‘Killer Clown’ lawyers want judge to sanction state and release Sheila Keen-Warren on house arrest

By Terri Parker

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    WEST PALM BEACH, Florida (WPBF) — Lawyers for accused killer clown defendant Sheila Keen-Warren are now asking the judge to sanction the state for repeatedly not turning over evidence they say could either exonerate her or help in her defense.

And the judge is listening, scheduling a Friday hearing and requiring State Attorney Dave Aronberg to be present.

After the state admitted last week it found a lost “Clown Sighting File” one day after a hearing where they said they had done their due diligence and it was nowhere to be found, Judge Scott Suskauer approved the defense motion to delay the trial again.

Now the defense wants these sanctions against the state:

Financial repayment – $3,347 for out-of-state subpoenas they say they had to file unnecessarily. Attorneys’ fees for the time they spent writing motions asking for discovery material. To be allowed to search evidence boxes themselves in the State Attorney’s Office.

And they’re asking Suskauer to revisit his decision to keep Keen-Warren in jail and not let her out on house arrest.

According to the motion filed by Greg Rosenfeld and Amy Morse, in the five years since Keen-Warren’s arrest for the 1990 murder of Marlene Warren, no new evidence against her has been found, and the two most compelling pieces of evidence the state has – a mysterious fiber from a clown wig, and DNA from two hairs found in the getaway car – have been found by the defense to not be conclusive at all.

Lawyers also say the state kept from them valuable information, like the existence of a possible other suspects such as Ed Bahr.

An inmate in Maine told detectives Bahr confessed to being the killer – that he was paid $10,000 to carry out the hit. The defense claimed the state hid the fact they last year re-interviewed Bahr, even jailed him, and searched his Texas home twice.

The defense says because the state made these discovery violations, keeping information from them, it forced them to ask for several trial delays, meaning Keen-Warren has had to stay behind bars longer and now trial has been continued again.

A hearing on the sanctions, pretrial release and other motions is set for Friday morning.

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