During the court proceedings, the Adult Correctional Institutions wins permission to force-feed the defendent, who appeared in a wheelchair, if necessary.

09:32 AM EDT on Thursday, July 21, 2005

BY GREGORY SMITH
Journal Staff Writer

PROVIDENCE -- "I'm not too good with the food here."

Journal photo / Mary Murphy

Marguerite Allen, the widow of slain Detective Sgt. James L. Allen, sits in Superior Court, Providence, yesterday at the arraignment of Esteban Carpio.

That remark by Esteban Carpio in court yesterday was about as clear as it got regarding why Carpio, charged with the murder of a Providence police detective, has been spurning food in his cell at the Adult Correctional Institutions.

Rhode Island corrections Director A.T. Wall II asked Superior Court Judge Susan E. McGuirl to authorize the department to take extraordinary steps to care for Carpio, including force-feeding if necessary.

McGuirl granted that authority, after a hearing, with the expressed acquiescence of Carpio and his lawyer, Kirsten M. Wenge.

Carpio's physical condition has been deteriorating because of a lack of nutrition, according to corrections officials, causing fear that he may eventually die if more is not done.

Wenge said she does not know why Carpio is rejecting food but that she assumes he is depressed. Wall's petition to the court apparently divulges some reasons offered by Carpio, but Wenge persuaded the judge to keep that part secret.

Carpio was arraigned yesterday on seven charges, including first-degree murder in the slaying of Providence police Detective James L. Allen. He pleaded not guilty.

While being questioned at police headquarters on April 17, Carpio allegedly wrested away Allen's gun and shot him to death.

Assistant Attorney General Paul F. Daly Jr. announced at the arraignment that his office will seek a sentence of life imprisonment without parole if Carpio is convicted. It is the harshest punishment that the state can get.

McGuirl conducted the arraignment and a medical-care hearing via videoconference, with Carpio slumped in a wheelchair at the ACI, wearing a baggy prison jumpsuit and belly chains, and surrounded by three correctional officers. The rest of the participants were in a fifth-floor courtroom at the Licht Judicial Complex.

As glimpsed from across the courtroom, the bearded Carpio did not seem demonstrably thinner than in his last videoconference appearance in court on June 20. In answering questions from the judge, he spoke clearly.

Friends and relatives of Carpio sat on one side of the courtroom and Allen's widow Marguerite, escorted by plainclothes Providence police officers, sat on the other. When Carpio appeared on a video monitor, Carpio's mother, Yvonne, put her hand to her mouth and appeared to catch her breath.

Corrections officials and Wenge said Carpio has consumed only small amounts of food and water for about a month. He has lost weight -- nobody will say how much -- and the ACI medical staff is worried that his organs may malfunction.

In the past day or so, tests of Carpio's blood showed his condition was becoming precarious, Wenge said.

At the same time, corrections officials have said that the authority to force-feed is only a precaution at this point. Force-feeding would be done at a hospital by introducing liquid nutrition through a tube in Carpio's nose or through the surgical implant of a tube in his stomach.

Journal photo / Mary Murphy

Esteban Carpio appears at the proceedings via videoconference from the ACI.

Corrections officials said Dr. Michael Poshkus, ACI medical director, persuaded Carpio to consume some liquids yesterday.

The Corrections Department is legally required to intervene when an inmate endangers himself, according to a state Supreme Court decision cited in the petition. The court declared that a prisoner does not have a constitutional right to starve himself to death.

McGuirl asked Carpio if he understands the consequences of not taking sufficient nutrition, and he said he does.

Wall's petition to the court states that Carpio has given various reasons for rejecting food, but at the request of the defense, the judge blacked out 3 1/2 lines from the public copy of the petition. The blacked-out portion apparently discusses the reasons.

The judge, also at the request of the defense, sealed an attached affidavit from Poshkus.

She said the redaction in the petition and the sealing of the affidavit are in accord with a medical-privacy law.

Asked if Carpio is in a wheelchair because he is too feeble to stand, corrections officials would not say.

Patricia A. Coyne-Fague, Corrections Department chief counsel, disclosed during the hearing that two mental-health specialists who work at the ACI are concerned about Carpio's mental competency.

She quoted Alan Feinstein, supervising clinical psychologist, and Dr. Martin Bauermeister, a psychiatrist who works under contract, as suggesting that the state or the defense may want to have an evaluation of his mental competency to stand trial.

Wenge, for the defense, and Daly, for the state, said they are not asking for such an evaluation. McGuirl said she could order an evaluation but that she lacks sufficient information to do so.

She told Coyne-Fague that she wants to see an affidavit from the two specialists by the time she holds a conference with the lawyers next Thursday.

The issue of Carpio's legal representation cropped up again, when Wenge acknowledged in court that Robert L. Sheketoff, the Boston lawyer who employs her, wants to represent Carpio at his expected bail hearing.

In order for him to do so, McGuirl said, Wenge must establish a Rhode Island office in compliance with Rhode Island court rules. Only then can Sheketoff, as an out-of-state lawyer, act as co-counsel for a Rhode Island defendant, the judge pointed out.

When Carpio was initially charged in District Court, the identity of his lawyer became an issue. Carpio family members, who come from the Boston area, hired Sheketoff.

Under rules set by the Rhode Island Supreme Court, an out-of-state lawyer who wants to represent a client in a Rhode Island court must team up with a Rhode Island lawyer and get court approval.

Sheketoff and Wenge were licensed to practice in Massachusetts, and Wenge said their office was having trouble finding a Rhode Island lawyer because of the notoriety of Carpio's case.

At least several Rhode Island lawyers ultimately offered their services, but the matter became moot because Wenge passed the Rhode Island bar examination and was admitted to practice in Rhode Island.

Yesterday, McGuirl instructed Wenge to report at next Thursday's conference the progress Wenge has made in setting up a local office.

By law, Carpio would be entitled to a bail hearing within two weeks of his arraignment, but the judge said she cannot schedule a bail hearing until Carpio's physical condition improves and his legal representation is confirmed.

For the time, being he remains held without bail in an isolation cell at the Adult Intake Center at the ACI under 24-hour observation.

At the conclusion of yesterday's hearing, Carpio declared, "I just wish my family good regards."

Carpio, 26, of Providence, is charged with discharging a firearm while committing a crime of violence, death resulting, as well as murder, in connection with Allen's slaying.

He also is charged with assault with a dangerous weapon, serious bodily injury resulting, and assault on a person over the age of 60. Those counts arise from his alleged stabbing of 83-year-old Madeline Gatta outside her house in the North End of Providence. Gatta recovered.

And he is charged with assaulting three correctional officers at the ACI.

Digital Extra: View photos of murder defendant Esteban Carpio from four previous court appearances, and recap the shooting death of Detective Sgt. James Allen, at:

http://projo.com/extra/2005/detectiveallen/