By Donna Hales
Phoenix Staff Writer
—
Convicted rapist Robert Nelson Clifton of Warner wants a new trial because his cousin didn’t get to testify.
The cousin, Mary Clifton, was arrested on a 12-year-old arrest warrant from Cherokee County during a recess of Robert Clifton’s trial, the filing states.
Jurors found Clifton guilty July 16 on four counts of rape and recommended a 45-year sentence on each count. He is scheduled to be sentenced Sept. 15.
Instead, defense attorney Lowell G. Howe filed a motion Tuesday for an Oct. 14 hearing requesting the guilty verdict be set aside. He wants Clifton to be granted a new trial.
Muskogee County Assistant District Attorney Larry Moore called Howe’s filing frivolous and a wish for a second bite of the apple.
Howe also alleges a woman in a purple shirt who sat by the family of the child who was raped communicated with jurors and questioned them during a recess at trial.
“You can allege anything with no names,” Moore said.
Because the prosecutor on the case, Assistant District Attorney Nikki Baker, used to work in Cherokee County, Howe alleges she may have had something to do with Mary Clifton being arrested before she could testify.
Baker said she had nothing to do with that arrest. And Howe would have to be able to show harm occurred to his client even though Clifton didn’t testify. Someone else testified to what Clifton planned to testify to, the prosecutor said.
All Howe would have had to do to get Clifton to testify would have been to notify the judge she was in jail and needed to be brought back to court, prosecutors said.
Howe is trying to blame his loss on someone else with his allegations in the Tuesday motion, Baker said.
Howe’s filing states Clifton’s arrest intimidated another witness, Clifton’s husband, 57, and also kept him from testifying on behalf of Robert Clifton.
Reach Donna Hales at 684-2923 or dhales@muskogeephoenix.com.
