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A state judge should not grant a convicted killer a new trial because — despite the defendant's claims — no new evidence has been found to warrant one, Utah County prosecutors said in court papers filed Friday.
Even a revised opinion from a state medical examiner about the manner of Heidy Truman's 2012 death fails to provide sufficient grounds to retry her husband, Conrad Truman.
The opinion "does not constitute new evidence," Utah County prosecutors wrote in the 200-plus page 4th District Court filing, "since it is based on information that, with reasonable diligence, would have been discovered and produced at trial."
A jury in 2014 convicted Conrad Truman, 34, on charges of first-degree felony murder and second-degree felony obstruction of justice charges for fatally shooting his wife at their Orem home in 2012.
A judge last year sentenced him to consecutive prison terms of 15-years-to-life and one-to-15-years.
But Truman maintains his innocence and has said he believes his wife's death may have been suicide.
In August, his attorneys filed a 400-plus-page petition asking the court for a new trial, citing the new findings of a medical examiner and a litany of errors by the prosecution as grounds.
Among the complaints: distorted crime-scene diagrams, the failure to test both Trumans for gunshot residue, and deliberate misrepresentations about the evidence, including that the couple was struggling financially. A $1 million life insurance policy death benefit was cited as a motive for Heidi Truman's murder.
In its response, Utah County acknowledged that the trial wasn't perfect, but said the errors cited in Truman's "burdensome" motion were "matters of opinion and interpretation," or harmless, invited missteps, not evidence.
"But even according to the United States Supreme Court, a perfect trial is not what the Constitution guarantees," Deputy Utah County Attorney Craig Johnson wrote. "A fair trial is what the Constitution guarantees. … The defendant received a fair trial, and as such, the court should not grant a new trial."
Johnson also argues that Truman has failed to meet three criteria for newly discovered evidence required by Utah's courts in order to secure a new trial.
Those include showing that the information could not have been discovered and produced at trial; that it is not merely cumulative; and that it is sufficiently significant that it might produce a different probable outcome at trial.
It wasn't immediately clear on Friday when 4th District Judge Samuel McVey would issue a ruling.
At the very least, Truman's attorneys have said their claims should warrant an evidentiary hearing to consider what they believe are significant new findings.
Central to the defense's argument is the revised opinion from Edward Leis, a deputy state medical examiner, who in 2013 ruled the death a homicide.
"I can no longer state with medical or scientific certainty which individual fired the fatal shot," Leis said in a 2015 affidavit filed with Truman's petition. "I can no longer rule out the possibility that Heidy Truman died of a self-inflicted gunshot wound of the head."
In the affidavit, Leis states that his new opinion is based on information provided by the defense and his own visit to the Truman home. Leis said he also believes information he received from police and prosecutors was inaccurate.
In the county's response, Johnson said, "They were not."