John Haskins
October 20, 2000

Ken Newell has spent countless days over the last year-and-a-half in Massachusetts courts facing twenty-six domestic violence charges filed by his mentally disturbed ex-wife, Cathy. One after the other, the charges have been dismissed for lack of evidence. 

Yesterday, Newell was finally found innocent of the last two charges during a trial before Judge Mark Coven in Quincy District Court. The 56-year-old father and self-employed landscaping contractor stood silently receiving a long hug from his sister, his eyes filled with tears, face flushed with emotion outside the courtroom. "Finally. Finally, the truth came out," he said softly. "I knew it would."

In the first case yesterday, a bank manager testified she was with Newell at exactly the time he supposedly threatened his ex-wife. In the second case, a family and friends were prepared to testify they were with Newell elsewhere when he allegedly followed Cathy in his vehicle. But their testimony was not needed. Judge Coven had already seen enough and prosecutor Roberta Ketty's latest attempt to get a conviction against Newell fell flat.

Coven had previously shown unusual patience toward the prosecution. Even with no credible evidence against Newell, prosecutor Ketty was strangely determined to prosecute him as a dangerous criminal. In fact, after Coven had granted numerous postponements to Ketty, the judge refused last August to grant a single postponement to Newell when the key witness in his defense, his ex-wife's sister, failed to appear.

In yesterday's proceedings, Ketty showed unusual determination in pressing for a conviction of the Braintree resident, though her key witness, Newell's ex-wife, failed to show up and evidence of Newell's innocence seemed remarkably strong. Prosecuting a person who strongly appears to be innocent is a basic violation of legal ethics. 

Though never found guilty of a single charge, Newell's life has been dismantled, his basic constitutional freedoms taken away. According to Newell's sister, he has lost his house and everything he owns and been bankrupted. Family members say that, though even Newell's mother-in-law begged him to talk to his children by telephone, a judge has prevented him from seeing or even speaking to them since June. One judge even put an unconstitutional gag order against him, preventing him from discussing his children, even with his dearest friends and family members. 

Well-known civil rights attorney Chester Darling referred to "serious Constitutional issues" in the state's handling of this and similar cases against fathers in such situations. In violation of the Constitutional right not to testify against oneself, Newell also has been coerced in a "battery intervention" program to confess to violent battery of his ex-wife to avoid a jail sentence. However, attorney Darling is confident that can be rectified through legal action.
 

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