Charlottesville Breaking News

Countdown to death: An action timeline of George Huguely V

hawes — Sun, 12 Feb 2012 20:23:45 +0000

Fall 2005 - Having excelled as both a lacrosse player (and as the starting football quarterback who led his Landon School to a conference title), Huguely enrolls in the University of Virginia to begin training as a varsity lacrosse player.

Fall 2007 - On a visit to his father's $2 million waterfront home near Florida's Palm Beach, Huguely is arrested for underage alcohol possession. He began dating UVA women's lacrosse player Yeardley Love just a few months earlier.

The Alston case

The one that gave Charlottesville juries a soft reputation.

November 8, 2003 - Police follow a trail of blood from a sidewalk to 222 14th Street, the same complex in which Yeardley Love would eventually die. In this case, UVA student Andrew Alston– having previously gotten his father to help him beat a domestic violence charge– finds himself charged with murder for stabbing Walker Sisk, an unarmed Albemarle volunteer firefighter, over 18 times. A year later, a Charlottesville jury points to alcohol consumption by both parties as precluding any malice and sentences Alston to three years in jail for voluntary manslaughter.

• Not guilty: Murder suspect beats assault charge

• The verdict: Sisk's family speaks out

• Bye bye, Botetourt: Release of Sisk killer nears

• No malice: Alston juror cites drunkenness

November 14, 2008 - On an alcohol-fueled trip with friends in Lexington, Huguely is stopped by a female officer who endures racial and sexual slurs as Huguely allegedly yells, "I’ll kill you. I’ll kill all of y’all. I’m not going to jail." He ends up getting Tased and eventually convicted of public drunkenness and resisting arrest. He pays his $100 fine and performs his 50 hours of community service but neglects to report the incident to the UVA, as required.

December 29, 2008 - Huguely's father calls Palm Beach police after his son creates a disturbance and then jumps overboard "The Reel Deal," the family yacht, in an effort to swim ashore. No charges filed.

February 21, 2009 - Huguely allegedly attacks a sleeping UVA lacrosse teammate and blackens the man's eye after hearing allegations that the player had kissed Love. Despite allegations that Huguely said, "Sweet dreams, punk," while delivering a sucker punch, both men downplay the incident to their coach, and no charges are filed.

February 27, 2010 - While visiting Huguely's apartment for a party, UNC lacrosse player Mike Burns hears a woman's plea for help inside Huguely's bedroom and flings open the door to find Love in a choke-hold at the hands of Huguely. Burns and Love "hook up."

April 27, 2010 - Having learned that Huguely had a fling with Love's sorority sister Stephanie Aladj, an angry Love drops in on Huguely's apartment to find two high school girls, prospective UVA softball players. Love hurls her purse at Huguely's head, an action that ejects the purse's contents. (Curiously, Love never finds either her camera or mobile phone.)

Friday, April 30, 2010 - Around 9pm, while in Chicago for the women's lacrosse game against Northwestern University, Love receives the "I should have killed you" email from Huguely. She discusses it with several friends and shows it to roommate Caity Whiteley.

Saturday, May 1, 2010 - With an 18-9 victory over Robert Morris, the UVA Men's lacrosse team wins its final regular season game and enjoys a post-game celebration at Boylan Heights restaurant. With some parents present– including Huguely's mother Marta Murphy– Love and Huguely speak to each other uneventfully.

Sunday, May 2, 2010 - Up at Wintergreen Resort, Huguely slurs his words, interrupts parents, and has trouble hitting golf balls at the lacrosse team's annual father-son golf tournament. Shortly before midnight, Huguely decides he "just wants to talk" to Love and ends up breaking through the door to her bedroom. He returns and lies to his roommate about where he's been.

Monday, May 3, 2010 - At 2:24am, the first police officer arrives at 222 14th Street, Apartment Number 9 to find the lifeless body of Yeardley Love.

Juror 206: A sad tale of two Charlottesville cases

Hook Contributor — Fri, 10 Feb 2012 22:56:50 +0000

By Jennifer Niesslein

At the Charlottesville Circuit courtroom, the jury box faces outward toward the audience. I sat in that jury box on the afternoon of February 7 as a potential juror for the George Huguely trial. Before me were the families of Huguely and Yeardley Love. All of them looked somber and grief-stricken, except Love’s sister. She stared hard at Huguely. The entire scene felt uncomfortably intimate, like crashing a stranger’s funeral. I didn’t know where to look.

Over 160 residents had been called for this trial. By the time the judge was ready to see my group, there were three slots in the jury pool of 28 left. The judge and clerk randomly selected a portion of us to be interviewed under oath. To my right was a woman I’d chatted with during the long wait. Her daughter had lived a block away from where Yeardley Love died, and on the morning before any details had been released about Love’s identity, this woman had been frantic until she spoke to her daughter. “I am not going to be on that jury,” she said as we waited. “I am not going to see those autopsy pictures.” Now she looked flushed.

The judge asked us a series of increasingly pointed questions. One woman knew the defense attorney well; she was dismissed. Some of us had experiences with violence. All of us had had media exposure to the case. Some of us said the exposure had led us to form an opinion. I was not one of those people.

I didn’t find the case fascinating; I found it tragic and horrible and all too common. I didn’t understand the media frenzy. The city blocked off some streets. To get to the courthouse, I wended my way past rows of media vans with huge satellites on their roofs. There were people in the courtroom who were honest-to-God spectators.

***

Less than a month before, I’d been summoned for another case as a potential juror, eerily similar to the Huguely case. Barry Bowles was charged with killing his wife. Both Huguely and Bowles had had prior run-ins with the law. Like Huguely, Bowles pled not guilty although he had confessed to police that he’d physically hurt his lover. Rachel Bowles’s family, like Yeardley Love’s, formed a cadre of well-dressed women. Like Huguely, Bowles looked somehow smaller than you expected an accused killer to look.

The two cases were different, but the most major difference was in who the victims and the accused were. Huguely and Love were attractive university students, each on a winning lacrosse team. They were from white and well-off families. The Bowleses were working-class, middle-aged, and black. Rachel Bowles had worked at Arby’s and more recently at a local dry cleaner. She was well-loved by her family and community– her online obituary lists many condolences– but the only picture I’d seen of her was a small black and white from her obituary.

There were some local reporters at the Bowles trial, but the jurors weren’t asked about their media exposure to the case. There was very little media to have been exposed to.

***

I was willing to give Huguely the benefit of the doubt. But I also couldn’t pretend that I hadn’t read that he admitted to kicking in Love’s bedroom door and beating her head against the wall. The last question that the defense attorney asked us as a group was whether we believed that a defendant was more likely to be guilty just because he’d been charged with a crime. We all paused.

“It’s hard to say,” I said. “There are a lot of charges here, and you can be guilty of some and not others.” Meaning: You can be the sort of monster who beats people half your size, but it’s still conceivable that you didn’t kill her.

The bailiff led us to the jury room. After a wait, he poked his head in and asked for Juror 206 and then gestured me to the witness stand, which faces the judge. I was almost giddy with relief that I wouldn’t have to answer questions facing those solemn families. The attorneys asked me questions. How much weight would I give expert witnesses who were compensated for their time by the defense? Did the genders of the victim and the accused make a difference? Did I have any pre-formed opinions?

“I believe that Mr. Huguely hurt Ms. Love,” I said. “I assume the case will be about whether those injuries caused her death.”

Maybe I should have emphasized that I could be impartial. Maybe I should have flat-out said I know what’s at stake: people’s lives– possibly Huguely’s, possibly the lives of the women in his future. I was willing to keep an open mind here, but my knowledge of the details put me in a tough position, wedged between a strong belief in a fair trial and my own good common sense.

The court interviewed three more jurors, all men. They took them and dismissed the rest of us.

***

I walked back to my car in the dark. I’d missed at least a half-day’s work and an afternoon with my son. I was worn out. I remembered one would-be juror telling me that she’d been having dreams in which her teeth fell out– she thought it was a dream about loss of control over her schedule. There were scores of us who’d been affected by this trial.

It was because of our collective fascination with people like Yeardley Love and George Huguely, I realized. We wouldn’t have this media circus or this bizarre jury elimination process if we all simply cared about domestic violence. We were whipped up into this mess because of what the case represented: our fetishes of the pretty, the athletic, the rich, the young– the people that most of us aren’t. It was the Kate Middleton and Prince William event of domestic violence. By contrast, the Bowles case was more akin to our own weddings: of deep importance to loved ones but no strangers were crying in the streets.

The thought saddened me as I headed back to the nearly empty fourth deck of the parking garage. I nervously clicked the unlock button on my key fob again and again, the beep-beep sound echoing off the concrete. I just wanted to be home. Home meant safety and comfort. At least for me.
~
Jennifer Niesslein is the co-editor of Brain, Child: The Magazine for Thinking Mothers and author of Practically Perfect in Every Way.

FunStuff: Charlottesville events February 16 and beyond

courteney — Thu, 09 Feb 2012 14:19:01 +0000

Black and white
Obama may be the first African American president, but he's far from the only black man– or woman– to occupy the White House. Historian Clarence Lusane, program director for Comparative and Regional Studies at American University and author of The Black History of the White House, traces the history of race relations in America's most famous residence from the slaves who toiled for past presidents to the high level advisors who have claimed increasingly prominent roles in leading a country still divided over race.
–>February 17, The Miller Center, 11am, free

Pour some sugar
The big hair, the tight pants, the over-the-top ballads of love and desire. If you miss the '80s– or missed the '80s– the Aquanett concert promises time travel to an era when there was nothing funny about a man with a perm, and women knew that shoulder pads weren't just for football players. And as a bonus, opening act Superunknown will take you back (or forward, as the case may be) to the '90s, when the grunge scene smothered leather and lace in flannel and ennui. Smells like Teen Spirit, indeed.
–>February 18, The Jefferson Theater, 8pm, $10/$12

Escape February
It might be winter, but in the jungle-like greenhouse of the new Glass House Winery in Free Union, you'll feel like you've stepped out of Central Virginia and into the tropics. Sunday afternoons bring the chance to sip wine and listen to live music in as close to an outdoor setting as possible this time of year. Thanks to winery co-owner Michelle Sanders, you can indulge your sweet tooth, too, with her artisan chocolates in flavors like Earl Grey, red wine cream, and salted caramel. So come out to eat, drink and be merry– really, you can do it all at Glass House. Just don't throw stones.
–>February 19, Glass House Winery, 2:15-5pm

Leonardo Live
The cryptic gaze of the Mona Lisa. The hidden meaning of The Last Supper. The anatomical sketches. Nearly five centuries after his death, Leonardo da Vinci remains one of the most fascinating figures in history, and the National Gallery, London has gathered eight of the master's 15 fragile paintings from museums around the world. But you don't have to jet across the pond to take a gander. "Leonardo Live," an HD presentation of the exhibition "Leonardo da Vinci: Painter at the Court of Milan," will take you there, and a panel discussion by three UVA professors following the screening will help put it all in perspective. And then, bestselling author Dan Brown will show up to crack the code once and for all. (Not really.)
–>February 19, The Paramount, 2pm, $10-14

God and science
Some would argue that science precludes the existence of a creator, and at the very least, it's hard to imagine, say, Richard Dawkins and Pat Roberts agreeing on anything. But Oxford mathematician John Lennox points out that religion and science might be able to co-exist without undermining the other. Since we're all headed for the abyss no matter what we believe, it might be wise to hear him out, and now's your chance.
–>February 20, Old Cabell Hall, 8pm, free

Best medicine
You take your vitamins, eat your veggies and exercise. But are you laughing enough? This week, you can go out for a few drinks and claim it's for your health– and maybe even get an extra ab workout! "What the Yuck!" is an open-mic comedy roundtable put on by comic Jim F'n Zarling (pictured right) that invites you to laugh to your heart's content. Think you're funny? You can test out your own material by arriving before 8:30 to sign up for your own five minutes of fame– or infamy– and hope that this time at least, they are laughing at you.
–>February 21, The Southern, 9pm, free

Matchmaker!
Nowadays, making romantic matches is predominantly the domain of websites that attempt to pair us off based on algorhythms and the lies we tell about ourselves online. Back in Tevye's time, it was the old crone down the street who did the matchmaking, and– just a guess– she had a better success rate than match.com. Revisit the classic musical that'll have you singing along, and bring the kids so they, too, can find themselves humming "If I were a rich man" and "Tradition!" 25 years after they last saw Fiddler on the Roof. Seriously, those sungs get stuck.
–>February 21, John Paul Jones Arena, $35-55

Cuba's peak
When you think of Cuba, your first thought might be cigars, Fidel Castro, and refugees in precariously small boats, but the tiny country lying just 90 miles off the coast of Florida has something to teach its giant neighbor about surviving and thriving past the easy availability of petroleum. Head to Staunton for a night of film and fine Cuban-inspired fare (using local ingredients) as the nonprofit Transition Staunton Augusta presents the documentary film The Power of Community: How Cuba Survived Peak Oil. Among the lessons: the importance of developing alternative transportation as oil diminishes and the need to increase small scale organic farming. (Reservations suggested 540-213-8777)
–>February 21, Mockingbird Cafe, 5:30pm, free

Hip shaking
Tucked away in the Frank Ix complex off Monticello Avenue, Alhamraa Moroccan restaurant isn't a place you stumble upon easily, but it has plenty of appeal– especially when Fire in the Belly dance troupe and Toma Que Toma flamenco band perform an evening of live music and dance. You might even find your own hips shaking.
–>February 23, Alhamraa, 7pm, $5 cover

Red carpet
What was your favorite film of 2011? But more importantly, what do you think Angelina Jolie is going to wear on the red carpet? And even more importantly, what are you going to wear on the red carpet? Yup, that's right– if you enjoy watching the Oscars at home, chances are you'll enjoy it even more after donning your new Zac Posen gown, grabbing your fave Dior diamond earrings and limo-ing it down to the Paramount to take in the big event on the big screen with a big group of friends. Best book hair and make-up now!
–>February 26, The Paramount, 7pm, $45

~
This week's "FunStuff" was compiled by Courteney Stuart, and next week's "FunStuff" will be compiled by another newsroom staffer. To get your event considered, send a press release to event@readthehook.com.

Huguely: 'How the f*** is she dead?'

hawes — Fri, 10 Feb 2012 17:59:42 +0000

A police interrogation videotape began with a groggy George W. Huguely V recounting copious amounts of alcohol he began consuming that fateful Sunday morning and ending with him expressing real or staged disbelief about the Monday-morning death of Yeardley Love.

"She's dead. How the f*** is she dead?" (long pause) "She's dead? How, how, how, how is she she dead? I didn't do anything. I didn't f***ing hit her."

It was a painful 20 minutes or so of the taped Huguely continuing to repeat alleged shock and disbelief. It was so awkward that even the present-day Huguely began rubbing his eyes in what appeared to be an effort to remove tears from the face that until now has impassively stared at the lawyers, jury, and audience in his first-degree murder trial.

"The alcohol got a hold of you?" a detective can be heard asking after the big reveal which came about 35 minutes after Huguely's interrogation began.

"She's not dead," Huguely frequently says on the tape which began rolling around 7:52am on May 3, 2010, the day Huguely's badly injured former girlfriend was found unresponsive on the bed of her 14th Street apartment.

"I want to see her," demands Huguely. "I don't believe she's dead. You guys said she had a black eye and a bump on her head."

"Let's calm down," says Charlottesville Police Detective Lisa Reeves as Huguely continues to repeat– perhaps as many as 30 times– some permutation of "She's not dead."

"There's no way," he says, "that anything that happened last night could kill her."

However, the tape also revealed a pile of potential problems for Huguely's credibility. For starters, he blamed any head injuries on Love banging her own head against a wall of her bedroom. He also says he'd never threatened her.

Later, when asked if he'd taken anything from her room, he first answers no, but when confronted about the laptop computer whose case and cord were found in the apartment, he admits he took it as "collateral." Asked where he was keeping the collateral, he finally reveals that he'd tossed it in a nearby dumpster.

Later, Huguely can be heard telling the investigators– who had already surmised what the state medical examiner determined: that Love died from blunt-force trauma– that when he left, "She was standing up looking at me."

But most of the audio after the big reveal was just Huguely.

"How? How? How?" he asks. "No! No! No!" he says. Eventually, his salvo of I-know-she's-not-deads turns into an unintelligible jumble of whimpering and sobbing.

"Tell me she's not dead– please," Huguely implores. "She's alive; she has to be."

Told again that the 22-year-old Love is dead, he exclaims, "Oh, my God," and what sounds like: "Kill me."

As this blubbering played out in the Charlottesville courtroom, Huguely– dressed in a grey sportcoat that fit more snugly the voluminous navy blue he wore during his first appearance– kept his chin down, took a sip from a foam water cup, and continued to rub his eyes. In front of him, members of the Love family dabbed their own eyes.

Conspicuously absent from this pathetic scene were George Huguely IV and Marta Murphy, both of whom are defense witnesses.

Earlier on the tape, before the dramatic denouement, Huguely walked the detective through his version of the fateful evening's events which began with four or five beers on a golf course and included two glasses of wine at dinner.

"After dinner," he says, "I probably had five drinks of vodka."

Huguely repeatedly tells his interrogators– unseen to the gallery but visible to the defendant, lawyers, jury, and judge– that he simply wants to talk to his "former girlfriend," as he described her.

"I sent like six emails saying let's talk, and she didn't respond," Huguely says.

"I was more emotional than I was angry," he explains of his demeanor when he enters her room, which he says was lit only by streetlamps beaming in through a bay window.

"It was not at all a good conversation," Huguely reports. "She's freaking out just seeing me there. I'm like, 'What the hell; we're just gonna talk."

Huguely admits on the tape that he probably woke Love from a slumber.

"I just want to talk to her," he repeatedly tells Detective Reeves. "I was like 'Yeardley, chill out,' and shook her."

And yet even after admitting to that, he seems unable to keep his story straight.

"I never touched her or struck her or anything," Huguely tells Reeves mere minutes after conceding that he might have pushed her arms, might have touched her neck, and that the two definitely ended up on the floor.

"We were like wrestling around," says Huguely, "and that's when her nose started bleeding."

So how did he leave her?

"I tossed her," Huguely says. "I pushed her on the bed. I was like, 'Go to bed.'"

The only other witness to testify Friday morning was cardiac pathologist Renu Virnani, who told the court, "There was nothing wrong with Love's heart that would have led to her death."

Although no transcript of the interrogation video was provided, members of the media expressed astonishment at the repetitive nature of Huguely's utterances, as if he were having trouble understanding the situation– or, in a less charitable assessment– buying time.

Told that he's about to be arrested, Huguely responds once again by asking, "She's dead?" then muttering, "Help."

In the final minutes of the tape, he says three times in a row: "There's no way." Four times in a row he says: "I know she's not dead." Three times he sobs, "Oh my God." And, shortly before investigators turn off their camera: "I did not kill her, I did not kill her, I did not kill her. I did not kill her."

Forensic Detective Mike Flaherty took the witness stand for the afternoon session, and identified pictures of the crime scene, from mundane kitchen counters to Love's bloody body on the floor of her bedroom. "Here are the broken pieces of her door inside her room," he narrated. "At this point her feet have been bagged," he said of another photo.

"That's a close up of Yeardley Love," he said. "Her left eye is open. Her right eye is swollen shut." Other photos detailed red stains on her neck, on her chin, with abrasions surrounded by contusions under the center line, and the red stains on the back of her left hand.

Because of those wounds, Flaherty went around her room and examined her dresser, bay window, desk, and bedside table, and said after photos of each one, "No evidence of impact."

An off-white discoloration on the bedroom wall drew Flaherty's attention. "I didn't know what it was," he said, and swabbed the wall.

Throughout the photo tour of Love's room, evidence of a well-organized young woman emerged. Her clothes were "neatly folded" in her dresser drawers, said Flaherty, and her desk was "orderly," with "neatly stacked items."

Flaherty noted in pictures of Love's bathroom a slightly crushed Natural Light can, and the upraised seat and lid of the toilet.

Commonwealth's Attorney Dave Chapman introduced into evidence items that had been described throughout the trial. He and a police officer held up Love's green comforter and her sheets with holes where the bloodstains had been cut out because those items were too big to send to a lab.

Brown paper evidence bags were opened with her pillow case and it elongated stains, her laptop case with a red stain, and her yellow North Face backpack, which had contained an empty Adderall prescription bottle. A piece of her bedroom wall was admitted as evidence, as was a letter from Huguely found in her desk drawer.

Throughout the trial, the oft-mentioned kicked-in door to Love's bedroom has been wrapped in brown paper and leaning against the wall of the courtroom. It was unveiled, and Flaherty said it was upside down. When it was flipped, an audible "oh" was heard in the media room where reporters saw a hole the size of a basketball up around door knob level.

It remained leaning against the wall of the courtroom, its gaping hole testament to the violence that entered Yeardley Love's bedroom that night.

–story updated 2:45pm Friday

– updated 5:05pm with additional reporting by Lisa Provence

–updated 8:22pm

–updated 7:44am Saturday with audio reenactment of tape (near top, under photo)

Off steroids? Slimmer Huguely prompts chem speculation

hawes — Fri, 10 Feb 2012 15:06:05 +0000

The dramatically different look of the on-trial George Huguely could stem from a lack of steroids behind bars, says Hook legal analyst David Heilberg, who cautions that his theory about the prohibited muscle-building compounds is pure speculation.

"The first thing that came to mind when I saw his appearance in court," says Heilberg, "was, 'Was he using steroids?'"

The images of Huguely that have long filled the public pages and airwaves show a lacrosse player who, according to his team roster, stood 6'2' and weighed 209 pounds. So the idea of any fight between such a towering, hulking Division I varsity athlete and a much smaller female in her bedroom has provoked widespread outrage.

Huguely should not have been using the muscle-building compounds because they're banned by most athletic organizations including the NCAA, which governs the University of Virginia's athletic team. Steroids have been linked to a variety of health effects including shrunken testicles and an increase in body hair.

More gravely, there's a negative side-effect that can affect those surrounding the user: "roid rage," an increase in aggression. Defendant Huguely has a history of alcohol misuse including a 2008 conviction for public drunkenness and resisting arrest in Lexington.

"You combine steroids and alcohol, and that's a very volitile mix," says Heilberg.

Ironically, however, any courtroom discussion of steroids could conceivably benefit the defense in this trial in Charlottesville Circuit Court that's been attracting nationwide attention.

"That would be a credible mitigator if that were true," says Heilberg.

Since his arrest in the May 2010 death of Yeardley Love, Huguely has been confined– often in isolation from other prisoners– in the Albemarle-Charlottesville Regional Jail. That could explain the loss of body mass, as he may not have had access to athletic facilities.

"He clearly is a shadow of what he looked like," says Heilberg. "The kid we saw in court is not the kid we saw in 2008 and 2010."

The new Huguely, however, looks not only smaller but also dressed in a too-large sportcoat, and there has been widespread speculation that his legal team intentionally dressed the 24-year-old in an oversized garment.

"I won't say that they did that or that they didn't do that," says Heilberg. "I will say he looks harmless– like an ordinary college kid. Clearly, that's an appearance they cultivated."

'Out of control': Witnesses say Huguely's drinking escalated

courteney — Thu, 09 Feb 2012 22:18:00 +0000

When University of North Carolina lacrosse player MIke Burns came to visit friends at UVA in the winter of 2010, he witnessed an altercation between George Huguely and Yeardley Love that prosecutors allege foreshadowed her death in the morning hours of May 3.

"We heard a girl yelling, 'Help me, help me!" testified Burns, who described attending a post-lacrosse game gathering at Huguely's 14th Street apartment complex the night of February 27, less than three months before Love's death. Following the cries that night, Burns testified, he reached Huguely's bedroom door and opened it.

"I saw George with his arm around Yeardley's neck," Burns testified, describing Huguely lying on his back on the bed, holding Yeardley atop him as he choked her.

His sudden presence in the room, Burns said, prompted Huguely to release Love, who quickly departed and sought comfort from friends and expressed her gratitude.

"She said, 'Thank you so much,'" he recalled.

As previously reported, Burns– who met Love when both lived in New York in the summer of 2009 and "hooked up" with her occasionally in the spring of 2010– would be the trigger of more tension between Love and Huguely, after Huguely learned that Love and Burns had been sexually involved. After Love allegedly taunted Huguely as a less able partner, he sent an email with the seeming threat, "I should have killed you."

Huguely's own "other woman" also took the stand and described a casual but romantic relationship with Huguely that overlapped his relationship with Love.

"I knew that sometimes they weren't dating and sometimes they were," testified Stephanie Aladj, a 2010 UVA grad who was also Love's sorority sister– a fact she acknowledged created tension between the two women.

Other witnesses testified that as Huguely's relationship with Love was winding down in the spring of their senior year, his drinking was winding up, with the soon-to-graduate senior lacrosse player imbibing to the point of intoxication, one witness estimated, at least four times a week.

He certainly appeared drunk on the morning of Sunday, May 2– the day of the father-son golf tournament, a UVA men's lacrosse tradition. Two of Huguely's teammates described arriving at the Wintergreen Resort golf course at 9am and finding Huguely already slurring his words. By 5pm, said his lacrosse teammate Brian Carroll, who was there with his own father and brother, testified that Huguely "was significantly more drunk," and was behaving inappropriately– at one point interrupting parents, Carroll recalled, "to tell a story that didn't make any sense."

At least two witnesses recalled a springtime altercation between Love and Huguely in which Love, apparently angered by the presence of two high school students visiting Huguely's apartment one evening, struck him with her purse, causing its contents to spill out.

"Are these your new girlfriends?" Love asked sarcastically, according to witness Kate Kamber, a current UVA fourth year.

"He pretended he didn't know her," recalled Kamber, who testified Huguely might then have called Love a "crazy bitch" or a "crazy slut."

The girlfriend of Huguely's roommate, Elizabeth McLean, described helping Love gather her belongings that evening and making sure she reached home safely. McLean testified that while Love had been drinking, it was Huguely's drinking that concerned her more as it appeared to have increased in frequency and intensity, and, she said, was affecting his mood and his behavior.

"He was out of control," McLean said.

Day four ended with testimony about computer security and emails, as well as information about the location of Love's laptop, which was found in a nearby dumpster after her death.

Tough morning: Photos bring tears at Huguely trial

hawes — Thu, 09 Feb 2012 20:20:30 +0000

Jurors responded stoically as they got their first painful glimpse of a deceased Yeardley Love on Thursday morning, as the prosecution in the trial of accused murderer George W. Huguely V launched a second day of testimony with graphic photographs amid the testimony of a doctor, two police officers, and a pair of emergency medical technicians.

"I happen to remember this photograph being taken," testified EMT Michael Hanshew. "The hands on the side of her head are mine."

He was looking at "P2," an image of emergency responders vainly attempting to revive Love on the floor of her bedroom in her 14th Street apartment. Moments earlier, defense attorney Fran Lawrence had voiced his objection to the introduction of the photograph by prosecutor Dave Chapman.

"We've already heard your objection," said an irritated Chapman, who won the right at a pre-trial hearing to show the raw images to the seven men and seven women who currently constitute the jury.

After the judge allowed the photograph to appear, the jurors betrayed little emotion as the image flashed up on a wide flat-screen monitor, although one juror suddenly seemed to take a few extra notes on a pad of paper. In the Love family's section, weeping could be heard. A few feet away, defendant George Huguely pressed his chin to his shirt, looked at his lawyers, but otherwise gave little indication that he might be seeing the fatal results of his interaction with Love on May 3, 2010.

While medical witnesses took the stand, the prosecutor went on to introduce P3, an image of resuscitation equipment on Love's bed, P4, an image of blood on the floor, and– worst of all– P5 and P78, what may have been close-ups of Love's body after the EMTs got permission from UVA's medical command to discontinue their efforts.

The photographs– seen only by judge, jury, lawyers, and court personnel– remained out of view of the families, media, and other spectators, though the whitish glow from the large-screen monitor added discomfort to the proceedings.

Charlottesville Police Officer K.W. Blackwell was the day's first witness, and he told the court how he was in his cruiser at the Ivy Square Shopping Center when he got a call about a possible alcohol overdose on 14th Street.

Instead, he arrived at the apartment to find a hole in the center of the bedroom door and a young woman wearing only panties. He knelt down to listen for breathing and saw dried blood on Love's face, an abrasion under her chin, and an eye swollen shut. Blackwell said he noticed something else about her body.

"She was a little cool," said Blackwell. "Around room temperature."

Later, during the testimony of Charlottesville Police Detective Shawn Bayles, the man who took the photographs, defense attorney Fran Lawrence blasted the reappearance of the pictures as "redundant and unnecessary." He was overruled.

Bayles revealed how he was driving over to the apartment to oversee the situation when he received word on his radio that the initial report of an alcohol overdose was mistaken. Seeing the smashed door helped convince him that he needed to warn the EMTs.

"I told them to continue what they were doing, but I wanted them to be aware they were in an active crime scene."

Shortly after saying that, Bayles revealed, an EMT remarked the bathroom's toilet seat was in a raised position. Before that remark could be analyzed another debate broke out over introducing photographs before the judge decided to break for lunch recess.

Other witnesses who testified Thursday morning included a female EMT and William J. Brady, a doctor who chairs the UVA medical center's rapid-response team and the resuscitation committee, endorsed the efforts of the first responders.

Analyst says: Huguely still heading for a conviction

hawes — Thu, 09 Feb 2012 15:04:41 +0000

Despite the previous day's revelation that after getting brutally beaten Yeardley Love survived for two hours, longtime Hook legal analyst David Heilberg indicates that he stands by his prognostication that a first-degree murder conviction remains a possibility.

"Basically, she was helpless during the short time she was alive," says Heilberg, noting the defendant's "cold indifference" to Love's welfare by absconding with her computer and failing to call emergency responders after pummeling her.

Prosecutor Dave Chapman noted during his opening argument that the injured Love was in a many-windowed apartment, something that resonates with Heilberg.

"He talked about the small apartment with lots of windows, so if she had any ability to move, she'd have sought help," says Heilberg. "She wouldn't have to go far to open a window or cry out."

The defense, however, has indicated that it it plans to introduce a variety of alternate scenarios that might have killed Love. These include a drug/alcohol-induced heart arrhythmia, bleeding from strenuous CPR efforts, and something akin to crib death called "positional asphyxiation."

Lauding the legal teams on both sides, Heilberg compliments the prosecutor, whose opening argument Heilberg watched during a break in his own downtown lawyering Wednesday

"I think he did a very nice job of closing the causation gap," says Heilberg. "The holes that were there in the beginning the Commonwealth seems able to cover."

Heilberg says he couldn't help but notice some impressive aspects of the jury.

"Boy, that's a very young jury," remarks Heilberg. "And they looked very intelligent– maybe it was the glasses."

As for the defense's warning to the jury that all six crimes for which Huguely has been charged require intent, Heilberg is less impressed.

"Pretty much any crime beyond speeding requires intent," says Heilberg.

So why wouldn't Huguely, like another famous UVA defendant named Andrew Alston, win a mere involuntary manslaughter conviction?

"The one thing that really goes against that," says Heilberg, "is he went to her place. The defense clearly has evidence to suggest that it's only manslaughter. If you're the defense, you hope for one juror who buys involuntary and can move the rest of the jury."

As for putting the defendant on the stand, Heilberg says that the defense may not decide that question until the prosecution has finished making its case. What Heilberg says definitely won't happen is an acquittal because even the defense has argued for a lesser type of conviction.

"Basically, it's a circumstantial case," says Heilberg, "but a circumstantial case can be as strong as direct evidence."

Prime location wins strong price

Samantha Masone — Thu, 02 Feb 2012 17:05:36 +0000

12/29/11

Albemarle

Ronald A. & Kathleen F. Mordini to Margeret L. Vanekeren & Meredith Ann Dixon, 5935 Buck Ridge Road, $370,000

J. Timothy Beeghly to Edwin Nordenschild, 3296 Irish Road, $355,000

John R. Lloyd to Jennifer M. Risner, 1303 Auburn DrIve, $246,500

VATN LC to Kristen M. Baker, 669 Lockesley Terrace, $126,000

Ellen E. Jones to Veronica Edwina Key, 2126 Richmond Road, $105,600

Charles E. Cary, Jr. to Reaching Dreams LLC, 175 Yellowstone Drive, Unit 2, $67,000

Secretary of Housing & Urban Development to Mark III LLC, 8842 Chestnut Grove Road, $65,000

Charlottesville

Calvin T. & Vernon D. Thompson to Carl Lynch III, 1003 Ridge Street, $177,500

Hugh Ragsdale to Thomas M. & Kim C. Hart, 1800 Jefferson Park Avenue, Unit #402, $150,527

Brent E. Jones to Cheryl H. Jones, 2716 Jefferson Park Avenue, $250,000

Federal National Mortgage Association to Robert Cameron Caswell, 1401 Forest Ridge Road, $153,000

1/3/12

Albemarle

Kenneth & Jessica Crawford to Rose C LLC, 1946 Lonicera Way, $265,000

Janet Bradley to Bank of New York Mellon, 1045 Susan Drive, $444,375 (foreclosure)

Rudolph R. Saunders to I & J Home Builders LLC, 1.042 Acres, TM 46-78, $60,000

Southern Property LLC to Margaret B. Gilmer, 288 Claremont Lane, $342,100

Tabor Presbyterian Church to Joel R. Walding & Kelly E. Nelson, 1441 Ballard Drive, $184,000

Southern Property LLC to Kristo A. Papa & Elmira Khakimova, 5477 Park Road, $297,875

Margaret J. Morton to James H. & Barbara A. McGrath, 500 Crestwood Drive, Unit 2201, $299,000

Felix H. & Ana Galvez to Bank of New York Mellon, 108 Woodlake Drive, $95,850

Charlottesville

Margaret Brown Gilmer to Megan Leboutillier, 301 NW 2nd Street, Unit C, $380,000

1/4/12

Albemarle

Liberty Land Ltd. to R.L. Beyer Construction Inc., 2533 Summit Ridge Trail, $350,000

March Mountain Properties LLC to Craig Enterprises, Inc., 624 & 626 Baywick Circle, $320,000

John M. & Elizabeth C. Hensley to Peter C. & Victoria L. Brunjes, 3.52 Acres, TM 27-47B, $142,500

Edward V. & Mary E. Bryant to Lynda Diane Van Der Sommen, 324 Westfield Road, $186,000

Charlottesville

Richard Carter, Trustee, Hilltop Land Trust to Shelby L. Fischer, Trustee, Shelby L. Fisher Revocable Trust, 1409 Hilltop Road, $825,000

Bank of New York Mellon to Jeffrey Easter & W. Davin Ford, 722 Franklin Street, $40,000

Moe LLC to Pediatric Research of Charlottesville LLC, 211 11th Street NE, $272,200

1/5/12

Charlottesville

Danielle W. & Wesley G. Steiner to Megan Amanda Kingsley, 1220 Agnese Street, $204,000

John & Annette Galdun to Kelsey Shea, 1800 Jefferson Park Avenue Condos, Unit 138, $143,500

R.L. Beyer Construction, Inc. to John J. O’Dwyer, 226 Huntley Avenue, $354,534

Hook turns 10: A decade of digging

hawes — Sun, 05 Feb 2012 21:20:00 +0000

Cover detailThe tale of the Hook's sudden founding ten years ago has oft been told, so I won't rehash it here. What I will repeat are a few exciting highlights. My personal favorite is the fact that the first issue rolled off the presses and hit the newsstands on February 7, 2002, the same day my youngest child was born.

Up next is the fact that I get to work with the Fab Three: Lisa Provence, Courteney Stuart, and Dave McNair. (They were nice enough to let me in this Fab Four photo with them.) They're the main reason the Hook has won 120 awards from the Virginia Press Association. And they don't just create good-for-you "broccoli" journalism. The Hook reporters are fabulously witty wordsmiths whose creativity matches their pursuit of stories, and they're probably the only print reporters in Charlottesville with name recognition.

Lisa Provence, Dave McNair, Hawes Spencer, Courteney Stuart

Then there's the deluxe fact that you are reading this thing, so bravo to you too!

Last fall, in an editor's note, I couldn't help but notice that although the Hook wandered a little in its early days, this paper has matured into a meaningful contributor to the causes of dialogue, investigation, and justice. And I believe we live up to our slogan: "You can handle the truth."

So thanks for allowing us our decade of digging!

Sincerely,
Hawes Spencer, Editor

February 7th, 2002
Issue #0101
Our first issue was an odd one. The outer cover showed an exuberant mouth (as our way of rejoicing in this new enterprise). Inside, almost hidden, was a fascinating cover story about a local man who ran drugs– and wrote a book about it. Read it!

February 28th, 2002
Issue #0104
We brought you the strange world of Mark Linkous, the then Dillwyn-based musician whose tortured soul brought an end to his earthly existence eight years later. Read it!

March 7th, 2002
Issue #0105
In what would become a Hook hallmark, Lisa Provence exposed how work-from-home usually means work-for-nothing. Later, such columns as The Fearless Consumer and The Tough Customer would provide additional scrutiny of business claims. Read it!

March 28th, 2002
Issue #0108
An amazing story, this was a hard-edged look at a restaurant that promised to open… but when? (We were also there in 2005 for the actual opening, a decade after the "opening… " sign first went up at the Corner Bodo's.) Read it!

May 16th, 2002
Issue #0115
Surprise indeed– when a Republican in the form of Rob Schilling got elected to City Council. While his official tenure lasted just four years, he would continue to entertain and inform the public with a radio show on AM 1070 WINA. Read it!

February 20th, 2003
Issue #0207
This story won a statewide prize for reporter Lisa Provence and helped catapult the plight of the parents who held a beer party for their teens into the national spotlight. Read it!

April 24th, 2003
Issue #0216
Oops. We interviewed people about the "end" of the Iraq war– our version of President George W. Bush's "Mission Accomplished" banner.

September 16th, 2004
Issue #0337
This was a classic, a cerebral look at the pursuit of fame, how it lavished mostly goodness on Dave Matthews and led one of his friends awry. Freelance author Dave McNair subsequently joined the Hook newsroom. Read it!

November 11th, 2004
Issue #0345
This story became just a first in a string of Courteney Stuart exposés exploring the judicial cruelties awaiting women raped at UVA. The story touched off a protest– and a wave of official reform. Read it!

July 28th, 2005
Issue #0430
We didn't plan on devoting two covers to the 18-stab-wound killing by a crying-in-court UVA student named Andrew Alston of a beloved firefighter named Walker Sisk. But when one of the jurors, in her college alumni mag, penned a 3,000-word treatise about the alleged hardship of jury service, we felt compelled to explore the case again. Read it!

August 11th, 2005
Issue #0432
The heat-induced death of a promising cross-country runner and Hook columnist was an incident that rocked the community and left his parents struggling for answers. Years later, the life of Kelly Watt still resonates with an every-November memorial race. Read it!

September 29th, 2005
Issue #0439
The springtime announcement that the Rolling Stones would play Charlottesville was greeted in some ears as an April Fool's joke. The only attempt at a joke was the bomb scare that stalled the concert– but not the fun! Read it!

February 16th, 2006
Issue #0507
Horror in the hallway indeed. Here was a man convicted of attempting to kill his wife in a Halloween-night plot involving chloroform, disconnected utility wires, and a perilous struggle atop a balcony. Five years later, perpetrator Kurt Kroboth threatens this newspaper with litigation over the coverage. Read it!

May 4th, 2006
Issue #0518
After the completion of what has since been renamed the nTelos Wireless Pavilion, Dave McNair asks the burning question: "Has Charlottesville jumped the shark?" Read it!

March 8th, 2007
Issue #0610
Courteney Stuart went hunting for a story brought back the exclusive tale of the man whose dream of bagging a 600-pound bear nearly cost him his life. Read it!

June 7th, 2007
Issue #0623
This case wouldn't officially become a charged criminal case for four more years, with husband Eric Abshire eventually convicted of murder; however, even back in 2007, Courteney Stuart began asking whether there would ever be "justice for Justine." Read it!

July 5th, 2007
Issue #0627
One of the Hook's favorite things is looking back at colorful characters and stories, in this case the strange attraction between the purported-but-disproven czarina calling herself "Anastasia" and Charlottesville's own Jack Manahan. Read it!

September 20th, 2007
Issue #0638
The authorities told us they might have intercepted another Columbine. But a pack of Lisa Provence stories found that the most of the so-called plotters didn't know each other and didn't have a bomb. Such revelations helped us win the Virginia Press Association's top honor that year. And the man who oversaw the prosecution of what became reviled as the "smoke-bomb plot" ended up getting turned out of office. Read it!

December 6th, 2007
Issue #0649
This story illustrates both the power and the limits of journalism. On the one hand, the public learned immediately that, contrary to police suggestions, there really were witnesses to the police cruiser striking Gerry Mitchell in a crosswalk. Sadly, it took a lawsuit to reveal, mere months before Mitchell's 2011 death, that the officer who hit him in broad daylight had been furiously texting. Read it!

February 28th, 2008
Issue #0709
Speaking of the limits of journalism, this story by Lisa Provence touched off several years of revelations on the secret underpinnings of the so-called community water supply plan: that the dam doesn't actually provide more water, that consumption has been trending down, and that the prime backer, the Nature Conservancy, has helped spread millions via a well-meaning but welfare-for-the rich program called conservation tax credits. For about the cost of consultant studies, the doomed Rivanna Reservoir might have dredged and thereby saved. Read it!

April 17th, 2008
Issue #0716
One day, when ionization smoke detectors are consigned to the dustbin of history, articles like this one by Courteney Stuart may have been forgotten or held up as unheeded, Cassandra-like warnings. As we found in a test, conducted for another cover story later in 2008, they just don't work at quickly detecting the fires likely to kill and maim you while you sleep. Seriously: Save a life; buy a photoelectric. Read it!

November 13th, 2008
Issue #0746
Like Republican Rob Schilling six years earlier, Tom Perriello faced the daunting task of running in a district supposedly safe for the opposition party. But, in a squeaker, hometown Democrat Perriello pulled off an upset over incumbent Congressman Virgil Goode. (Two years later, however, Perriello was unseated by Robert Hurt of Chatham.) Read it!

December 18th, 2008
Issue #0751
Taking a page from Time magazine, we inaugurated a tradition of naming a person of the year, in this case Gary O'Connell, the man who helped the Nature Conservancy foist the reservoir plan on the local populace. Like Time, we choose the person whose actions have most greatly shaped the news– and in 2011 the "winner" was Western Bypass-pusher Ken Boyd– not necessarily the person the history books will celebrate. Read it!

October 8th, 2009
Issue #0840
Like a story on the 40th anniversary of the Hurricane Camille disaster by Lisa Provence, this was one of those Hook-looks-back tale, in this case the 1959 sole-survivor crash on Buck's Elbow Mountain. This one by editor Hawes Spencer was named the year's best by the Virginia Press Association. Read it!

October 29th, 2009
Issue #0843
The concert night disappearance of Morgan Dana Harrington was event that catapulted UVA's John Paul Jones Arena into a realm of publicity it didn't want. But, along the way, her still-unsolved murder brought about a major change to Virginia's DNA databank and made her parents the public face of anguish-backed action that galvanized a nation. Read it!

January 7th, 2010
Issue #0901
It's not just digging for stories. Sometimes, we just dig through the snow! Read it!

May 6th, 2010
Issue #0918
In the sea of stories of the killing of Yeardley Love, the Hook jumped right in with blanket coverage. Read it!

August 19th, 2010
Issue #0933
For most of its decades VQR was a literary journal. But in 2010, after the suicide of its managing editor, Dave McNair's stories of Virginia Quarterly Review helped launch a national debate about whether it was the scene of workplace bullying. Read it!

January 6th, 2011
Issue #1001
We still don't know who sent the secret documents over our transom, but the taxpayers might be grateful that they did. This story put a fine point on the case of Charlottesville land-speculator Hunter Craig and Orange assessor Patricia O'Grady-Filer, the latter who improbably claimed that raw land bought in bubble-era somehow doubled in value. The case of Biscuit Run is now roiling the courts. Read it!

Charlottesville Breaking News

Countdown to death: An action timeline of George Huguely V

The Alston case

Juror 206: A sad tale of two Charlottesville cases

FunStuff: Charlottesville events February 16 and beyond

Huguely: 'How the f*** is she dead?'

Related stories:

Off steroids? Slimmer Huguely prompts chem speculation

Prior steroid story

Related stories

'Out of control': Witnesses say Huguely's drinking escalated

Related stories

Tough morning: Photos bring tears at Huguely trial

Related stories

Analyst says: Huguely still heading for a conviction

Yesterday's story

Prime location wins strong price

Hook turns 10: A decade of digging