Conviction

A man with no country has a chance to stay in the United States a bit longer. Maryland's highest court has ruled that 36-year-old Mark Denisyuk, who has been in the United States illegally for more than two decades, deserves another trial on five-year-old assault charges because no one told him his guilty plea could lead to his deportation. The ruling means Denisyuk can stay in the country — his lawyer says he's been released from the custody of federal immigration officials — at least until his case is resolved in Harford County.

The state attorney general's office will ask the Maryland Court of Appeals to review the reversal of a first-degree murder conviction against a Pennsylvania man accused of strangling and burning a woman on a Carroll County farm.Gary E. Bair, chief of the attorney general's criminal appeals division, said yesterday that he would prepare a brief within several weeks asking the state's highest court to review the June 6 reversal decision by the Court of Special Appeals.The intermediate court last week threw out James Howard VanMetre III's conviction because Carroll prosecutors failed to follow the state's trial-scheduling rule.

Manuel Noriega's defense attorney said over and again during the trial of his client that the case "smelled all the way to Washington." In fact, many professionals in the State Department, the Central Intelligence Agency and the Justice Department in Washington reportedly opposed prosecuting the Panamanian dictator on drug-related charges, on the grounds that this would harm inter-American relations and reveal embarrassing facts about U.S. activities....

The state's second highest court has thrown out the murder conviction of a Pennsylvania man charged with strangling and burning a woman on a Carroll County farm because prosecutors failed to secure a waiver of Maryland's trial-scheduling rule.In an opinion filed yesterday, the Court of Special Appeals said the Carroll state's attorney should have asked a judge to waive the rule -- which calls for trials within 180 days of an attorney's involvement in a case -- when it was clear that James Howard VanMetre III would not be released by Pennsylvania authorities in time for a trial.

ANNAPOLIS -- A leading cancer surgeon's efforts to restore his reputation reached the state's highest court yesterday as several judges questioned the rationale for his 1993 conviction on a charge of battering a female patient.The long, murky legal battle of Dr. George Elias, chief cancer surgeon at the University of Maryland Medical Center, arrived at the state Court of Appeals 19 months after he was convicted of misdemeanor battery during a non-jury trial in Baltimore District Court.Dr.

A Baltimore Circuit Court jury convicted a man yesterday of robbing an 82-year-old woman of her pocketbook outside a KFC restaurant and stabbing her with a knife when she tried to fight back. Rozza Alston, 40, who lived three blocks from the KFC at North Avenue and St. Paul Street, was found guilty of second-degree assault, robbery with a deadly weapon and openly carrying a dangerous weapon. He faces a maximum of 33 years in prison. The jury acquitted Alston of attempted first-degree murder, attempted second-degree murder and first-degree assault.

WASHINGTON -- The Supreme Court, dividing 6-3, barred state prison inmates from federal courts yesterday if a mistake by their lawyers kept state courts from having the first chance to rule on constitutional complaints against their conviction or sentence.The ruling was the latest, and one of the most far-reaching, decisions in a lengthening list that have curbed state prisoners' opportunities to take constitutional challenges to federal court under a right of review that has origins going back at least to the 13th century.

Maryland's highest court reversed the conviction yesterday of a leading cancer surgeon who was accused of improperly touching a woman during a medical exam, apparently ending a two-year court battle.In a 4-3 decision, the court found no evidence that Dr. George Elias either intentionally or recklessly battered a female patient when he examined her groin during an office visit Jan. 5, 1993. The surgeon said he felt the area for swollen lymph nodes to rule out cancer."This is big stuff because I've never been accused of such a thing in my life," said Dr. Elias, who has practiced for 36 years.

The man who police say was behind the wheel of a car that struck and killed the father of a Baltimore officer escaped conviction on federal gun charges last year — a rare exception, given federal prosecutors' reputation for closing cases. Umar Burley, 39, the suspected driver , and passenger Brent Matthews, 36, were ordered held without bond Thursday on drug charges in connection with the crash. City prosecutors say both men, accused of fleeing a drug arrest, could face manslaughter charges once the investigation is complete.

The state's highest court has refused to review the reversal of a cocaine-distribution conviction of a Westminster man believed to be serving the longest prison sentence for drug dealing ever handed down in a Carroll County court.Without comment, the Court of Appeals last week declined to review Noland Maurice Rheubottom's case. Earlier this year, the Court of Special Appeals reversed Rheubottom's cocaine distribution conviction of Jan. 20, 1993, his third in four years.That court said Carroll Circuit Judge Raymond E. Beck Sr. failed to instruct the jury about incorrect statements made by a county prosecutor in his closing arguments.