Defendants charged with tampering with pump station valves

By Lloyd Garrison

There was supposed to be another hearing last week in Litchfield Superior Court to advance the case of the State vs. Mathew Carey and Kyle Majewski, but nothing went right for the two 19 year olds accused of multiple felonies that led to the torching of the Norfolk Curling Club last December.

The hearing on April 24 was scheduled to begin at 9:30 a.m. David Shepack, the state’s attorney prosecuting the case, arrived early. Among the spectators who began to pack the courtroom was Curling Club President Mary Fanette. The defendant’s lawyers showed up on time. The judge was waiting in his chambers. And they all waited, and waited some more.

An hour went by with no sign of the corrections department van bearing the defendants from the Juvenile Detention Center in New Haven. Shortly, the word was passed that the defendant’s lawyers had to leave the building to keep other court appearances. The hearing was postponed to May 30.

When the van finally pulled in to the barbed wire enclosure behind the courthouse an hour later, Carey and Majewski were in for a surprise. They were met by new arrest warrants for allegedly tampering with the valves at the pumping station on Mountain Road three hours before the fire. If the evidence bears out the charge, it would bolster the prosecution’s contention that the fire was no accident but clearly pre-meditated.

All of which may be moot if the case ends in a plea bargain, which lawyers close to the proceedings think is a certainty. Whatever happens, there will be more waiting. “Neither side is ready yet to begin talking,” said Shepack. “We haven’t even begun to exchange evidence. A big case like this could take a year to get through the system.”