AURORA | A death row inmate convicted of three murders — including gunning down a murder witness — is back in an Arapahoe County courtroom and could be there for a while.
Lawyers for Sir Mario Owens, 27, are scheduled to argue some post-conviction issues before an Arapahoe County judge from now until at least March, said Casimir Spencer, a spokeswoman for the Arapahoe County district attorney’s office.
The issue aren’t connected to Owens’ appeal so they have to be heard before a trial court judge instead of the state’s court of appeals, Spencer said.
Owens’ lawyers have long argued that his trial in Arapahoe County wasn’t fair and said prosecutors relied on shady witnesses who testified only because they scored plea bargains for their own crimes.
Spencer said she couldn’t say specifically what the issues are in front of the court now. The lengthy hearings started last week are scheduled to last through March, she said.
Owens was convicted of killing murder witness Javad Marshall-Fields and his fiancee in 2005. Marshall-Fields was scheduled to testify against Owens’ friend and drug-dealing partner, Robert Ray, in a 2004 shooting that left Gregory Vann dead at Lowry Park.
At the time of the witness slaying, Owens wasn’t a suspect in the Lowry Park case, but police later said he also killed Vann.
In addition to his death sentence in the witness slaying, Owens is serving life in prison for killing Vann.
Ray is also on death row for Marshall-Fields’ death. Prosecutors say he masterminded the slayings and also shot and wounded a man in the Lowry Park shootings. A third man, Perish Carter, was convicted of helping Owens the night of the slayings and is serving a lengthy prison sentence.
Owens’ lawyers last summer filed a lawsuit in federal court challenging a state law aimed at speeding up death penalty appeals.
In a suit filed July 30 in United States District Court in Denver, Owens’ lawyers argue that the state’s “unitary review system” puts Owens’ two sets of lawyers — those appealing his sentence, and those appealing his murder conviction — at odds. If one set of lawyers discloses information in their appeal, it could be used by the state to harm Owens’ other appeal, the lawyers argue.