The following text may have been generated by Optical Character Recognition, with varying degrees of accuracy. Reader beware!

CR TR STR "IE 0 RE te Lair a 2 Cl NNER FI 12 - "WEEKEND STAR" FRIDAY, DECEMBER 22, 2000 Trial ends in acquittal for officers From page 1 When Const. Hoskin refused to give older brother Enzo, then 19, any information, Enzo uttered threats against Hoskin, court heard. It was eight®days later, on the night of Dec. 28, when officers Hoskin and Martin, accompanied by and Durham officers Robins and Nancy George, traveled to the Romagnuolo home to question Enzo. (Enzo would later be acquitted of threat- ening Hoskin in a Newmarket court, a fact withheld from the jury during trial.) After initially telling the officers that no one named Enzo lived at the sprawling home on the 17th Sideroad of Brock Township, Tony Romagnuolo eventually told Enzo to come out of the house and speak to Const. Hoskin. After denying any knowledge of the threats, Enzo was placed under arrest. During the last four weeks the members of the jury heard through tape recordings made by the two York officers that night that Enzo told Hoskin, "I ain't goin' nowhere buddy". The tapes follow the escalation of the confrontation, with Tony heard shouting, "You'll have to arrest the whole f--in family!" A fight developed during which Const. Hoskin was repeatedly punched by Enzo, and Tony placed Const. Martin in a choke hold. Court heard that after being shot in the leg by Martin as he frantically tried to escape from the hold, Mr. Romagnuolo forced the officer's gun into his face leaving Const. Martin with a wound to the tip of his nose. In an effort to save himself from what he told the court was imminent death at the hands of Tony Romagnuolo, Const. Martin testified he forced his gun into the man's abdomen area and "fired it until it wouldn't fire any more." While this struggle took place, Rocco Romagnuolo, according to the testimony of Const. Robins, exited the house and was confronted by the officer. ~ Const. Robins testified that Rocco pushed him out of the way, and began to run towards the struggle between Tony and Const. Martin. Const. Robins told the court that he saw Martin bleeding from the face and losing the struggle for control of his gun. He said that after warning Rocco to stop, he fired twice at the young man, hitting him once in the abdomen. Harry Black, defense council for Al Robins, told the court that the officers actions were necessary in order to preserve ox Rocco (left) and Lorenzo Romagnuolo outside the Whitby courthouse in a file photo, taken earlier this year. Below are the officers who were acquit- ted earlier this week by a jury: Al Robins (left), Randy Martin, and Mike Hoskin. ~ the life of Const. Martin, and that the shoot- ing was justified. Heavy Security What the jury did not see was the extra- ordinary security in place for the trial of the three officers. Members of the Durham Regional Police's elite Tactical Support Unit (TAC) guarded the doors to the court. Everyone entering, with the exception of lawyers, was carefully searched. Members of the TAC Unit in plain clothes with secret service type ear pieces carefully guarded the accused at all times. The halls and his partner Na e shooting inciden tic. stress syndrome were cleared whenever officers Hoskin, Martin and Robins moved within the build- ing. Another event kept from the jury occurred when a member of the Special Investigations Unit (the civilian agency which laid charges in the case) left a file box containing a Barretta police pistol and ammunition unattended beside members of the Romagnuolo family in the courtroom. An alert member of the TAC unit spotted the gun, and quietly gave it to the defense lawyers. In the aftermath of the jury's decision, Harry Black read a statement for his client Al gely traumatic experien Robins. "(People) will draw what they want from this case, and from the evidence in this case," said Mr. Black. "But to me what this signifies most is the awesome decisions that police officers must sometimes make... decisions they hope they never have to make. And it is true to say that the most terrifying ones they have to make are typically the ones in which they have absolutely the least amount of time to make." David Humphrey, lawyer for Const. Martin, was critical of the SIU and its investi- gators, as well as of the Crown's office for prosecuting the cops. "Given that the SIU are so quick to judge the police, it's only right that others should closely scrutinize the conduct of the SIU," Mr. Humphrey said after his client's acquit- tal. "This is the type of case where the Crown should have given careful consideration to whether the charges should have been fully prosecuted." "A lot of the evidence (that acquitted Martin) came from the Romagnuolo family members," said Mr. Humphrey. "Linda con- firmed that he (Martin) was being choked. Michael (the youngest son) confirming that there was a struggle over the gun moments before the fatal shots were fired. "In those circumstances, the Crown should have taken a serious look at the case." No comment from family The Romagnuolo family left the court building after refusing comment, and still under the watchful eye of SIU investigators. They still have a $40 million lawsuit against the officers and their police forces pending in civil court. The three officers and their families left the court the way they have for the past five weeks, under close guard by heavily armed officers, and sped off into the cold night. It was a frigid, and snowy night very much like the one when they travelled to a rural home to make an arrest that turned the world of four families upside down. After the very public way in which the trial was conducted, the moments following the not guilty finding were subdued. Officers Martin and Hoskin showed no visible emo- tion as the verdict was read. A gasp was heard from the court gallery. And a single tear was visible on the cheek of the weathered face of Const. Al Robins. Randy Martin, who has self-defense, told of fear they felt ic) are never t famatic experienc for these officers. | Al (Robins) can get on with his life, Al's ified and it may be trie, having heard evry likely saved ike lf of Ran Rik Davie