THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1996, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Tuesday, April 30, 1996 TAG: 9604300305
SECTION: LOCAL PAGE: B3 EDITION: FINAL
SOURCE: BY ALETA PAYNE, STAFF WRITER
DATELINE: VIRGINIA BEACH LENGTH: Short : 44 lines
Board members Tim Jackson and Ferdinand V. Tolentino will be tried jointly for misdemeanor malfeasance charges, a circuit court judge has decided.
At a hearing Monday, Judge Glen Tyler of the Eastern Shore also agreed to put off Jackson's trial beyond the original July 8 start date so that the two could be tried together, avoiding a scheduling conflict for Tolentino's attorney. Tyler was brought in after local judges recused themselves from the case.
The trial now appears likely to start in August at the earliest.
Attorneys Moody E. ``Sonny'' Stallings, representing Jackson, and James O. Broccoletti, representing Tolentino, wanted the two trials to be held separately.
While the charges are the same, Stallings and Broccoletti said the cases and the evidence will be different.
``It's going to be very confusing for the jury to keep straight what Mr. Jackson has done and what Mr. Tolentino has done,'' Stallings said after the hearing. ``One's problems shouldn't be the other one's problems.''
Commonwealth's Attorney Robert J. Humphreys, however, argued for the joint trial. Humphreys said a single trial was an issue of ``judicial economy'' and that Jackson and Tolentino's votes on the board were ``indistinguishable.''
In ruling for a joint trial, Tyler said, ``It would be supremely inefficient to try these cases separately.''
Humphreys, meanwhile, said after the hearing that he will seek additional indictments against Jackson and Tolentino on misdemeanor conflict-of-interest charges. Should the grand jury decide to indict them on Monday, that would lead to a second trial altogether.
Humphreys first raised the possibility of the conflict-of-interest charges earlier this month, saying Tolentino and Jackson may have violated that law when they took part in a board vote to pay their legal fees up to $25,000 each. Stallings has argued that no law was broken by the vote.
KEYWORDS: VIRGINIA BEACH SCHOOL BOARD MALFEASANCE by CNB