Colville Murder Trial Delayed Again for Lack of One Prosecution Witness
As written in the Columbus, Georgia Ledger
Acquitted
JEFFERSON, Ga. - Judge Mark Donahoo continued, over defense protests, the murder case of an 18 year-old Florida boy, whom the governors of both Georgia and Florida will not extradite under present circumstances, as the absent youth was arraigned in Jackson County Superior Court Monday. The defendant is John Robert Colville, who now lives at Jensen Beach, Fla.
Donahoo raised the possibility of calling a special term of court to try the case which came before him by the fateful quirk of a county boundary survey which showed the crime scene to be in Jackson instead of adjoining Clarke County. The next regular court term is next March.
Donahoo continued the case at the request of District Attorney Nat Hancock, who said a vital witness, a former State Crime Laboratory technician, could not be present to testify at this court term.
Miami attorney Edwin A. Marger, who is a former Columbus resident, informed both Hancock and Donahoo that the missing witness was only one of two available to the district attorney. Marger argued that Dr. Herman D. Jones, "is in partial retirement, but should be available" to testify.
Dr. Jones is director of the State Crime Lab. He was a microanalyst formerly employed in the lab, who now is working in Ohio and "available on three weeks notice," according to Hancock.
"Is that the boy who killed his mother?" Judge Donahoo asked Hancock and defense lawyers Marger and Jack Davidson of Jefferson.
"We say he didn't do it, your honor", Davidson responded.
Young Colville was indicted last March by the Jackson County Grand Jury the murder three years before of his mother, Jacqueline Colville, 42, on evidence presented to the grand jury by Ralph Clarke, an investigator for Clarke County Sheriff Tommy Huff.
Clarke then went to Florida and had young Colville arrested on a Georgia murder warrant. The boy's father, Joseph H. Colville, director of development of Indian River Community College at Fort Pierce Fla., fought extradition, and the youth is free without bond and enrolled in college on a scholarship.
The youth's lawyers say he stands ready to come to Georgia and stand trial at anytime the State of Georgia is ready for trial - but not to sit in the Jackson County Jail awaiting trial.
So far they have convinced the chief executives of both Florida and Georgia that is a valid outlook.
"Do you think the ends of justice would be served by this boy sitting in jail?" William L. Harper, executive counsel to Gov. Jimmy Carter, asked when queried about extradition status.
Harper has advised Gov. Carter, and Florida Gov. Reuben Askew via a letter to Gov. Askew's extradition secretary, Mrs. Ruthie Dixon, that an extradition hearing which loomed with the apparent upcoming trial delay - should be indefinitely postponed. So far, that recommendation has been accepted.
Young Colville, 15 years old at the time, is accused of the shooting death of his mother on March 29, 1968. The youth was the only other family member at home on rural Nowhere Road when the slaying occurred in the late afternoon after he came home from school.
He told investigators he was in the woods nearby, sent there to investigate a noise reported by his mother, when he heard shots from the house.
Colville said he ran toward the house to find a young man with long hair, and wearing a sleeveless denim jacket, standing over the prostrate victim, holding a .22 caliber rifle.
The stranger dropped the gun and fled, the youth said, whereupon he grabbed the rifle and fired three shots at the man before the rifle jammed, young Colville said.
The rifle, and a decrepit .22 caliber revolver, both owned by the boy's father, were both used in the slaying, according to investigators.
The case was investigated by Sheriff Tommy Huff of Athens. No charges were made, and Colville and sons John and Jeffery, 20, moved to Florida.
Colville's lawyers say they're ready for the trial at any time, and that the prosecution's delay could have political purpose aimed at being beneficial to Sheriff Huff. "Clarke County has control over the witnesses," lawyer Marger told Judge Donahoo.
Huff will be subject to election next year, with qualifying in the Democratic primary coming up in the spring. A series of unsolved murders in Clarke County makes Huff politically vulnerable, lawyer Marger maintains.
"I urge that this boy not be used as a political pawn by the sheriff of Clarke County," Marger said to Judge Donahoo in asking the case be called for immediate trial during the current two-week term of court.
"I can assure you he will not be a political pawn," Judge Donahoo replied.
Donahoo at first denied lawyer Davidson's request to file a demand for trial for young Colville. Under such a move, the state must try a defendant within the next two court terms, or acquittal is mandatory. Court is held in Jackson County twice a year, in March and September.
"The defendant must be in court and ready for trial. You didn't do that," Donahoo said, noting the youth's absence. Later, after hearing argument in his chambers, Donahoo ruled Davidson could file the demand, the legality argued and finally determined later.
The lawyers refused to bring Colville to the arraignment because Donahoo has not indicated whether he would be agreeable to releasing the defendant on appearance bond. Such a bond, to enable freedom from jail while awaiting trial on a murder charge in Georgia, is available only upon the discretion of a Superior Court judge.
