Case against judge is postponed

The deal for the judge accused of trying to enter two women's hotel room remains possible.

By ANITA KUMAR

© St. Petersburg Times,
published August 18, 2001

Pinellas-Pasco Circuit Judge Charles Cope, charged with trying to enter the hotel room of two women in Carmel, Calif., will have his day in court next week.

The case was postponed from Friday until Aug. 22, when Judge Gary Meyer, who has presided over the case, returns from vacation.

Prosecutors offered Cope a deal, but his California attorney, Tom Worthington, said that he did not agree with the possible terms of probation.

The case could be resolved next week or be set for trial if a judge is unable to work out an agreement between the two sides.

After his arrest in California in April, Cope began to seek counseling for a drinking problem, said Lou Kwall, Cope's Florida attorney. He entered an in-patient rehabilitation program Monday and is expected to be there several weeks, Kwall said.

Neither Worthington nor the assistant district attorney handling the case would reveal terms of the proposed plea. The charges carry a maximum penalty of six months in jail.

Cope, 52, a married father of three, is charged with two misdemeanors, prowling/loitering and peering into an inhabited dwelling. Carmel police say he tried to enter the hotel room of a 64-year-old woman and her 31-year-old daughter at 12:30 a.m. April 5.

Cope was attending a judicial seminar in Carmel.

Cope, who called the incident a "huge misunderstanding," has pleaded not guilty. His attorneys have said the judge was simply taking a walk through Carmel, something tourists do all the time, and that someone else tried to get into the women's room.

- Information from reporter Virginia Hennessey at the Herald in Monterey County, Calif. was used in this report.

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