OGDEN -- A judge has ruled that enough evidence exists to advance a Roy man to trial on child abuse homicide charges -- then he released the man from jail.
"I probably made a mistake," 2nd District Judge Ernie Jones said Friday of his Oct. 5 decision to raise Robert Glenn Abbott's bail to $200,000.
Jones had just listened to arguments on a defense motion to reduce the bail to the $20,000 Abbott had previously met.
He had also just heard more than two hours of testimony in Abbott's preliminary hearing establishing the minimum standard of evidence had been met to sustain the homicide charge in the death of Abbott's stepdaughter.
"We've heard child murders where the victim was starved to death, where they were burned with cigarettes," Jones said. "Having heard the evidence, this case is clearly different. It's a case of recklessness."
Abbott was to be released from Weber County Jail later Friday, having previously posted the $20,000 bail.
Jones noted bail is meant to jail someone considered a flight risk or a threat to the community, and he said he found Abbott to be neither. "Also, now, I don't think he is a threat to the other children in the family. I just don't think he is."
Deputy Weber County Attorney Ben Willoughby reiterated the prosecution's stance.
"The defense accuses the state of exaggeration. They're trying to say there was no cruelty or depravity, but Mr. Abbott's actions are examples of cruelty and depravity."
Abbott, 31, is charged with first-degree felony child abuse homicide in the Sept. 9 death of 2-year-old Hailey Byrne at their home in Roy.
Police were called to the home in the 1900 block of 4700 South that morning when the girl's mother called authorities to say that Hailey was unresponsive.
Emergency medical responders found the girl dead from apparent suffocation.
Police said Abbott admitted that, the night before, he had pressed the "crying and screaming" Hailey's face into a pillow "nine or 10 times" in an attempt to quiet her so she wouldn't wake the couple's 1-year-old.
He said the girl was breathing when he left her on her bed. He had an early morning appointment at a methadone clinic for drug counseling.
Bernie Allen, part of Abbott's defense team, argued, "Even if everything the prosecution states is true, which we feel it is not, this is just an attempt to quiet a yelling child. ... There is nothing grave or egregious enough to blow up the bail to an inappropriate level."
Allen and co-counsel Randy Richards had been prepared to argue a motion seeking a court order for the jail to resume Abbott's medication, Wellbutrin, to offset his suicidal depression since the girl's death.
Willoughby had argued that Abbott's five suicide attempts in the jail since Oct. 19 were another reason to keep his bail high.
Allen said a lack of the medication while in jail caused Abbott's suicide attempts.
A deputy state medical examiner testified that if it weren't for a call during the autopsy from Roy police about Abbott's admissions, he would have ruled the cause of death as undetermined.
But Abbott's admissions bolstered what would have been otherwise insignificant evidence of possible asphyxiation, said Dr. Eric Christensen.
Allen and Richards have requested extra money -- the Abbott family is drained of finances for the case -- to hire experts to counter what they believe was Roy police leading Abbott into his confession.
The motions are pending.
Comments