6/25/09 – NWA: Alamo’s lawyer says evidence ‘fatally stale’
NWA News
June 25, 2009
Alamo’s lawyer says evidence ‘fatally stale’
An attorney for evangelist Tony Alamo has asked a judge to suppress evidence taken from his client’s compound in Fouke, saying the information used to justify a search warrant was “fatally stale.”
In a motion filed Tuesday, attorney Jeff Harrelson of Texarkana asked U.S. District Judge Harry F. Barnes to keep a jury from seeing evidence seized from the compound during a Sept. 20 raid. He also wants Barnes to bar law enforcement officers who participated in the raid from testifying about what they saw.
Harrelson contends that the only information indicating evidence could be found at Alamo’s house at the compound was based on alleged events that took place at least five years earlier.
Federal authorities seized two Polaroid cameras from a house but have not indicated that the cameras contained any incriminating evidence.
Harrelson also asked Barnes to order prosecutors to reveal the name of a confidential informant who provided information used to justify the search.
Alamo, 74, is set for trial July 13 on charges that he transported five underage girls across state lines for sex from March 1994 through October 2005.
Debbie Groom, acting U.S. attorney for the Western District of Arkansas, declined to comment on Harrelson’s motions Wednesday.
“We will be filing responses to the motions that were filed in this matter and our positions will be set forth in the responses,” she said.