High court to hear appeal in murder-for-hire case

The Maine Supreme Judicial Court is scheduled to hear arguments next week in Portland in the appeal of the former Belfast woman who was convicted of the murder-for-hire of her husband, Mervin “Sonny” Grotton.

Norma Small, 63, was convicted of murder during a weeklong jury trial last August. She also was convicted of defrauding the federal government of pension and survivor benefits. At the time of his death in December 1983, Grotton, 46, of Belfast, was a Navy chief petty officer.

Small was sentenced to 60 years in prison on the murder conviction and received a consecutive 10-year sentence on the theft conviction.

Two others charged in the crime, Boyd Smith, 44, of Brooks, and Joel Fuller, 47, of Searsmont, were found not guilty in separate jury trials. Smith’s trial took place in 2002 and Fuller’s was earlier this year.

The case went unsolved for 17 years. Then, in the spring of 2001, state police detectives and undercover agents from the Naval Criminal Investigative Service obtained evidence to indict Small, Smith and Fuller.

Throughout all three Superior Court trials, the state contended that Small asked Smith to help her find someone to kill her husband. Smith testified that he approached Fuller and provided him with Small’s name after telling him what she wanted. Smith testified that he was unsure whether Fuller ever followed up on the matter, but assumed he had when he learned that Grotton had been shot to death in his front yard. Fuller never testified at any of the trials.

Small’s attorney, Christopher McLain of Camden, said he was basing his appeal on a decision by the trial judge to allow hearsay testimony to be entered as evidence. Larry Phillips, a former friend of Fuller’s, was allowed to recount for the jury some incriminating statements that he claimed Fuller told him about the crime and murder weapon.

Although Small’s attorney during the trial, Peter Mason of Searsport, argued away from the jury against permitting Phillips to tell his story, Justice Nancy Mills permitted it to be entered as evidence, McLain said Thursday.

“Norma did not have the ability to challenge those pieces of evidence about the gun and some of the comments Phillips claimed Fuller made,” McLain said.

McLain noted that Fuller, who had his own murder trial pending, exercised his Fifth Amendment rights and refused to testify in the Small trial.

“We had Larry Phillips saying ‘Joel Fuller said,'” McLain said. “That was the only link between Fuller and Norma, and that testimony was crucial to the state’s case. I don’t think she would have been convicted without that piece of testimony.”

In his brief to the supreme court, Assistant Attorney General Donald W. Macomber discounted McLain’s argument. Macomber noted that Phillips’ statements did not directly implicate Small and tended to “subject Fuller to criminal liability” for his role in the case. He said that because Fuller refused to testify, the rules of evidence permit the introduction of statements made by others.

“In this case there was no direct reference to Small in Fuller’s statements to Phillips,” Macomber says in his brief. “Indeed, the only reference in those statements to the involvement of a third party was when Fuller stated that ‘he was paid to shoot some guy,’ which implies that another person gave him money to commit the crime. There is nothing in this statement that directly or indirectly establishes that it was Small who paid Fuller. The only way for the jury to draw that inference is when the state is linked to other evidence in the trial.”

McLain said he also planned to argue a specific point of law regarding hearsay evidence that may have been misinterpreted by the trial judge and the attorneys. He believes Small deserves a new trial.

“I want to have an opportunity to go to trial now that Joel Fuller has no Fifth Amendment privilege. I want to have a fair trial based on witness testimony. I feel it would be unfortunate to let a conviction stand based on hearsay,” McLain said.