Turning Verdicts a Specialty for Aaron Hernandez Defense Team
The defense team for Aaron Hernandez has made the prosecution’s road to a guilty verdict long and bumpy.
If defense lawyers were like health care plans, the Rankin & Sultan law firm includes both Grade-A preventative care and catastrophic coverage. And when on trial for murder, it’s a necessity to get the best insurance money can buy.
After nearly 29 years together in practice, James Sultan and Charles Rankin — Jamie and Charlie to colleagues — are representing Aaron Hernandez in the former New England Patriots tight end’s trial for allegedly murdering Odin Lloyd.
Nationally and regionally acclaimed, Rankin and Sultan might be more well-known for their work outside of trial than actually in it.
“When you try a case, you’re trying it on two levels: You’re trying it to the jury, and you’re also trying it to the appellate court,’’ said Suffolk University law professor Chris Dearborn.
The second level — trying it to the appellate court — is where Rankin and Sultan have been particularly successful. Appellate courts, or the Court of Appeals, will cancel decisions upon finding a mistrial. Guilty (and not-guilty) verdicts may be retried if lawyers prove that evidence was improperly admitted, an individual commits misconduct in court, or that the original court did not have jurisdiction.
“And they do a phenomenal job at that,’’ said Dearborn.
According to Dearborn, who worked at Rankin & Sultan for a couple years before leaving to teach, their work and advocacy has made the Hernandez case much more difficult for both the prosecution and Judge E. Susan Garsh.
The pair complement each other with different courtroom personae. While Rankin is more methodical and patient, and poised in developing his arguments, Sultan is more direct and emotional (which has led to a few confrontational moments with witnesses on the stand).
It’s their job, along with attorney Michael Fee, to not only create enough reasonable doubt that Hernandez did not shoot his friend, but also that he was not even involved. Under Massachusetts state law, defendants need only to be present during the crime with the “intent’’ necessary to kill in order to be convicted of homicide.
Hernandez, left, speaks with Rankin during his murder trial.
However, when they aren’t prodding and critiquing the investigation as “sloppy and unprofessional,’’ Rankin and Sultan have fought to exclude as much of the prosecution’s evidence as possible from the trial. From Lloyd’s text messages sent to his sister hours before his death to photos of Hernandez holding the same model gun said to have been used in the murder, the two defense lawyers convinced Judge Garsh to dismiss critical elements of the prosecution’s case.
“The more recent stuff where she refused to let them get into the Alexander Bradley (testimony), that was a no-brainer,’’ said Dearborn. “The text stuff and gun references were closer calls. They were very well-litigated by the defense, and it’s their advocacy that tipped the scales a bit.’’
While Garsh has made a career of being a smart and very principled judge, said Dearborn, the presence of Rankin and Sultan has been influential in the case. As past judges know, dealing with these two is like walking a judiciary tightrope.
In 2012, Sultan successfully appealed the murder conviction of Mattapan resident Linrose Woodbine to the Massachusetts Supreme Court. Sultan argued that testimony from a police officer regarding Woodbine’s unrecorded confession had been improperly influenced by evidence that was barred from the trial. The Court agreed and overturned the conviction. Woodbine later plead guilty to lesser manslaughter and weapons charges.
Thomas Toolan III is escorted to Nantucket Superior Court during his murder trial in Nantucket in this June 8, 2007, file photo.
In 2011, Sultan also successfully appealed the conviction of New York banking executive Thomas Toolan III for stabbing his girlfriend to death in Nantucket. Sultan argued, and the court agreed, that many of the jurors — all of whom lived on the 11,000-person island — had direct or indirect connections to the victim and had not been properly vetted. Toolan was then retried for the same crime in a larger county and convicted in 2013. Sultan was not involved in either of Toolan’s murder trials, only the appeal for a new trial, according to court documents.
The firm also defended the famous Fells Acre Day Care Center abuse trials, in which convictions of the three defendants were repeatedly overturned and reinstated by appellate courts, after an interviewer supposedly swayed children into saying they were molested.
The list goes on of overturned post-trial convictions by the Sultan and Rankin team. Literally, the list goes on.
“They’re great trial lawyers too, but they’re just off-the-charts unbelievable as post-conviction lawyers,’’ said Dearborn.
Dearborn remembers working a case with Rankin and recounted how good “Charlie’’ was at “preserving the record,’’ which is to say he kept tabs on side arguments and objections that the judge overruled during trial. These are the things that can lead to an appeal—even a retrial.
The Hernandez defense team has made the prosecution team’s road to a guilty verdict long and bumpy. And even if prosecutors can reach that goal, as the track record for Jamie and Charlie proves, the journey might just be getting started.
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