Luzerne County Commonwealth Attorneys office filed several motions on Tuesday (11-05-07), alluding to the fact that they have even more evidence to present at trial... this is on top of the mountain of evidence previously known:
-Harlow Cuadra & Joseph Kerekes burglarized Kocis’ home
-Harlow Cuadra & Joseph Kerekes approached individuals to ask them to give police false information about their whereabouts the day Kocis died
-Harlow Cuadra & Joseph Kerekes destroyed some of Kocis’ personal property
-Harlow Cuadra & Joseph Kerekes burglarized Kocis’ home
-Harlow Cuadra & Joseph Kerekes approached individuals to ask them to give police false information about their whereabouts the day Kocis died
-Harlow Cuadra & Joseph Kerekes destroyed some of Kocis’ personal property
Burglary offense defined: A person is guilty of burglary if he enters a building or occupied structure, or separately secured or occupied portion thereof, with intent to commit a crime therein, unless the premises are at the time open to the public or the actor is licensed or privileged to enter. Now we all know that the original burglary charge was dropped during the preliminary hearing, so the DA's office isn't trying to charge them criminally for this, but it does appear that what they do have is evidence to show that Harlow and Joe were in fact in Bryan's house... if true, it would be a very key piece of evidence.
The second one about asking individuals to lie for Harlow and Joe is a pretty damning piece of evidence. This would bring more witnesses in for the prosecution, and would show that Harlow wasn't in Virginia Beach with a client on the night of the murder (though Joe did a good job of dispelling that notion already), and that Harlow and Joe asked others to lie about it, in trying to cover up their crime(s). Innocent people don't generally go around asking others to lie for them.
Harlow and Joe destroying some of Bryan's property is an interesting one. In actuality, they destroyed a lot of property after setting the fire. This would tell me that the prosecution has been able to find evidence of specific property that was destroyed. An educated guess is that they have evidence of the property being destroyed at the 1028 Stratem Court residence.
Since these are motions filed, we won't know if any of the above will be allowed to be heard during the trial until the judge rules, and the consensus seems to be it'll probably take a few months. The defense still has to respond. Then there will be a hearing. Then he'll rule. Also, he might wait until the defense files their pre-trial motions to have one big hearing on all of the motions.
The wheels of justice can be slow at times.
