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Show Mitchell's father pleads for dismissal of charges An attorney representing the father of the man accused in the murder of airline pilot Fred Duncan asked Third District Court Monday to dismiss drug trafficking charges against his client because county officials have withheld information from the defense. Gilbert Athay, a Salt Lake City attorney representing Patrick Mitchell, Mit-chell, told Judge J. Dennis Frederick that Assistant County Attorney Terry Christiansen had "been playing games" with the defense for three months. Athay asked the judge to dismiss charges against his client of conspiring to distribute cocaine for value saying Christiansen had failed to supply transcripts of grand jury proceedings. In May, a Summit County grand jury indicted the 45-year-old Arkansas resident. The grand jury also returned a drug trafficking indictment on Mitchell's son, Preston Pres-ton charged the younger Mitchell with the Aug. 4 murder of Duncan. Arguing before the bench, Athay said Christiansen would not provide grand jury transcripts to the defense because the county attorney's office was affraid the documents would fall into the hands of Preston Mitchell or his attorney, Kenneth R. Brown. Quoting Christiansen, Athay said, "We don't want to give it to them because they might give it to someone else." Judge Frederick said he would take under advisement Athay's motion to dismiss the case as well as one by Christiansen to restrict the transcripts the defense receives to uio&e winch do not pertain to the homicide. But Christiansen argued that, "Contrary to game playing... any delay (in supplying information to the defense) is due to Athay's schedule. Further, Christiansen maintained the county attorney's office found it necessary to keep grand jury evidence pertaining to the Duncan murder from Athay to "protect witnesses and prepare for trial." Christiansen contended that evidence evi-dence on the homicide did not apply to the charges brought against the senior Mitchell. The assistant county attorney asked the Judge Frederick to review the transcripts and release only information on the older Mitchell. Athay answered Christiansen stating: stat-ing: "We don't care about testimony in the homicide." He explained, however, that since his client was charged with conspiring with the younger Mitchell, he had to have all testimony in which the father's name was mentioned. In addition, Athay argued that Third District Court Judge Leonard Russon had earlier ruled that the defense would receive such information. informa-tion. The defense lawyer said that included the grand jury testimony of seven witnesses. Charging that the county attorney's attor-ney's office had not fulfilled the order of the court, Athay said, "We have been given nothing but a bunch of promises." The senior Mitchell was not in court. Athay said his client was at home in Berryville, Ark. His 24-year-old son remains at large. |