Thursday, September 22, 2005

Coshocton, Ohio

From the Coshocton Tribune of September 22, 2005
Jury returns 'not guilty' verdict

A jury in Coshocton County Common Pleas Court returned a not guilty verdict on Thursday in the Alan L. Bailey murder trial.

Bailey, 24, of Coshocton, faced the charge after he fatally shot Raymond D. Tomak Jr., 26, in the hallway of his Walnut Street apartment on Jan. 30.


From the Coshocton Tribune of September 21, 2005
Bailey trial: a question of intent

Down the street, a group of elementary schoolers walked in two lines past the playground at Central Elementary. At the same time, two busloads of jurors formed a single-file line to enter an apartment building where a man was shot in January.

The jurors had just been selected to hear a murder case against Alan L. Bailey, 24, who is accused of shooting a sometime neighbor in the Walnut Street apartment building.

In court on Tuesday, Prosecuting Attorney Van Blanchard said jurors would hear several versions of what happened the night of Jan. 30, when Raymond D. Tomak Jr., 26, was fatally shot in the chest.

Sheriff's deputies say Bailey opened his door during an argument between Tomak and his girlfriend, Gina Cass, who had just returned to the building together. Both men pulled weapons, and Tomak was shot. The details about those few minutes or seconds in the hallway are disputed.

Blanchard said all witnesses would agree that Bailey had shot Tomak, including Bailey. He said some witnesses would say Tomak had been abusing alcohol and cocaine and had fought with his girlfriend earlier that weekend.

County Prosecutor Bob Batchelor said earlier this year that the prosecution would show Bailey "brought about" the deadly situation by drawing his gun first and using unnecessary force.

Bailey has told sheriff's detectives he was acting in self-defense, and that's exactly what Public Defender Jeffrey Mullen told jurors in his opening statement. He said Tomak had had "an increasingly violent weekend" including an earlier attempt to enter Bailey's apartment, and he ended up dead "because he threatened to kill Alan Bailey."

Mullen painted Tomak's girlfriend as panicked and desperate to escape Tomak when she entered the building that evening, saying Tomak had kicked her windshield and ordered her to take him to the apartment. He described Cass racing into the building ahead of Tomak, and then a confrontation in the hallway.

"She was frantically trying to get her keys to fit the door," Mullen said, and that's when one witness reported hearing a woman screaming. "It's a scream of fear, and Alan thinks he has to go to her aid."

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