New Wrinkles In Sudafed Tampering Case Grand Jury Abuse Hinted As Lifer Seeks New Trial Based On Confession

Government lawyers, fighting a motion for a new trial in a product tampering case, got a preview of testimony from at least two witnesses by calling them before a grand jury.

The case raises questions of a potential abuse of federal power, defense attorneys say, because grand juries are supposed to be used for investigations that may result in criminal charges.

Joseph E. Meling, serving a life prison term, sought a new trial last year after Monte Lee Bridges, a fellow inmate at the federal prison in Sheridan, Ore., claimed responsibility for a Sudafed tampering case in which two people died in 1991.

Bridges, 59, sentenced in 1995 to five years and three months for a bank robbery in Northern California, said he put cyanide-filled capsules into blister packs of the 12-hour decongestant, then placed the packages into Sudafed boxes in stores in the Olympia and Tacoma areas as an extortion scheme.

He said he thought the capsules looked different enough that no one would take them and was so upset by the deaths and conviction of Meling in 1993 that he left a suicide note to his son, Monte Lynn Bridges, at Wallace Falls State Park, 35 miles northeast of Seattle.

Last year Bridges confessed to lawyers for Meling and then his son, a welder in Sultan, a few miles west of the park, who led investigators to a note in a buried plastic container there July 10.

The elder Bridges said he became more distressed after meeting Meling in prison. Testimony indicated they never were cellmates, spent little time together and seemed to be only casual acquaintances.

U.S. District Judge Barbara J. Rothstein is expected to rule on Meling’s motion soon.

No new charges have been filed.

“So what are they using the grand jury for?” asked James C. Frush, a lawyer appointed to represent Bridges in hearings on the motion.

“If they were trying to push an obstruction of justice charge against Joe and Monte (the father), then that’s a proper use of the grand jury,” Frush said. “You might think, more cynically, that it was meant to put more pressure on Monte’s relatives in a proceeding that is quite fraught with influence and power on the part of the prosecution.”

Grand jury investigations are conducted under tight secrecy. Even lawyers for those subpoenaed to testify are barred, although witnesses may go outside to consult with their attorneys before answering questions.

U.S. Attorney Katrina C. Pflaumer said her office was “bound by the highest levels of secrecy” on grand jury proceedings and thus could not comment on the case.

The probe on the Meling motion was revealed when Bridges’ son said in open court he was made to testify more than 2-1/2 months earlier about his father’s account.

In a brief telephone interview, the younger Bridges said he was planning to leave the area in about a month, largely because of the case.

“I have been hammered (both times on the witness stand), and I’m pretty fed up with the whole thing,” he said.

Meling, 35, a former insurance salesman in Tumwater, is serving a life prison term for two counts of product tampering causing death, four of nonlethal tampering, two of perjury and three of insurance fraud.

His wife, Jennifer, nearly died of cyanide poisoning on Feb. 2, 1991, the day after his $700,000 accidental death policy on her became effective. Kathleen Daneker, 40, of Tacoma, died that Feb. 11 and Stan McWhorter, 40, of Lacey, died a week later after taking what they thought was Sudafed.

Two tampered Sudafed packages were found in homes and one was recovered from a store during a $17 million nationwide recall.

Jennifer Meling stood by her husband at trial but later got a divorce, saying she believed he was responsible.