Father and daughter Tom and Molly Martens retrial in the US won’t be held for several months
Tom and Molly Martens’ retrial in the United States for the murder of Irish businessman Jason Corbett will not be staged for several months.
he revealed for the first time when Mr Corbett’s two children, Jack (17 years old) and Sarah (15 years old), faced their stepmother and grandfather for the first time since their father (39 years old) was beaten to death in the bedroom. about his North Carolina home in 2015.
Both children were led to a Davidson County Superior Court hearing by Mr. Corbett’s sister, Tracey Corbett-Lynch, her husband Dave, and their children, Dean and Adam.
Tom (71) and Molly Martens (37) – who entered the Lexington building separately from family members and supporters – sit to the left of Court Room Nine next to their legal team.
Molly Martens and Dad Tom
Neither the children nor members of the Corbett family were looking when they entered and sat on the right side of the courtroom.
Jack and Sarah sat at the front of the court, right behind Assistant District Attorney Alan Martin, who will lead the prosecution team and who participated in the first trial in 2017.
The Limerick family have traveled to North Carolina to show their continued support for North Carolina prosecutors – and underscore their plea for an early retrial.
The family has been told a retrial could happen in May or June.
However, a retrial is now unlikely before the end of summer or even fall – a huge disappointment for the Limerick family as Jack and Sarah are facing important exam years in New York. high school.
It is expected that the retrial – which includes direct evidence from Jack and Sarah Corbett – could last up to seven weeks.
Forsyth County Judge David Hall, who was specially appointed to hear the retrial, was told by Martin that the State fully disclosed this month to the defense legal teams of Douglas Kingsberry, R. Vannoy and Jones Byrd.
He revealed this includes 9,725 pages of documents as well as digital files including photos and audio recordings.
Neither Mr. Kingsberry nor Mr. Vannoy participated in the initial Davidson County Superior Court hearing, although Mr. Kingsberry did participate in the successful appeal of the original conviction to the North Carolina Supreme Court in last year.
Mr. Martin told Judge Hall that the prosecution hopes to reach agreement with the defense legal teams on a hearing schedule that will include a specific date for a retrial.
He said he hopes to get the deal and is ready for a second administrative hearing in Lexington on May 23.
Previous movements will probably also be processed on that date.
Judge Hall issued a special warning given the high profile nature of the Martens case.
“To be fair, this case has attracted a large amount of press coverage by what I consider news media and what I consider entertainment media,” he said.
Judge Hall said his priority was to ensure that justice was served – and the rights of the media would have to be balanced with that.
Limerick man Jason Corbett was beaten to death in the bedroom of his North Carolina home in 2015
He issued a special order prohibiting prosecution or defense legal teams, or any of their employees or agents, from making any unlawful statements about the case.
Judge Hall also said he would not allow what he called any “media exploitation” to undermine the functioning of the justice system.
“My only rule is to see these parties get a fair trial without any outside power at play,” he said.
“We are here for a purpose and that is to serve justice.”
Judge Hall also said he would not allow the re-trial to be filmed or videotaped because he has said he believes it could affect witnesses, jurors and even attorneys.
He bluntly warned that, for media matters, he reserved every authority to enforce court orders, including the loss of liberty to those found to be in contempt of court.
Mr. Martens, a former FBI agent, and his daughter, Molly, the Irish widower’s second wife, Mr. Corbett, face a retrial after their 2017 convictions were dropped by the Supreme Court. North Carolina high flipped last year.
Both were found guilty of Mr Corbett’s second-degree murder after a five-week trial in August 2017 and received sentences ranging from 20 to 25 years in prison.
However, they later won a retrial after challenging the North Carolina Court of Appeals and then the North Carolina Supreme Court.
Both served three and a half years in prison before being released.
A father and daughter living in Tennessee beat to death the Limerick-born packaging executive at his luxury home outside Winston-Salem in North Carolina in August 2015.
Both claim they acted in self-defence after they allege they were assaulted by the Irish father of two.
Mr Martens said he feared for his life and that of his daughter.
However, the initial trial heard evidence that Mr Corbett was likely asleep in his bed when the first blow was delivered.
Tom and Molly Martens were found completely uninjured at the scene – while the Irish widower’s skull was so shattered by a concrete slab and a metal baseball bat that a researcher Pathologists could not count the exact number of blows inflicted.
Prosecutors later claimed that an attempt had been made to anesthetize Mr Corbett – and that the father and son deliberately delayed calling emergency services just to ensure that the Irish executive had died when they arrived.
The Limerick man adamantly refused to sign the adoption papers that his late first wife, Margaret ‘Mags’ Fitzpatrick, who died of a nasty asthma attack in November 2006, would have given him. gave Martens equal rights to her two children.
Molly Martens married Mr Corbett in June 2011 after arriving in Ireland a few years earlier to work as a nanny for the Irish widow’s two children, both two years old or younger when his first wife died. because of an asthma attack.
He then began a relationship with Ms Martens while being completely unaware of her history of mental health problems.
The Limerick businessman moved to the US in 2011 after his Tennessee-born wife repeatedly complained of homesickness.
Mr Corbett’s family still insists he was in the process of bringing his children back to Limerick when he was attacked and killed in his bedroom.
The 2017 trial found Mr Corbett had a plot to drugged him, he was initially attacked while sleeping in his bed and he was beaten even while lying dead on the bedroom floor.
It is also alleged that Tom and Molly Martens deliberately delayed calling emergency services.
When the concrete slab was then lifted off the floor by forensic officers, it left a bloodstain on the carpet.
Corbett’s blood, tissue and hair were also found in the bricks.
https://www.independent.ie/irish-news/courts/us-retrial-of-father-and-daughter-tom-and-molly-martens-wont-be-staged-for-several-months-41438253.html Father and daughter Tom and Molly Martens retrial in the US won’t be held for several months