Let us boil down the state of things in the case of Commonwealth of Pennsylvania v. Subramanyam Vedam:
No witnesses ever came forward and said they saw Subu Vedam shoot Tom Kinser.
No evidence was ever produced that Subu was with Tom when he died.
The Commonwealth’s case against Subu hinged on one fact and one theory.
The fact: Subu was with Tom the day he disappeared in 1980.
The theory: Subu owned a .25-caliber weapon. The hole in Tom’s skull was made by a .25-caliber bullet.
The problem with the theory: The murder weapon was never found. The circumference of the hole in Tom’s skull was smaller than the circumference of a .25-caliber bullet.
The problem with the guilty verdicts in Subu’s 1983 and 1988 trials: The juries never heard about the FBI measurements that showed the bullet hole was smaller than the bullet.
In vacating Subu’s convictions last week, Court of Common Pleas Judge Jonathan Grine put it succinctly:
“Having the specific FBI measurements would have bolstered Petitioner’s [Subu’s] argument that a .25-caliber gun could not have been the murder weapon and Petitioner could not have committed the murder because there was no evidence that Petitioner had access to any other gun or ammunition smaller than a .25-caliber.”
The jury’s lack of access to those measurements, Judge Grine wrote in his opinion, “undermines confidence in the outcome of the trial,” and the suppressed evidence “raises a reasonable probability that its disclosure would have produced a different result…”
Subu’s supporters, understandably, were in a jubilant mood when Judge Grine’s ruling circulated last week. But the ball is now in Centre County District Attorney Bernie Cantorna’s court. He can: prepare for a new trial, appeal Judge Grine’s ruling or simply walk away from the case.
Thus far, Cantorna has said that he remains confident in the jury’s original verdict. That’s discouraging to Subu’s camp, but as long as a new trial is under consideration, His Honor can’t very well say otherwise.
I am woefully inexpert when it comes to the workings of a D.A.’s office, but my guess is that a prosecutor’s primary consideration when weighing whether to try a case is simply, “can we win?”
Leaving aside the more troubling aspects of Subu’s two trials – all-white juries passing judgment on a dark-skinned man; the prosecution’s “othering” of the defendant via allusions to his meditation and yoga practices – it seems clear that the deaths of key investigators, fading memories and the introduction of the suppressed measurements are going to make it difficult to obtain a new guilty verdict.
If that is Cantorna’s calculation, what remains is the choice between appealing Judge Grine’s ruling and dropping the case. My question about filing an appeal is: Why? Why cling to this prisoner? Why not factor in Subu’s stellar record as a prisoner, his age, the amount of time he has already served and, above all, the weakness of the case against him, and say enough is enough?
The other thing the D.A. said in response to Judge Grine’s ruling is that he is “sensitive to how difficult and confusing this news is to the surviving family and friends of Mr. Kinser.” As well he should be.
At the same time, if Subu has been telling the truth all these years when he says that he did not kill Tom Kinser, “Subu’s continued incarceration for a crime he did not commit does not provide justice for Tom Kinser, his family, or his friends.”
That quote comes from Subu’s family, whose stake in this matter should also be considered. They have believed in his innocence from the first. They have visited him in prison and stayed in close touch and seen the person he has become: educated, peaceable, generous. That is the person I have seen also when I have visited Subu at Huntingdon.
For the life of me, I cannot see any reason to keep someone locked up other than to protect us, the public, from a dangerous person and I cannot see how a person who has not committed a single violent act in 42 years in prison and perhaps has never committed a violent act in his life can be considered dangerous.
For what it’s worth, The Sentencing Project favors maximum 20-year sentences for nearly all crimes. “Sentences that close the door on rehabilitation and second chances are cruel and misguided.”
The Supreme Court agrees when it comes to defendants under the age of 18. The state of Washington applies such thinking to defendants under the age of 21. Other states are considering following suit. Subu Vedam was 19 when Tom Kinser disappeared.
I understand that the district attorney does not have the power to pardon or make evaluations of a prisoner’s potential to commit violent crimes upon his release from prison, so let’s return to the matter of reasonable doubt.
There simply isn’t and never was enough evidence to prove that Subu Vedam killed Tom Kinser. It is therefore past time to let Subu Vedam go home.
