From: Solitairea1
Date: October 29, 2005
Time: 05:10 AM
Right Down to a Bloody Glove!!! .................. .................................................. ONTRA COSTA TIMES MARTINEZ - As the teenager accused of killing Lafayette resident Pamela Vitale briefly appeared Thursday in a courtroom filled with reporters, his mother was in custody on suspicion of being an accessory to the crime. Scott Dyleski, 16, did not enter a plea to charges that he killed Vitale in her home Oct. 15. If convicted, he faces 26 years to life in prison. Vitale, wife of TV legal analyst Daniel Horowitz, was bludgeoned, was stabbed and had a symbol carved into her back. About 90 minutes before Dyleski appeared, his mother, 53-year-old Esther Fielding, was arrested on suspicion of being an accessory to murder after the fact. She is being held on $500,000 bail, said deputies at County Jail in Martinez. Deputies declined to provide further details, citing a temporary gag order issued by a Contra Costa Superior Court judge because of the intense media interest in the case. According to court documents, investigators found a blood-stained glove Oct. 17 in a van parked outside of the Hunsaker Canyon Drive residence where the mother and son lived. The vehicle was registered to Fielding. Investigators said in court documents that the killer wore gloves. The documents also reveal that Fielding told her son to stay at his girlfriend's home the night of the killing because of all the police activity on their street. On Wednesday, before the judge issued the gag order, Thomas McKenna, Dyleski's former lawyer, described Fielding as being "stressed out of her mind," about her son's arrest. Dyleski lived with his mother, a long-distance healer who believes that DNA strands can be activated to alleviate disease, in a house shared by three families just down the one-lane rural road where Vitale lived with her husband in a modular house. The couple had been building a palatial new home nearby. In court, McKenna told Superior Court Judge David Flinn that he was recusing himself from the case. A representative of the county public defender said her office would most likely represent Dyleski. Dressed in a sweatshirt issued to offenders held in Juvenile Hall, Dyleski looked straight ahead during the 10-minute proceeding. He spoke once, saying, "You are," when the judge asked him if he was pronouncing his name correctly. McKenna requested a gag order Wednesday to keep investigators and lawyers from talking about the case. Prosecutor Harold Jewett filed a motion that afternoon in support of the request. The judge ordered Dyleski to return Nov. 9 to enter a plea. He also said he would hear arguments on a permanent gag order on Nov. 10. Neither Horowitz nor members of the Dyleski family were in the courtroom. Horowitz found Vitale's body in their home. Dyleski was arrested four days later at a home in Walnut Creek. Prosecutors have charged the teenager as an adult with one count of murder and an enhancement of using a deadly weapon. Outside the Martinez courtroom, dozens of people waited in line for a seat. Television camera operators waited, too, hoping for an interview with anyone involved in the case. District Attorney Bob Kochly spoke, but said little, citing the temporary gag order. "My office will not be commenting or discussing any of the facts of the case with the media," Kochly said. "We're going to try the case in this matter in the courtroom, not in the media." Also at the courthouse was Los Angeles attorney Gloria Allred, who represented Amber Frey in Scott Peterson's murder trial and witnesses in other high-profile trials. She said a potential witness in the case whom she would identify only as a young female has retained her. On the night of the killing, Dyleski was at a friend's house with his girlfriend, according to an affidavit filed in support of a warrant to search the girlfriend's Walnut Creek house. Dyleski then went to his girlfriend's house to have sex, the documents say. A man who answered the cell phone of the girlfriend's father declined to confirm whether Allred was representing the family. Police had been investigating Dyleski and a teenage friend for credit card theft at the time of his arrest. A credit card stolen from a neighbor was allegedly used to buy hydroponic growing equipment -- often used to cultivate marijuana -- that was scheduled for delivery to the Horowitz residence, according to police documents. An investigative source said police believe Dyleski went to the home looking for the equipment and got in a fight with Vitale. The affidavit said investigators seized a duffel bag from a vehicle at Dyleski's house that contained clothing and a glove, both with traces of blood. "It appears as though some clothing items are still missing, as well as, the stabbing instrument believed to have been used in the commission of the crime," detective Cary Goldberg wrote. Horowitz is a popular legal pundit who received national attention for his commentary during the double-murder trial of Scott Peterson, convicted last November of murdering his pregnant wife. Dyleski is a former Boy Scout who had recently enrolled at Diablo Valley College and immersed himself in art and music. Friends say that after the death of his half-sister in a car accident in 2002, he distanced himself from the adults who knew him best and wore eccentric, dark goth clothing. His hair, which was long, lank and stringy at the time of his last high school yearbook photo, was cut short when he appeared in court Thursday. email this print this reprint or license this ................................................. Solitairea1