The attorney for a former Palmer Home employee accused of sexual battery was formally sanctioned in Lowndes Circuit Court Wednesday after he referred to a victim’s medical history in front of the jury.
Thomas Pavlinic of Maryland is no longer allowed to question witnesses on the stand for the rest of the trial of his client, 45-year-old Seth Copes, per a ruling by presiding Judge Jim Kitchens. Copes’ trial began Tuesday and is expected to continue through the rest of the week.
Copes and his wife, Kara, worked as house parents at Palmer Home for Children from 2006 to 2013. Copes is accused of sexually abusing three of the girls who lived at the home in the months after he arrived. He and his wife were terminated from their positions and Copes charged with two counts of sexual battery in 2013 after two of the victims came forward.
During one of the victims’ testimony on Wednesday, Pavlinic began to ask her about an incident from her childhood that required medical attention before Assistant District Attorney Scott Rogillio objected, causing Kitchens to send the jury out of the room.
The information, which was not directly related to the case, could have colored the jury’s view of the credibility of the victim’s testimony, Rogillio argued.
“He was about to go into real violations,” Rogillio said. “There was complete assassination of her character.
“The jury’s heard it now,” he added.
Kitchens, who raised his voice when admonishing Pavlinic, said the attorney’s question violated the victim’s medical privilege, which the victim had not waived. However, Pavlinic disagreed.
“For the purposes of the record, the statement … did not come from medical records,” he said.
He said he learned of the incident from a separate conversation with Copes’ wife, but Kitchens said she would not have been able to waive the victim’s medical privilege either.
Kitchens further alleged Pavlinic’s tactic was “an intentional act to prejudice the jury against (the victim).”
Pavlinic claimed that wasn’t his intention.
“There is no way for you to climb inside my head and know that,” he said.
Pavlinic is an attorney with Maryland-based Premier Defense Group, an organization devoted exclusively to defending those accused of sex crimes.
After being sanctioned, Pavlinic moved for a mistrial on the grounds that defense attorney Patrick Rand of Richland, who Copes also retained, had not made the same preparations for questioning certain witnesses that Pavlinic had. Kitchens denied the motion.
Rand will question witnesses for the rest of the trial.
The sanctions came after two days of testimony during which prosecutors repeatedly objected to evidence Pavlinic wanted to bring up, including alleged sexual behavior by the victims as teenagers. Kitchens ruled before the trial that any evidence about the victims’ sexual activity outside the assaults they reported would violate Mississippi’s rape shield law.
Kitchens had previously warned Pavlinic to ask outside the jury’s hearing if he had a question about evidence after Pavlinic made reference to one of the victims “sexting” during opening statements on Tuesday.
On Wednesday, Kitchens said after all those discussions, Pavlinic should have known to approach the bench before bringing up the medical issues.
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