MANSLAUGHTER MAY BE McCARTHY’S FATE
Defense protests option
The jury that will decide the fate of Michael P. McCarthy, charged with murder in the death of 2-year-old Bella Bond, will likely be able to consider the lesser charge of involuntary manslaughter, a Suffolk Superior Court judge indicated yesterday.
Addressing the attorneys after the jury had been dismissed for the day, Judge Janet Sanders said she is “inclined to submit involuntary manslaughter” when she gives her instructions to the panel early next week, a move defense attorney Jonathan Shapiro said is “outrageous.”
“The commonwealth’s opening argued premeditated, firstdegree murder, that was their theory,” Shapiro said.
“Now the commonwealth is thinking maybe its case isn’t so strong and they are looking for evidence that isn’t there,” he said. “You can’t make up evidence just so the commonwealth can squeak by and try to find some compromise.”
The state, Shapiro added, “should grit its teeth and deal with what it’s wrought.”
McCarthy has pleaded not guilty in the death of the little girl who became known as “Baby Doe” when her body washed ashore on Deer Island in June 2015. His former girlfriend, Rachelle Bond, Bella’s mother, testified McCarthy killed her daughter by punching her in the stomach and told the woman the toddler was a “demon” and had to die.
“If that’s not intentional, I don’t know what is,” Shapiro said in reference to the prosecutors’ theory.
“I don’t think it’s necessary for the jury to find he went into the bedroom with the preconceived plan to kill her,” Assistant District Attorney David Deakin countered, adding McCarthy’s alleged statement casting Bella as a demon is “probative of his attitude toward the child. That’s not something you would say about a child, alive or dead, if you cared for her.
“If there is a reasonable view of the evidence that could support the charge,” Deakin added, “the court can give the instruction.”
The judge, indicating she agreed with Deakin’s argument, referenced the case of Louise Woodward, the British au pair found guilty of seconddegree murder in the death of an 8-month-old Newton boy in 1997, a conviction later reduced to involuntary manslaughter.
Bond, who testified against McCarthy last week, pleaded guilty to accessory after the fact and will be released from jail after the trial is over.
Prosecutors rested yesterday morning and the defense has begun presenting its case. Shapiro said he has not decided whether McCarthy will take the stand, and could be finished calling witnesses on Monday or Tuesday.
Each side will be given an hour for closing arguments, and Judge Sanders promised lengthy instructions to the jury before they retire to decide McCarthy’s fate.