Should this be a murder case?
Valerie Hamilton overdosed on heroin and cocaine while apparently in the presence of Michael Harvey and he is charged with her murder. Trying, much less convicting, those with a person when they die of a drug overdose for murder is pretty rare, even if they provided the drugs.
Then again, Harvey did some seriously weird things, like not calling 911 when others advised him it was clear that she needed medical attention, hiding her body in a storage unit and then fleeing to Niagara Falls and burning his getaway car, all actions consistent with covering up a crime. And he has a history of prowling bars for women, taking them home and doing terrible things to them. He picked up the woman he was charged with raping over a decade ago in a bar in New York, and was ultimately convicted on a lesser sex charge (first-degree sexual abuse) and forced to register as a sex offender.
Still, this could be a tough sell for a jury. They’ll probably try to prove he injected her himself, since the needle site was reported to be on her right arm and she is right handed. Proving that will be tough unless Harvey admitted to it.
Even Valerie Hamilton’s father, the police chief of Concord, has had doubts about whether this was a murder, words that will surely come back during a trial.
“If I wasn’t in law enforcement I would probably say he killed my daughter. But because I know killed means murder, you know, first degree murder, I don’t know. I don’t know enough about it to say that,” Merl Hamilton said. “I think if he wasn’t with my daughter that night she would be alive.”
You’ve got to wonder if Harvey would have even been prosecuted if this case hadn’t received the publicity it has, and if Hamilton weren’t the daughter of a local, well-connected police chief.
Still, I could make a good argument that Harvey should be prosecuted. I’m on the line on this one. What do you think?
