STAMFORD, Conn. _ A Stamford judge Friday ruled on some of the half-dozen motions filed in the case against Farmington developer Fotis Dulos, but did not decide on a gag order requested by prosecutors or a motion to dismiss charges filed by Dulos' attorney.
Dulos, 51, was charged in June with tampering with evidence and hindering prosecution by investigators probing the disappearance of Jennifer Farber Dulos, his estranged wife. Friday's appearance is his third time facing a judge in the case. He has pleaded not guilty to the charges and has been free on $500,000 bail while monitored by GPS.
In the weeks since his last appearance, Norm Pattis, Dulos' lawyer, has filed more than half a dozen motions in the case ranging from the return of evidence to the dismissal of the charges.
On Friday, Judge John F. Blawie asked for legal briefs before he said he would rule on a gag order requested by Stamford/Norwalk State's Attorney Richard J. Colangelo Jr., or a motion to dismiss charges filed by Pattis.
In arguments on the gag order, Colangelo acknowledged Pattis has a right to defend his client publicly but was concerned about false statements, including that Michelle Troconis, Dulos' girlfriend, had taken a lie detector test.
Pattis said that if Blawie issued a gag order, he would immediately appeal to the state Supreme Court. "We are not going to sit back silently and be crucified in the press," Pattis said.
Colangelo said rules of professional conduct require lawyers not to make extrajudicial comments that can have a prejudicial impact on a case.
"It's the state's contention his statements are out of bounds," Colangelo said of Pattis.
Blawie denied motions related to Farber Dulos' medical records and for Dulos to be able to move the GPS monitoring device he wears from his ankle to his wrist. He agreed to have two vehicles returned to Dulos, but said investigators could keep a Ford Raptor truck and all electronic devices they seized.
Blawie continued the case to Sept. 13.
Farber Dulos was reported missing just before 7 p.m. on May 24 after she missed several appointments in New York City, authorities said. Her car was found a short time later by a New Canaan police officer not far from her home.
Farber Dulos and her husband have been embroiled in a contentious two-year divorce and custody battle. Their five children are with Farber Dulos' mother after a judge granted her temporary custody.
In the weeks since the disappearance, state police and New Canaan officers have searched across Connecticut and into New York for Farber Dulos or for any evidence into her disappearance.
Investigators said they found blood stains and blood splatter in the garage of her home, along with evidence of attempts to clean the crime scene, leading authorities to conclude there was a serious assault there, records show.
Investigators obtained a warrant for Dulos and Troconis after they obtained video footage that they said showed a man resembling Dulos throwing garbage bags in trash cans along Albany Avenue in Hartford on the night that Farber Dulos went missing, records show. A woman resembling Troconis was seen in the video either picking up an item or putting something down.
The two were in a Ford pickup that investigators said matched one owned by Dulos, records show. Investigators recovered some of the items discarded, which they said were covered in Farber Dulos' blood, records show.
The Hartford Courant has reported that some of that garbage was found that weekend by a Hartford man rummaging through trash. The man told The Courant that he found a bloody pillow and a knife in the garbage. He said he traded the knife for a $5 hit of crack cocaine.
Law enforcement sources told the Courant that the items police have recovered is a Vineyard Vines shirt that Farber Dulos was believed to have been wearing the day she disappeared, a bra, two mops and sponges with traces of her blood on them.
At a June court appearance, Colangelo told a judge that investigators found Dulos' DNA mixed with Farber Dulos' blood on a kitchen faucet in the home in an argument to raise the bond on Dulos. He told the judge there was no explanation for Dulos' blood to be on that faucet.
Dulos has pleaded not guilty to the charges. His defense team is "pursuing a revenge suicide hypothesis as an explanation for her disappearance," noting that Farber Dulos made comments to Dulos that led to grave concerns about her well-being.
