By LOU CHIBBARO JR., Washington Blade
Nov 21 2008, 10:02 AM |
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UPDATED: Nov 21, 5:00 PM
Two of the three gay men indicted this week on an obstruction of justice charge for the August 2006 murder of attorney Robert Wone were cleared for supervised release Friday after pleading not guilty at a D.C. Superior Court arraignment.
At the request of prosecutors, Judge Frederic Weisberg agreed to drop the government’s earlier request that Joseph Price be held on $100,000 bail. Price, his domestic partner, Victory Zaborsky, and a former housemate, Dylan Ward, were indicted Wednesday on the obstruction of justice charge in connection with Wone’s murder.
In a combined bail hearing and arraignment Friday for Price and Zaborsky, Weisberg agreed to the government’s new request that the two men be released without having to post bail. Under the release arrangement, the two men must wear an electronic ankle bracelet that monitors their whereabouts and must be confined to their homes during a 10 p.m. to 6 a.m. curfew.
The terms of their release also prohibits them from having any contact with Kathy Wone, Robert Wone’s widow, or any member of the Wone family, and requires that the two undergo regular drug tests.
Assistant U.S. Attorney Glenn Kirschner, the prosecutor in the case, declined comment after the hearing when a reporter asked why the government decided to drop its earlier request that Price post$100,000 bail.
Wone, a prominent Washington attorney, was found stabbed to death in the guest bedroom of the Dupont Circle townhouse where Price, Zaborsky, and Ward lived in August 2006.
Ward, who recently moved to a suburb of Miami, was arrested on the obstruction of justice charge three weeks ago by authorities in Florida at the request of D.C. police. He has been held without bail in Florida pending his return to D.C. for arraignment early next week.
A spokesperson for the U.S. Attorney’s office said Zaborsky was arrested Friday morning after he surrendered to police under prior arrangement with prosecutors. Price was taken into custody 24 hours earlier after surrendering to police on Wednesday.
During an earlier arraignment for Price on Thursday, courtroom observers were startled when Zaborsky entered the courtroom as a spectator to watch the arraignment along with friends of Price and Ward. Zaborsky sat on the opposite side of the spectators seating area from where Kathy Wone was sitting.
Sources familiar with the case said prosecutors most likely made arrangement for Zaborsky to surrender to authorities the following day, allowing him to observer his partner’s court proceeding as a spectator.
The three men have said they believe an intruder killed Wone after entering the house through a rear door while they were asleep in their bedrooms. Investigators, however, have said that crime scene evidence made it unlikely that an intruder entered the house on the night of the murder.
Speaking through their attorneys last year, the men said they have cooperated with the police investigation and voluntarily gave DNA and finger print samples to authorities.
In an e-mail sent last week to friends, Price solicited contributions for a legal defense fund to help the three men pay legal expenses. He called the obstruction of justice charge "meritless" and characterized as "inexplicable" the police "theory that we were somehow involved in Robert's death."
Wone was a friend of Price's from their days as students at the College of William and Mary in Virginia. He had been spending the night at Price's house on the night of the murder after working late at his D.C. job as general counsel for Radio Free Asia. He lived with his wife in Oakton, Va.
After Price's earlier arraignment, Kirschner declined to say why Zaborsky had not been arrested as of Thursday.
At the request of prosecutor Kirschner, nearly the entire proceeding at Thursday's arraignment was held at the judge's bench in private. Price remained silent during the proceeding except to respond to a request by the courtroom clerk that he state his name for the record.
"Joseph Price," he replied.
Price, an attorney, has worked for the prestigious Washington law firm Arent Fox. The firm announced last month that he would take a leave of absence following the release by police of a detailed affidavit in support of the allegation that Price, Zaborsky and Ward obstructed justice in the Wone murder.
According to the 14-page affidavit, the three men allegedly hindered the police investigation by "orchestrating the crime scene, planting evidence, delaying the reporting of the murder to authorities and lying to the police about the true circumstances of the murder."
The affidavit adds that evidence in the case "demonstrates that Robert Wone was restrained, incapacitated, sexually assaulted, and murdered" inside the home where the three men lived at 1509 Swann Street, N.W.
It says the city medical examiner who performed an autopsy on Wone's body believes someone restrained Wone in the bed where he may have been sleeping, possibly by placing a pillow over his face, and injected him with a paralytic drug. The autopsy found multiple needle marks on different parts of his body that authorities say appear to have been caused by a syringe.
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