By CARY DAVIS nd CHASE SQUIRES
Published June 18, 2003
It's not often that Pasco-Pinellas State Attorney Bernie McCabe ventures into a courtroom these days.
Most of his time is taken up with administrative duties and making decisions about how cases will be prosecuted. The job of actually trying the cases falls to the more than 100 assistant state attorneys who work for him in Pasco and Pinellas.
But McCabe has taken a personal interest in the June 1 sniper-style shooting death of longtime Pasco sheriff's Lt. Charles "Bo" Harrison in Lacoochee. McCabe said Tuesday that he will personally handle the case against the suspect, 19-year-old Alfredie Steele Jr.
A career prosecutor with three decades of experience, McCabe said he has a policy of personally handling any case in which a law enforcement officer is killed on duty.
Tom Hanlon, the public defender appointed to represent Steele, expressed surprise Tuesday when he learned that McCabe would be trying the case. Hanlon said he would defend the case the same way no matter who prosecutes.
McCabe will take Steele's case to a grand jury this morning. McCabe has said previously that he expects to ask the grand jury to indict Steele on a charge of first-degree murder.
Harrison, 57, was shot in the back while sitting in his marked patrol car, conducting surveillance of Rumors nightclub in Lacoochee. Investigators say Harrison, a 30-year veteran who was two weeks from retirement, was shot with a high-powered rifle.
For Hanlon, most of the time spent between Steele's arrest and the day sometime in the future when prosecutors must reveal their evidence to the defense is a waiting game. Some things can be explored, such as potential witnesses, possible alibis and Steele's mental condition.
A preliminary exam shows Steele understands the seriousness of the possible charges facing him and is fit to sit in a courtroom, Hanlon said. His client hasn't been examined in depth to determine whether he was sane when Harrison was shot, although there is a history of paranoid schizophrenia in Steele's family, Hanlon said.
A mental illness, if Steele is found to suffer from one, could be a tool for the defense, Hanlon said. But as of Tuesday, he said, those tests had not been conducted.
