Alleged intruders request jury trial in Stewart case

ELLSWORTH – The two men accused of criminal trespass last July on Martha Stewart’s Seal Harbor property have requested jury trials in Maine Superior Court.

The attorney for the two Rhode Island residents said Wednesday her clients were invited into Stewart’s Skylands estate by a gardener after he saw the two men admiring Stewart’s landscape and gardens.

Attorney Lynne Williams of Camden also asserts that the arrests were illegal because Maine law allows police to arrest people on misdemeanor charges only when they witness the alleged offense or under special circumstances, such as the threat of violence or flight.

“In no way does the statute include criminal trespass” as a reason to make an arrest on a misdemeanor offense, rather than issuing a summons, said Williams, who specializes in representing protesters, which often include charges of criminal trespass.

Williams also asserts that District Attorney Michael Povich and the Mount Desert Police Department treated the incident differently from how they would any other alleged criminal trespass case because it involved a wealthy celebrity.

“They are being very sensitive” about the case, she said.

Williams said Povich was slow to arraign the men – he waited more than three months after the arrest. She said Povich offered her clients a deal the week before the Nov. 4 arraignment whereby he would recommend a fine of $200 each in exchange for guilty pleas.

Neither of the men has a criminal record, Williams said. One is a federal government employee and the other is a floral designer, Williams said.

Her clients refused to make a deal, she said.

“My clients did not break the law,” she said.

According to Williams, David Cimalore, 45, of Westerly, R.I., and Joseph A. Moretti, 38, of Cranston, R.I., got a map to Stewart’s estate on July 29 from someone in a local store.

They drove up to the estate and were admiring Stewart’s landscape and gardens when a gardener approached them and invited them to go to the door and ask for a tour the house, according to Williams.

They were on their way out of the house after the tour, Williams said, when a Stewart employee realized they were not on a list of people who could go into the house and asked them to leave.

Williams asserts that Mount Desert police located the men in a store in Northeast Harbor and initially only wanted to talk to them. But after Police Chief James Willis called Povich for advice, the men were arrested and jailed.

Previous verbal reports about the incident, provided by District Attorney Michael Povich, alleged that Cimalore and Moretti talked their way into Stewart’s mansion under false pretenses. Povich speculated at the time the men were arrested that the pair “like to go around and get into famous people’s houses.”

Povich had little to say about the matter on Thursday. He said the men were arrested rather than summoned in part so there would be bail and therefore incentive for the out-of-state residents to show up for a trial.

Both men posted $500 cash bail and were told to stay away from Stewart’s property.

Williams said the bail was “very high” for a criminal trespass charge.

“I have represented felons who don’t have $500 bail,” she said. “I’ve had people who chained themselves to trees get $100 [bail],” she said.

She said the two men were “humiliated” by their arrests and the jail mug shots that were published in newspapers. It was their first visit to Maine, Williams said.

A trial date has not been set, but the two trespass cases will be put on the January criminal trial list, according to a court clerk.

Williams said she plans to file a motion to dismiss both cases.

According to sketchy police information last July, the two Rhode Island men allegedly talked their way into Stewart’s home after telling the woman who answered the door that they had permission from Stewart’s employees in Connecticut to tour the estate.

While the employee was giving the two men a tour of the house, another employee became suspicious and called Mount Desert police, according to police.

The only records available on the case, filed in Superior Court on Tuesday, provide no details of the alleged crime.

Police have declined to release copies of the police reports.