Murder Defendant Found Man to Win Case: Himself

Stewart was raised in Hyattsville, and he has lived there with his mother since his acquittal and release last month. He is an unmarried father of four and worked as a roofer before his arrest in 2005.

Although he won, Stewart said he plans a civil suit. Against whom? "Take your pick," he said, rattling off the names of defense attorneys and various officials in the criminal justice system who he believes have wronged him.

While his case was pending, to combat what he said was a concerted effort to deny him his rights, Stewart filed handwritten motions. Lots of them.

The official court file is about five inches thick. More than 4 1/2 inches are from motions Stewart filed, written in meticulously legible script, citing criminal codes and statutes. Many of the motions fault his former attorneys.

Authorities alleged that Stewart struck 43-year-old Derrick "Spud" Johnson, a guest at the Riverdale Park house where Stewart rented a room, seven times in the head and face. In a statement to police, Stewart's housemate, Kevin Green, an acquaintance of Johnson's, said Stewart had told him he didn't like having Johnson in the house.

Stewart and Green had been drinking beer on the night in question, July 11, 2005, according to prosecutors and Stewart's first attorney, Assistant Public Defender Janet Callis.

Green told police that he witnessed the attack, which he said occurred about 9:30 p.m., and that he walked to a nearby fire station to report it. Paramedics, however, did not arrive until shortly after midnight -- a possible discrepancy that did not go unnoticed by the defense.

At the first trial, in February 2006, prosecutors had a powerful witness: Stewart's sister, Nancy Dee Barahana. She testified that Stewart showed up at her home the night of the attack and told her that he thought he might have killed someone, according to Fran Longwell, the former assistant state's attorney who prosecuted the case.

The case went to the jury, but not for long. A little more than an hour into deliberations, the foreman told the judge that one of the jurors might not speak English well enough to have understood the jury instructions, Callis and Longwell said.

Judge Melanie M. Shaw Geter spoke to the juror, a woman of Asian descent who spoke conversational English, and decided the foreman's concerns were well founded. Shaw Geter declared a mistrial.

After the mistrial, Stewart's family hired lawyer David M. Simpson to represent him. In a Sept. 26, 2006, letter, Simpson encouraged his client to consider a plea deal on a charge of second-degree murder.

"Based on my review of the evidence, as well as the transcript of the earlier aborted trial, I strongly recommend that you consider the state's plea offer," he wrote. Simpson warned Stewart that he could be sentenced to life in prison if he went to trial and lost, while second-degree murder carries a maximum penalty of 30 years in prison.