Judge sides with Safe Passage in rape case
South
By RALPH BARTHOLDT
Staff Writer
A Coeur d’Alene judge agreed with prosecutors Monday when he quashed a subpoena seeking personal information from a woman at a crisis center.
Judge Scott Wayman wondered aloud why defense attorneys for Michael R. South demanded that a victim in a rape case turn over information documenting her time at Safe Passage.
Subpoenas are generally court-ordered, Wayman said, not issued by attorneys to badger witnesses or victims into coughing up information.
In the latest case, defense attorneys for South, 45, who was convicted in August of rape and who is awaiting another rape trial, ordered Safe Passage to turn over documents of the victim’s time at the center.
Attorney Scott Jones, who represents Safe Passage, asked the court to quash the subpoena demanding Safe Passage turn over “any and all records relating to the victim including, but not limited to, the dates of her participation, and treatment notes, observations or other documentation relating to her demeanor, (or) statements, (or) treatment.”
Because of its status as a nonprofit that has no ties to the government, the police or prosecutor’s office, and because Safe Passage functions to provide emergency housing, advocacy and education to victims of domestic violence, it does not share personal information with attorneys or police.
“It doesn’t even tell law enforcement who its clients are,” Jones said.
The center relies on confidentiality.
“If the word got out that victim communications would be turned over, no victims would show up,” Jones said.
Calling the subpoena “unreasonable and oppressive,” Wayman denied defense attorneys the right to view information Safe Passage had compiled on the victim.
Jones said the center only collects personal information such as addresses, telephone numbers and family and work history.
The information defense attorneys requested, Jones said, “simply does not exist.”
But Wayman went further to show the illegitimacy of the subpoena because it did not request the victim appear in court, for a hearing or deposition, but only ordered that “someone bring documents to a lawyer’s office.”
“It goes to privacy, and it is unreasonable and oppressive and I am going to order it quashed,” the judge said.
South is accused in the latest case of holding a woman hostage in a trailer he rents in Coeur d’Alene, threatening her with a hatchet and knife, and raping her.
He is charged with kidnapping, rape, two counts of aggravated assault and battery. A three-day jury trial is scheduled Nov. 19 in Coeur d’Alene’s First District Court.