Dibartolo Wants Sentence Overturned Former Deputy’S Oldest Daughter Still Believes He Shot Her Mother

FROM FOR THE RECORD (Friday, April 14, 2000): Correction Title incorrect: Larry Steinmetz is a deputy prosecutor for Spokane County. His title was incorrect in Thursday’s story.

Michelle Robinson doesn’t talk to her father anymore. But if she did, she would ask Tom DiBartolo two questions.

“Why are you appealing your sentence, and why are you dragging your family through this again?” Robinson said.

The oldest of DiBartolo’s five children, Robinson was back in court Wednesday to hear her father’s attorney argue why the convicted killer should have his sentence overturned.

DiBartolo is serving a 26-year sentence for first-degree murder in the killing of his wife, Patty DiBartolo.

Attorney Lorraine Parlange said evidence of DiBartolo’s extramarital affairs never should have been allowed during the trial of the former Spokane County sheriff’s deputy.

“He was not charged with adultery, and that’s what this case was about,” Parlange told the State Court of Appeals panel.

Testimony from women who said they had been involved in affairs with DiBartolo created “undue prejudice” in the jurors’ minds, Parlange said.

But Larry Steinmetz, a state assistant attorney general, said DiBartolo’s infidelity established motive in the case.

“It indicated the marriage was not good,” Steinmetz said.

“It was necessary to show why he would have committed the murder.”

The appeals panel generally takes about six weeks to announce its findings on whether a trial judge erred and a new trial is warranted.

In December 1997, a jury concluded DiBartolo planned to kill his wife at Spokane’s Lincoln Park, shooting her with her own .38-caliber pistol, then wounding himself to support his story of being attacked by two would-be robbers.

DiBartolo is serving his sentence at an undisclosed prison on the East Coast. Law enforcement officials and attorneys won’t say where DiBartolo is for his protection.

Parlange also asked the three-member appeals panel to overturn the conviction because witnesses who could have helped DiBartolo’s case were not allowed to testify.

DiBartolo could be retried if the panel agrees with his attorney.

Two men, Sam McNeal and Curtis Jones, who were later shot to death in separate incidents, could have offered evidence that someone else shot his wife, Parlange said.

McNeal was to testify about two men he drove across town after Patty DiBartolo’s murder. One of the men was Jones.

McNeal was shot to death in an altercation in a house in February 1998. Jones was killed in January 1998 in what police called a gang-related shooting.

McNeal said the two talked about killing a woman. A judge ruled that some of McNeal’s account was hearsay and could not be admitted.

Police investigated Jones and concluded he was not in Lincoln Park at the time of the murder.

DiBartolo told police he and his wife were approached by two black men on Nov. 2, 1996. After demanding money, one man grabbed a pistol and fired two shots, DiBartolo said - one shot killing Patty DiBartolo, the second wounding him in the side.

McNeal and Jones each had several convictions for property and drug crimes, according to court documents.

Steinmetz said DiBartolo’s contention that witnesses who could have helped his case were not called was “a smoke screen.”

Parlange also said the trial should have been moved from Spokane County because of all the pre-trial publicity surrounding the case.

Because the trial was in Spokane, jurors overheard a courthouse security guard say he would have found DiBartolo guilty, Parlange said.

Steinmetz said the trial court was aware of the incident.

“The trial court instructed each juror not to listen or make any decision outside the courtroom,” Steinmetz said. “It’s not giving any credit to the jury for its ability.”

After the hearing, Robinson said she had to bite her tongue when she listened to Parlange argue for her father.

“I wanted to get up there and issue a rebuttal myself,” Robinson said. “I just wish he would let this go.”

Robinson said when DiBartolo called her to the hospital and told her what happened, she immediately had a “gut feeling” that her father was responsible for the shooting.

“I kept it to myself for two weeks before I said anything,” said Robinson, who lives in Spokane.

She called herself a forgiving person; however, she said she still hasn’t forgiven her father for killing her mother.

“I want him to ask us, his children, for forgiveness,” Robinson said. “Even if he gets a new trial, I don’t think anyone can find him innocent.”