Retrial Urged in Ventura Slaying

If Bridget Callahan’s original defense attorney had taken advantage of all the evidence available to him during her Ventura County murder trial last fall, she would have been acquitted, Callahan’s new lawyer argued in court Tuesday.

“We’re not asking that Miss Callahan go home, we’re asking that Miss Callahan get a fair trial,” Kay Duffy said during closing arguments in a hearing to determine whether Callahan should be retried.

Superior Court Judge Vincent O’Neill Jr. said he will issue a ruling Friday.

Callahan, 31, was convicted in November of first-degree murder for standing guard while skinhead gang members David Ziesmer and Michael Bridgeford allegedly slashed a Ventura teenager in a motel room bathtub. Callahan’s cooperation with authorities later led to the arrest of the two gang members.

She is now accusing her former court-appointed lawyer, Joseph O’Neill, of being abusive to her during trial, failing to investigate leads that would have helped her case and refusing to let her testify. Joseph O’Neill is not related to Judge O’Neill.

“All we’re asking is that the system work for Miss Callahan,” Duffy told the court. “She was betrayed by law enforcement ... and she felt betrayed by her attorney. I’m asking the court not to betray her.”

But Deputy Atty. Gen. Michael Katz, whose office took over the case in 2001 amid allegations of prosecutorial misconduct, said the system did work when a Ventura County jury found Callahan aided in the 1998 kidnapping, robbery and killing of 17-year-old Nichole Hendrix.

“Miss Callahan committed murder, and that’s what she was convicted of,” Katz argued.

Katz accused Callahan of lying “blatantly and repeatedly” when she testified in the hearing last week -- her first appearance on the witness stand in open court. The jury would have heard those lies had Callahan testified during trial, Katz argued.

“There’s no way her testimony would have helped her,” Katz said. “It would have hurt her very badly.”

Duffy, however, said that is a question for a jury to decide.

Throughout the hearing, which began in March, Duffy and fellow defense attorney Jim Farley have tried to show that Joseph O’Neill was unprepared for and overwhelmed by the complex Callahan case. As a result, Duffy said, he failed to call Callahan to the stand and failed to explore a battered-woman’s defense.

He also failed to properly cross-examine two key prosecution witnesses, Duffy said. When Callahan took the stand last week, her testimony countered that of those two witnesses, who were crucial in establishing that Callahan actively participated in the kidnapping and robbery of Hendrix. Without those additional felony charges, Callahan could not have been convicted of first-degree murder, a conviction that comes with a mandatory life sentence, Duffy said.

Last week, a psychologist who evaluated Callahan before her trial said she might have reached different conclusions about the case had O’Neill been more forthcoming with information about Callahan’s history with certain members of the skinhead gang to which Ziesmer and Bridgeford belonged.

Katherine Emerick told the judge she did not know about the alleged physical and mental abuse Callahan had endured at the hands of the skinheads -- something Callahan detailed on the witness stand last week.

Katz, however, painted Callahan as a hardened skinhead “groupie” who stood up for herself to members of the gang and had earned respect and admiration from some of them.

“She’s trying to overturn her conviction in every way she can,” Katz said.