Goff case to get new judge

Published 9:58 am Thursday, February 10, 2011

Crow won’t serve; cites health

The judge who sentenced Megan Goff to a minimum of 33 years at the state reformatory has taken himself off the retrial of the high-profile murder case.

In an judgment entry filed on Tuesday, Meigs County Common Pleas Court Judge Fred Crow recused himself from the trial, citing a medical illness. Crow was originally assigned to the case because of conflicts from the then Lawrence County Common Pleas judges.

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Crow found the former Hamilton Township woman guilty in a bench trial in 2007 of murdering her estranged husband, Bill Goff, at his home. Goff had admitted to shooting her husband 15 times in the head and upper torso. However, during her trial Goff had offered the battered woman syndrome to show that she had acted in self-defense.

On Dec. 30, the Ohio Supreme Court ruled 7-0 that Goff’s constitutional rights had been violated during her trial before Crow. The high court sent the case back to the local court.

Goff’s appeal centered on whether the state had the right to compel her to submit to a psychiatric exam by its expert when the defendant was asserting a battered woman syndrome defense. During her trial the state had called in nationally known expert Dr. Philip Resnick to examine Goff. Resnick testified that he was unable to form an opinion on whether the then 27-year-old suffered from battered woman syndrome.

However, on the stand Resnick repeated statements made by Goff during his examination and described what he called inconsistencies between those statements and the woman’s responses during police investigators’ questioning.

The high court ruled that while a defendant may be compelled to undergo a psychiatric exam, testimony from that exam must be confined to the battered woman syndrome and how it might have influenced the defendant’s actions.

Crow’s order followed a motion filed by Goff’s attorney, Paula Brown of the Columbus firm of Kravitz, Brown and Dortch that handled the woman’s appeals.

In it Brown requested that Crow recuse himself citing the due process clause of the 14th Amendment.

“A reasonable and objective observer would harbor serious doubts about whether this court would be able to put aside its prior factual findings and its knowledge of Dr. Resnick’s constitutionally violative testimony and approach Ms. Goff’s retrial without any preconceived notions or prejudices regarding her credibility, her mental health and her guilt,” Brown argued in the motion. “It would simply be impossible for the court to erase from his mind the factual and credibility determinations made at Ms. Goff’s first trial …. and have a neutral position toward Ms. Goff’s guilt or innocence during her retrial.”

There has yet to be a hearing on that motion.

It is up to the Ohio Supreme Court to appoint all visiting judge.

“We receive a request from the local court,” according to Bret Crow, spokesperson for the high court. “Sometimes the court in its request recommends a particular judge be assigned.”

Right now the supreme court has not received a request from the local court, the spokesperson said.

Judge Crow set a pre-trial hearing for March 4 with trial date set for Aug. 1. However, the new judge may alter that calendar.

“We will be awaiting the decision of the supreme court to appoint a replacement judge,” Lawrence County Assistant Prosecutor Robert Anderson said. “We will proceed with the time frame he sets.”

A call made to the law office of Brown was not returned by press time.