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Calaroga Shark Media. Good morning. This is Daily Crime and
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Justice from Calaroga Media, powered by AI. I'm Garrett Fisher.
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It's Monday, September 14th, 2026. This morning in Largo, Florida,
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a 47-year-old plastic surgeon walks into a courtroom to defend
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himself against a first-degree murder charge in a case where
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the state is seeking the death penalty. He has no attorney.
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He fired them all. He has no jury because he
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gave that up too, for both phases. He has no
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motions to suppress because he withdrew the ones his own
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lawyer filed. And he has no objection on file to
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being executed because he withdrew that as well. When the
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judge asked him why he did not want a jury,
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he said, I really have to answer that? And the
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judge said, I guess not. In Colorado, Barry Morphew's bond
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went from $ 3 million to $ 10 million cash only, after
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prosecutors finally got the full GPS data and found out
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what a work exception actually looks like in practice. And
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the Matthew Exton case out of Toledo has gone properly
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viral this week, mostly as a piece of black comedy
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about a divorce lawyer. I want to talk about that
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because the comedy is real, and it is also hiding something.
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Let's get into it. Stephen Causey was 41 years old.
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He was an attorney in Largo, Florida. On March 21st, 2023,
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he walked into his office building wearing a red sweater.
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There is surveillance footage of him going in. There is
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no footage of him ever coming out. He had stepped
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away from his desk to use the restroom. Prosecutors say
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he was killed in that bathroom. His body has never
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been found. The state's theory is that it was driven
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to the Everglades. At the time he disappeared, Stephen Cozy
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was representing a client in a civil lawsuit against a
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plastic surgeon named Tomasz Kosowski. Kosowski was representing himself in
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that civil case. Kosowski is 47 and Dartmouth-trained. He has
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been in custody since March of 2023. He has pleaded
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not guilty to first-degree murder and he is presumed innocent.
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Prosecutors are seeking the death penalty. The state says investigators
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recovered a bag containing brass knuckles, a stun gun, duct tape,
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and masks, and that Kazi's DNA was found in the
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trunk of Kosowski's vehicle. Those are allegations. They have never
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been tested at trial. And that is the thing, because
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today they finally will be. In front of one person.
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Let me walk you through what Tomasz Kosowski has done
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to his own defense over the last few months, because
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I have never seen anything like it and I have
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been reading these dockets for years. He has gone through
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multiple sets of attorneys. At least one team withdrew citing
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ethical reasons. A fourth attorney asked out. In the email
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that outgoing attorney sent the court, there were two lines
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that should have stopped everybody in that building. That Kosowski
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refuses to sign consent forms for a doctor's evaluation, and
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that he did not want evidence presented in his defense.
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Last month, he told Judge Joseph Bologna he would represent
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himself at his own capital murder trial. Two weeks later,
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he sat alone at the defense table. His former lawyers
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had filed motions arguing the death penalty is unconstitutional and
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illegally applied in Florida. He withdrew all of them. He
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withdrew every objection to being executed. Then he came back
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and withdrew the motions to suppress evidence that his previous
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attorney had filed. That is the machinery that keeps improperly
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obtained evidence out of a trial. Gone, at his own request.
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And then prosecutors raised a request to bring jurors to
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the office building to stand in that bathroom. A jury
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view is enormously powerful for the state. 12 people in
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the actual room is worth more than any photograph, and
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defense attorneys fight it hard. Kosowski did not fight it.
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He removed the jury. He asked for a bench trial.
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Judge alone, guilt and penalty both. In Florida, a capital
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defendant has to waive a jury twice, separately, because the
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state considers those decisions that serious. He waived both. Lawyers
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who follow capital work describe a dual waiver like that
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as exceptionally rare. Ballone asked him why. He said, I
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really have to answer that? And the judge said, I
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guess not, and accepted it, finding that a Dartmouth-trained physician
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understood his rights and was choosing knowingly. Legally, that is correct,
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and I want to be clear about it. The right
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to counsel is yours to waive. The right to a
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jury is yours to waive. A court cannot force a
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competent adult to mount the defense a judge would prefer.
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The alternative, where the state decides which defendants are permitted
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to make their own choices, is far worse than what
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we have. But I'm going to say the uncomfortable thing
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again because today it stops being theoretical. Add it up.
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Four sets of lawyers gone. Refuses to sign consent forms
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for a medical evaluation. Tells his own attorney he does
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not want evidence presented on his behalf. Withdraws every objection
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to his own execution. Withdraws the motions that might keep
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evidence out. Gives up a jury for both phases. Declines
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to say why. That is not a trial strategy. Nobody
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has ever drawn that up on a whiteboard. I am
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not a doctor, and I am not diagnosing anybody from
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a studio. Competency to stand trial is a specific legal test,
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and a judge who has watched this man in his
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courtroom for three years has found he meets it, and
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that judge knows vastly more than I do. It is
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also true that a person can be entirely competent and
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still be making catastrophic choices out of pride or exhaustion
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or a belief that the whole thing is rigged. But
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a man is systematically removing every protection standing between himself
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and an execution chamber and refuses to be evaluated and
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will not say why. And starting this morning, one judge
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in Pinellas County is the only thing between him and
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that outcome. There is one more consequence of a bench
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trial that almost nobody has mentioned. Judge Bologna has been
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presiding over this case for three years. He has read
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the suppression motions that got withdrawn. He knows what is
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in them. He has heard the pretrial arguments. Normally, all
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of that is invisible to the people deciding guilt, because
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a jury walks in knowing nothing. Today, the person deciding
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guilt is the person who already knows everything. Judges are
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trained for exactly that, and they do it constantly. And
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I am not suggesting Bologna cannot do it. But Kosowski
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just handed the fact-finding in his own capital case to
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the one human being in that building who has already
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seen the material a jury would never have been shown.
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Stephen Causey was 41. He was doing the most ordinary
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thing a lawyer does in this country, which is represent
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a client in a lawsuit. He went to the bathroom
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at work and never came home. His family has never
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had a body to bury. There is footage of him
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walking into that building in a red sweater on an
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ordinary Tuesday in March. That is the last image anybody
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has of him. And there is a reason a case
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with no body got charged at all, which is worth understanding.
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Florida does not require a body to prove murder. It
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never has. What the state has to prove is that
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a person is dead and that the defendant caused it,
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and that can be built entirely on circumstances. The last
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known movements, the forensic traces, the motive, the absence of
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any innocent explanation for a man vanishing from a bathroom
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in the middle of a workday. Those cases are hard
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and they are winnable, and prosecutors bring them when they
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believe they have enough. Stephen Kazi, someone has to say
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his name. That trial starts this morning and it is
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expected to move fast because there is no jury to
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select and no jury to instruct. We will be on
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it every day this week. When we come back, $ 10
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million cash only. Suzanne Morphew was 49 years old, a
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mother of two daughters, and she disappeared on Mother's Day
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in May of 2020 after reportedly going out for a
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bike ride near Maysville, Colorado. Her remains were not found
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until September of 2023, about 45 miles away in a
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shallow grave, by investigators searching for a different missing woman.
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Her husband, Barry Morphew, was charged in 2021. That case
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was dismissed in 2022 over problems with the evidence. A
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grand jury indicted him again in June of 2025. He
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has pleaded not guilty to first-degree murder, he denies killing her,
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and he is presumed innocent. Trial is set for July
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of next year. He has been out since January on
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a $ 3 million bond, wearing an ankle monitor, allowed to
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leave his home essentially for work, medical appointments, his lawyers,
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and court. We told you Wednesday that a private citizen
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emailed the judge about a hit and run in Denver
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on August 26th, that Judge Amanda Hopkins watched the video
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herself and said the man in it was very clearly
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the defendant, and that she confined him to his house
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with no exceptions. Then Boulder County deputies arrested him Thursday
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night on a warrant, and he went to jail. Tuesday
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was the hearing, and it did not go the way
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his lawyers wanted. Here is what prosecutors put in front
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of that judge, and this is the part that is new.
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They finally got complete GPS data from the private monitoring
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company for the week of August 26. Not a summary.
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The whole week. And what it showed, according to the prosecution,
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is that Barry Morphew worked on Monday and Tuesday. And
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then he did not work. They described trips to trailheads, restaurants,
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a Whole Foods, hotels in the Cherry Creek area, and
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a drive to Denver International Airport, which his attorney said
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was probably to pick up his daughter. The prosecutor's line
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was that after the airport, he comes back to Cherry Creek,
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goes to a couple of hotels, and is just out
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and about with his day. No work whatsoever. That is
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the whole case in one paragraph. The work exception was
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the only thing letting this man leave his house and
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prosecutors say he was using it to run errands. Prosecutors
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also told the court something that should alarm you regardless
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of what you think of Barry Morphew. Neither the court
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nor the district attorney's office knew the hit and run
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had happened until a local news station aired the footage.
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A man on a $ 3 million bond in a first
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degree murder case wearing a GPS monitor paid for by
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a private contractor allegedly fled the scene of a crash,
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and the system designed to watch him did not notice.
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A television station noticed. Judge Hopkins raised the bond to
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$ 10 million, cash only. And her reasoning from the bench
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was about as blunt as judges get. She said Morphew
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has shown time and again that he has no respect
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for any order of this court, and that he is
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not going to comply with an order if it is
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inconvenient to the lifestyle he wishes to live while out
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on bond. The defense had asked for home confinement with
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no work exception at all, which tells you they saw
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this coming. Even if he posts $ 10 million in cash,
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he cannot leave the San Luis Valley, and he cannot
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leave his home except for his attorneys, court, or a
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medical emergency requiring an ambulance. Both of his daughters listened
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to that hearing virtually. So did Suzanne Morphew's sister and brother.
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I want to be careful and precise here, because this
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is a bond hearing, not a trial. Barry Morphew has
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not been charged with anything arising from the Denver incident.
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He is presumed innocent of murdering his wife, and nothing
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prosecutors described on Tuesday has been proven to a jury.
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What happened this week is a judge deciding he cannot
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be trusted to follow her orders, which is a different
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question entirely. But the pattern the prosecution described is the
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one that matters at a bond hearing. They argued that
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fleeing the scene of a crash the moment police were
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mentioned is a preview of what he might do if
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things go badly at trial. There is a larger point
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here that goes well beyond one defendant, and it is
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the second time in two weeks I have had to
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make it. Electronic monitoring is the entire justification for releasing
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people charged with serious violent crimes before trial. The argument
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judges make, and it is often a good argument, is
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that somebody should not sit in a cell for two
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years awaiting a trial when technology can watch them instead.
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That argument only works if the technology is actually being
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watched by somebody. In this case, the data existed the
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whole time. Every trailhead, every restaurant, the airport, the hotels.
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It sat on a private company's server while a man
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accused of murder ran his week. Nobody looked at it
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until prosecutors went and asked for it after a news broadcast.
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A monitor that records where you are is not supervision.
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It is a receipt you can read afterward. Trial is
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10 months away. His next hearing is a virtual one
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on November 3rd. Suzanne Morphew has been dead for six years.
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She lay in a shallow grave for three of them.
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And this week, the hearing about her husband was not
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about whether he killed her. It was about Whole Foods
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and a trailhead, and whether a man can be trusted
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to stay in his own house, Suzanne Morphew. Someone has
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to say her name. When we come back, the Toledo
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lawyer case is everywhere, and the funny part is not
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the real part. We covered this case last Tuesday when
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the verdict came in, and since then, it has taken
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off online in a way I did not expect. Matthew Exton, 43,
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was convicted on September 5th in Lucas County, Ohio, of
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attempted murder, two counts of felonious assault, and multiple firearm specifications.
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He was acquitted on one remaining assault count. He faces
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up to 25 years when Judge Gary Cook sentences him
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on September 21st. And the internet has decided this is
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the funniest criminal case of the year. I understand why.
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Let me lay out the parts people are sharing. He
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is a lawyer. He was licensed in Ohio and had