place.

Two Philadelphia men charged in unrelated robbery-murders of immigrant merchants this year waived their rights yesterday to preliminary hearings and agreed to have the charges proceed directly to trials. Lawyers for Thomas Foggy, 19, and Cordell Adams, 24, confirmed the waivers during brief appearances before Philadelphia Municipal Court Judge David C. Shuter. Foggy and Adams, both of whom are in prison without bail pending trial, are accused of involvement in what police have said are two of five robbery-murders of Philadelphia immigrants in recent months.

HERE'S WHAT will be making news in Philly this week: CITY COURT Prelim in witness death Philadelphia police and prosecutors believe that Jorge Aldea and his ruthless street gang plotted and carried out the execution-style murder of Rosemary Fernandez-Rivera, a Mexican-born store clerk also known as Reyna Aguirre Alonso. They believe that Aldea, 23, wanted Fernandez-Rivera dead because he believed that she saw him gun down Louis Chevere, 22, Nov. 25, in front of the Caribe Mini Market, on Mutter Street near Westmoreland, in North Philly, where she worked.

Preliminary hearings, which have been held in the Criminal Justice Center in Center City since January, will be moved back to the neighborhood police districts in May, the head of the Municipal Court system said yesterday. Municipal Court Administrative Judge Seamus P. McCaffery said he originally moved the hearings to the Justice Center to reduce the number of cases that are dismissed or postponed because witnesses or lawyers fail to show up. The move was designed in part to help defense attorneys who had to run back and forth between criminal trials in the courthouse and hearings in the police districts.

  Eight months after Pennsylvania's Supreme Court revived the use of county indicting grand juries, in an effort to fight victim-witness intimidation, the Philadelphia District Attorney's Office has opted to use one in the case of reputed mob soldier Anthony Nicodemo. Nicodemo, 41, was arrested Dec. 13 in the daytime slaying of 50-year-old Gino DePietro outside his South Philadelphia home. The killing occurred as a federal court jury was hearing evidence in the racketeering trial of seven alleged Philadelphia mobsters.

Brian C. Peterson and Amy S. Grossberg, charged with first-degree murder in the death of Grossberg's newborn baby, each waived the right to a preliminary hearing, a court official in Delaware said yesterday. Fred Kirch, chief clerk of the New Castle County Superior Court in Wilmington, said lawyers for both defendants filed court papers indicating they would waive the hearings, which had been scheduled separately for tomorrow. "We waived it, obviously, and obviously there are good reasons why," Peterson's attorney, Joseph Hurley, said yesterday.

Judge William Maruszczak's courtroom is hardly the stuff of Law & Order. Often, there isn't even a prosecutor. Police officers put on criminal cases, outlining only the barest details to persuade the judge to hold a defendant for trial. Victims seldom take the stand. Defense lawyers ask few questions. No stenographer keeps a record. Hearings conclude within minutes. "We move 'em in. We move 'em out," said Maruszczak, a district judge in King of Prussia. "We don't mess around.

A judge ruled yesterday that the younger brother of a North Philadelphia boy beaten to death last week will remain in a foster home, according to the Department of Human Services. Meanwhile, a preliminary hearing for the couple charged in the child's death was postponed until Nov. 9. Desiree Pizarro, 20, and her boyfriend, Victor Santana, 21, were jailed without bail in the Aug. 24 death of Pizarro's 3-year-old son, Luis Rivera Jr. Each is charged with murder, conspiracy, involuntary manslaughter, and child endangerment.

Charges of welfare fraud have been filed against 18 people whom state officials said failed to report all their income while receiving welfare payments. Authorities said the individuals received welfare payments for which they were ineligible in amounts ranging from $1,156 to $6,263. The charges were filed in District Court in West Chester Sept. 27 by John M. Jarrell of the state Office of the Inspector General after the state Department of Public Welfare reviewed the defendants' payroll records.

The third suspect in a Coatesville home-invasion killing surrendered to police Saturday. Dominique M. Lee, 20, turned himself in two days after police arrested his alleged accomplices, Marquis Rayner, 23, and Camren Horne, 20. Police had been searching for Lee, Officer Chris McCarthy said. Police said Lee, Rayner, and Horne, wearing black T-shirts on their heads, broke into a house on Merchant Street in June 2012. Dominique Williams, 20, who was playing a video game in the house, was killed by a shotgun blast.

  Eight months after Pennsylvania's Supreme Court revived the use of county indicting grand juries, in an effort to fight victim-witness intimidation, the Philadelphia District Attorney's Office has opted to use one in the case of reputed mob soldier Anthony Nicodemo. Nicodemo, 41, was arrested Dec. 13 in the daytime slaying of 50-year-old Gino DePietro outside his South Philadelphia home. The killing occurred as a federal court jury was hearing evidence in the racketeering trial of seven alleged Philadelphia mobsters.

Eight months after Pennsylvania's Supreme Court revived use of indicting grand juries by county prosecutors, the Philadelphia District Attorney's office has opted to use one in the case of reputed mob soldier Anthony Nicodemo. Nicodemo, 41, was arrested Dec. 13 in the daytime slaying of Gino DePietro outside his South Philadelphia home. The slaying occurred as a federal court jury was hearing evidence in the racketeering trial of seven alleged Philadelphia mobsters. Some trial observers speculated about a possible connection between trial and killing and lawyers feared the news might taint the jury.

CENTENNIAL, Colo. - The suspect in the Colorado movie theater killings returns to court this week for a hearing that might be the closest thing to a trial the victims and their families will get to see. James Holmes, a former neuroscience graduate student, is charged with killing 12 people and injuring 70 by opening fire in a darkened theater in the Denver suburb of Aurora last July. At a weeklong preliminary hearing starting Monday, prosecutors will outline their case against Holmes, the first official public disclosure of their evidence.

DELLA SHEARER took the witness stand Monday in Chester District Court and recounted "the worst beating" - from six teenage girls who broke into her home, videotaped their crime, then posted it on Facebook last month. "They hit me on the side of my face, and it went right through me," Shearer, 48, said of the defendants, ages 15 to 19. "They were just punching everywhere, on my face and my nose, everywhere. " The six defendants, who could be heard laughing callously throughout the video, were crying in court Monday as they stood for their preliminary hearings.

The preliminary hearings for the six Chester teens accused in the beating of a mentally challenged woman have been continued to a later date. Janyea Bell, 16, Jamia Davis, 15, Anye Davis, 16, Takie Edwards, 19, Rahmiyah Henderson, 16, and Jasmir Womack, 17, are charged with aggravated assault, simple assault, burglary, recklessly endangering another person, conspiracy, and related crimes. On Tuesday night, the six allegedly attacked the 48-year-old victim then posted the video on Facebook.

For a moment, Alisha Kuttler was relieved that she wasn't going to get a speeding ticket. She was on I-95, going about 70 m.p.h., when a motorcycle appeared in the rearview mirror. The officer pulled alongside her and smiled, "as if to acknowledge that I was going to slow down," Kuttler said. She noticed the drill-team insignia on his Harley-Davidson, and in that instant, "there was this loud boom. " Kuttler told a packed courtroom Wednesday morning that she never saw the oncoming headlights or the vehicle driving the wrong way on the highway - only the motorcycle coming down, followed by the officer's body, and then his helmet.

SOMEONE erased data on a murder victim's stolen phone about two hours after investigators looking for it visited a West Hazleton business, police said. The owner of the electronics store said that he did not know that the iPhone belonged to Aaron Reznick, who died last month after being found beaten on a Hazleton street. "We just bought a phone without knowing what it was," said Nelson Matos, owner of Smart Geek System Computer Services. Police say in court papers supporting a search warrant that someone reset the phone to factory settings and deleted Reznick's information at 11:42 a.m. Aug. 20 - not long after officers were at Smart Geek a second time, looking for the phone.

An East Frankford man waived his right to a preliminary hearing Tuesday in the death of his infant son, whose bottle had been spiked with narcotics. Orlando Rosado's decision to forgo a Municipal Court preliminary hearing means his case will move directly to trial in Common Pleas Court on third-degree murder, drug, and child-endangerment charges in the May 11 death of his son, Christopher. According to Assistant District Attorney Lorraine Donnelly, Christopher Rosado was found dead in his own vomit by his father and his mother, Crystal Miller, just two days shy of his first birthday.