New report delays stabbing trial

WEST CHESTER » Newly obtained prosecution evidence that may cast doubt on a Coatesville man’s version of events the night he allegedly stabbed an acquaintance to death caused his trial to stop before it began Monday.

Common Pleas Judge Anthony Sarcione reluctantly granted a motion by both the prosecution and the defense to continue the trial of Andre Rashodd Smith on charges of first- and third-degree murder and aggravated assault until next month. In the meantime, Smith’s attorneys said they would investigate the new evidence — which consists of a re-

port by an ambulance employee who spoke with Smith the night of the incident — and possibly file a suppression motion.

Sarcione rejected a motion by Assistant Public Defenders Kelly Jurs and James McMullen that the prosecution be prohibited from presenting the new evidence at trial. “This is huge in the prosecution’s case,” the judge said. “It is very damaging evidence.”

Smith, who was brought into the courtroom in a wheelchair, said he understood the need for a continuance, and agreed that he had spoke with Jurs and McMullen about the new report and its possible impact on his case, in which he was expected to claim self-defense. He was returned to Chester County Prison, where he has been held without bail since his arrest in May 2016.

Sarcione dismissed the jury of six men and six women that had been chosen last week. He did not explain the decision to the panel, simply saying that new developments had made their service unnecessary.

Police arrested Smith in 2016 for the alleged homicide of an acquaintance of his, 55-year-old Grayling A. Chambliss of Coatesville, who police found dead in the 300 block of East Diamond Street. He had been stabbed in the chest and stomach. The knife that Smith allegedly used was found sticking out of the victim’s chest.

City police and Chester County Detectives said their investigative efforts determined that Chambliss and Smith, 35, knew one another, and that Chambliss had arrived at the house where Smith was staying on East Diamond Street shortly before 1 a.m. on May 11, 2016, according to the police report. Chambliss was pronounced dead at the scene.

Police said Smith fled inside his residence where he reportedly jumped from a second-story window to East Diamond Street below. Smith was injured and still walks with a cane because of a severe fracture of his right lower leg. The Washington Hose Company ambulance of the Coatesville Fire Department transported Smith to Paoli Hospital where he was treated for his injuries.

On Monday, Assistant District Attorney Andrea Cardamone, who is prosecuting the case with Assistant District Attorney Ryan Borchik and Coatesville Detective Kevin Campbell, told Sarcione that her office had last week finally got in contact with the Medic 93 emergency technician who had ridden with Smith to the hospital the morning of the incident.

She said she checked her reports and found that when asked what had happened, Smith told her that he was at home and that someone came into his house and tried to rob him. He said he stabbed the man, then jumped out of the window to escape. When he fell, the female technician said her report showed, he said he hit his head on the pavement outside the house.

That sequence of events — with Smith hitting his head in the fall — would contrast with his insistence that Chambliss had hit him in the head, causing an injury, the attorneys agreed. Smith’s attorneys said they might have to change their trial strategy because of the information, and Cardamone also suggested that her office’s strategy would change.

“We are forced to reevaluate how we are going to proceed,” Jurs told the judge.

Cardamone said she received the message about the report from the technician and immediately forwarded it to Jurs and McMullen.

It came, however, on Thursday after the jury had been selected. Jurs asked Sarcione to ban its use, but Cardamone argued that it was not information that was part of the police file on the matter, and that she had been trying to get the report from Medic 93 for some time.

“This goes right to the heart of the matter,” said Sarcione in the continuance. “It’s comes right from the defendant’s own mouth. I don’t see any choice.”