The Legal Intelligencer

Raynes McCarty Pro-Bono Team Proves that Faulty Medical Evidence Led to Father Being Falsely Accused in Son's Death

A Costa Rican national from Centre County had a lot to be thankful for this Thanksgiving due to the pro bono work of two Philadelphia attorneys from Raynes McCarty.

Alejandro Mendez Vargas, charged with first-degree murder for the death of his 3-month-old son, sat in jail for more than two years with no bail or trial.

Charles Hehmeyer and A. Roy DeCaro, two civil lawyers who hadn’t done a criminal case in over 20 years, were asked to take over Vargas’ defense by Holmes Morton, a physician who specializes in genetic disorders among the Amish community.

Vargas’ wife and mother of their baby, Lisa Mullenax Mendez, lived in Centre County with Vargas and their son Lucas.

Mendez never wavered in her support of Vargas and maintained that he did not shake the baby to death as he was accused of doing, the attorneys said. It was that charge that had Vargas facing the death penalty.

Morton told Hehmeyer he believed the baby’s death was due to a vitamin K deficiency in his blood, something that was overlooked in a key lab report done by Geisinger Medical Center when the baby was brought to the center “lifeless,” the two attorneys said.

This was like déjà vu for Hehmeyer. He received a nearly identical call five years earlier from Morton. After that call, Hehmeyer took on as pro bono the case of another Amish mother who was accused by the same medical center of shaking her baby to death, he said.

Morton thought that Sara Glick, the child of an Amish minister, was not shaken to death but suffered from the same vitamin K deficiency that he assumed killed Vargas’ son. That mother was released on all charges.

Hehmeyer was not able to take on this case by himself because he did not meet state requirements to try a capital murder case. That’s where DeCaro came in. Hehmeyer thought that his years of experience in medical malpractice work and DeCaro’s former work as a state and federal prosecutor would be a good mix.

He then went to firm founder Arthur G. Raynes to see if the firm would back the cases. “Arthur told me, ‘If you truly believe he is innocent, then we are obligated to take the case pro bono. The firm will back you 100 percent,”’ Hehmeyer said in a statement.

After getting expert testimony from both Morton and Lucy Rorke, the chief of neuropathology at Philadelphia’s Children’s Hospital, DeCaro and Hehmeyer went forward with what they felt was a strong defense of a vitamin K deficiency.

According to the attorneys, taking care of the logistics of the case was difficult because the original prosecutor in the case, Centre County District Attorney Ray Gricar, went missing in April.

They secured a trial date of January 2006 earlier this summer. Their next step was to get rid of the capital murder charge, removing the possibility of a death sentence if the case went to trial.

In August, Hehmeyer and DeCaro were granted a motion to dismiss that capital charge by Centre County Common Pleas Court President Judge Charles C. Brown Jr.

“The court determines the commonwealth failed to present sufficient evidence to constitute a prima facie case on the charge of murder of the first degree,” Brown said. “The commonwealth presented evidence that Lucas’ death was a result of shaken-baby syndrome and possible impact to the head…however, the commonwealth did not present further evidence to show defendant’s intent to kill,” Brown said.

After receiving their first partial victory, their next steps were a bit unusual, according to DeCaro and Hehmeyer.

They served the District Attorney’s Office and prosecution experts with five defense expert reports and demanded a retraction of the prosecution’s reports that Vargas shook his baby to death, they said.

Their next step gave the prosecution a road map to their defense, but it was a risk they were willing to take, DeCaro and Hehmeyer said. They requested that they be allowed to present the case to the Attorney General’s Child Abuses Review Committee, a committee established to aid smaller counties in reviewing complex medical malpractice cases.

The committee did reconvene to discuss the case again, but the defense was not allowed in. It has traditionally been a committee for the prosecution.

The two main defense experts, however, sat on this committee. The day after the committee met, the District Attorney’s Office offered Vargas a deal, DeCaro said.

Vargas was offered a plea of involuntary manslaughter and immediate release from prison with time served, according to the attorneys.

The defense refused the deal, which would have forced Vargas to admit his guilt. The prosecution then returned with a second offer of a plea of nolo contendere, allowing him to maintain his innocence and walk out of jail with time served.

It seems that both sides were hesitant to take this case, where neither sides’ experts would budge, to trial.

It’s a horrible position to put someone in,” DeCaro said in a statement. “Alejandro knows he is innocent. But how can you go to trial in a murder case and risk a jury mistake which would put him in prison for more than 20 years?” Vargas walked out of jail just a few days before Thanksgiving after accepting a plea of no contest to involuntary manslaughter.

The Centre County district attorney that tried the case, Lance T. Marshall, said he was concerned about a jury trial as well.

“Dr. Rorke and Dr. Morton, they’re heavyweights. We’re not suggesting they’re not heavyweights in this field.” Marshall said. “But if the scientists can’t agree on how this baby died, how can 12 people?”

Vargas’ deal allowed him to go back to Costa Rica a free man or remain here with a 19-month probation term to serve. He decided to go back to his home country, but he still has the option of coming back to America.

Mendez is a college profession in Pennsylvania and remained in the country to finish out the school year. According to DeCaro, the two still want to be together, and at the end of this school year that is what they will do. It is still undetermined where they will choose to live.

“He had the option,” Marshall said of Vargas’ option to stay in the country. “He would have been an immigrant convicted of involuntary manslaughter. His prospects of getting a job, I think, quite frankly, aren’t very good.”

Both sides view this case as at least a partial win.

“It was important for us to get a conviction here,” Marshall said. “We didn’t want this case to be kind of the standard for vitamin K deficiency.

“I know intellectually it is a good result,” Hehmeyer said in a statement. “But it doesn’t feel good. These doctors are going to sweep this mistake under the carpet.”