Pictured is the end of the driveway at the Harris residence on Hagadorn Hill Road in Spencer, N.Y. Kevin Tubbs is expected to testify next week that he saw Michele Harris arguing with a man who wasn’t Calvin Harris at this location, hours after the prosecution claimed that Calvin Harris murdered his wife, Michele Harris. According to previous testimony, Michele Harris’ van was discovered at the end of the driveway, pictured here. Calvin Harris is on trial a third time for second-degree murder in the disappearance of his wife, Michele Harris. She disappeared sometime during the evening of Sept. 11, 2001; neither her body nor a weapon has been found.
After eight long weeks in Schoharie County, the prosecution rested on Wednesday morning after presenting close to 50 witnesses in the third trial of Calvin Harris, who was charged and convicted twice of murdering his wife, Michele Harris.
Michele Harris disappeared some time during the evening of Sept. 11, 2001. Neither her body, nor a murder weapon has been found, and the investigation that ensued following her disappearance involved a convergence upon the family’s residence on Hagadorn Hill Road in Spencer, N.Y. – also the site of Empire Lake.
The prosecution, during their arguments, focused on witness testimony regarding Calvin Harris’ behavior following Michele Harris’ disappearance. The two were in the process of a divorce, but were still residing in their home together.
Pictured is the intersection in Spencer, N.Y. where Hagadorn Hill Road begins. Calvin and Michele Harris shared a home on this road and on property that contains the once popular Empire Lake. Calvin Harris is on trial a third time for second-degree murder in the disappearance of his wife, Michele Harris. She disappeared sometime during the evening of Sept. 11, 2001; neither her body nor a weapon has been found. (Photos by Wendy Post)
The prosecution’s case has been built around circumstantial evidence, with claims that Calvin Harris had the motive to murder his wife, and that blood stains, found inside the garage and home, would prove that Calvin Harris murdered Michele Harris that evening.
The defense, however, has continually stated that their client is innocent, and that the investigators targeted Calvin Harris, and then built their case around him. They also stated that the case does not have enough evidence to warrant a charge of murder, and have continually stated that they have evidence that would exonerate Calvin Harris completely, if the judge in the case will allow them to present new evidence.
But on Thursday the defense was delivered a large blow, when Schoharie County Judge George Bartlett denied that request.
The defense also made a procedural motion to dismiss the murder charge, stating that the burden of proof in this case was not met by prosecutors.
But on Wednesday morning, the prosecution rested their case, and then the defense called two witnesses who are friends of Calvin Harris. These witnesses testified that Calvin Harris was upset after the disappearance of Michele Harris, and even cried – wondering how he was going to tell their four children.
One of those children, now 17-year old Jenna Harris, is one of the witnesses that the defense is hoping to call to the stand, but the prosecution is objecting, stating that she was only four years old at the time, and that the testimony would have no relevance.
The jury, following Wednesday’s start of defense arguments, was dismissed until Monday.
Defense Attorney Bruce Barket expects to call six to 10 defense witnesses before resting his case. But new evidence Barket will not be introducing is in relation to Stacy Stewart and Christopher Thomason, two men that Barket states are linked to Michele’s death – and not Calvin Harris.
But after weeks of consideration, Schoharie County Judge George Bartlett denied a request by the defense to introduce this new evidence in Calvin Harris’ third trial, stating that it would be based on hearsay.
According to reports, Barket stated on March 19 that Stewart and Thomason were steel workers in their early twenties, who moved to Tioga County in 2001 and frequented the Waverly restaurant where Michele Harris was a waitress before she went missing.
Barket said, in further reports, that both men had a relationship with Michele Harris, and defense witnesses would have testified that both went out for drinks with her after she left her boyfriend’s residence at 11 the night she disappeared.
The defense lawyers said that contradicts the prosecution’s theory: that Michele was killed in her Spencer home after she drove there from her boyfriend’s residence.
Barket also said a witness would have testified that Thomason burned bloody clothing on Stewart’s Tioga County property on Sept. 12, 2001.
Witness testimony also would have revealed that Thomason told another woman that Michele Harris was “buried in concrete” and Stewart had once bragged, “I know how to hide a body,” Barket said, according to reports.
Barket feels that not allowing this testimony is an injustice. He was reported as stating, “It’s a grotesque injustice that will run the risk of convicting an innocent man. We remain certain of Cal’s innocence.”
Expected to testify for the defense on Monday is Kevin Tubbs, the farm hauler who stated, following the first trial in 2007 that he saw Michele Harris arguing with a man who was driving a blue pickup truck at the end of the driveway at the residence Michele and Calvin Harris shared. He stated that the man was not Calvin Harris, and that this was seen in the early morning hours following the alleged time of Michele Harris’ disappearance.
Because of this testimony, the conviction in the first trial held in Tioga County, N.Y. was dismissed because it did not match the prosecution’s timeline of when they alleged Calvin Harris murdered Michele Harris, and a new trial was ordered.
In the second trial, the defense tried to enter a statement from a man named John Steele that corroborated with Tubbs’ testimony, but the statement was not allowed into court as Steele had since passed away, and the prosecution at that time, Gerald Keene, argued that the witness could not be cross-examined. The statement was never entered into the trial.
Tioga County’s District Attorney Kirk Martin, however, argued on Wednesday that he has presented a strong circumstantial case, and that blood spatter in the house contains Michele Harris’ DNA, and it places her in the residence at the time she was murdered.
The defense argued that the bloodstains were from an earlier injury Michele Harris sustained prior to the night of her disappearance.
Judge Bartlett has not made any decision regarding the request to dismiss the murder charge. The defense attorneys can, however, make another request for dismissal when they rest their case.
The trial will resume on Monday, in Schoharie County. Still to be decided is whether Bartlett will allow Harris’ 17-year-old daughter, Jenna, to testify for the defense.
