Vermont Attorney General TJ Donovan has intervened in an attempted murder case previously dropped by Chittenden County State’s Attorney Sarah George. The case is expected to be refiled and result in a plea deal.
Terms of that plea agreement are still being worked out for Veronica Lewis, who is accused of shooting her firearms instructor, Darryl Montague, during a lesson in 2015 in Westford.
Lewis was expected to mount an insanity defense. Her lawyer submitted opinions from psychiatrists showing that Lewis was insane at the time of the crime.
According to a recent court filing, a deal is expected to be finalized in about three weeks.
Charity Clark, Donovan’s chief of staff, said this week that the attorney general was “unable” to comment on the matter.
George, who dropped an attempted murder charge against Lewis in June 2019, said at the time that she could not counter an insanity claim.
The state’s attorney wrote that her office had received evidence that Lewis had a long history of mental illness diagnoses and previous psychiatric hospitalizations.
At the same time she dismissed the case against Lewis, George also dropped two unrelated murder cases for similar reasons.
Gov. Phil Scott had called on Donovan to review all three cases that George had dismissed. Donovan conducted that review, and now has twice taken the unusual move of reviving a prosecution that a county state’s attorney had already dropped.
One of those cases involved murder charges against Aita Gurung who was accused of using a meat cleaver to kill his wife, Yogeswari Khadka, 32, and seriously injure his mother-in-law, Thulsa Rimal, at their home in the Old North End of Burlington.
In September 2019, Donovan’s office refiled murder and attempted murder charges against Gurung. The case remains pending in Chittenden County Superior Court.
After George dropped the attempted murder charge against Lewis, federal prosecutors filed their own criminal case against her on firearms charges. Lewis had been set to enter a plea agreement on those charges on Wednesday in federal court in Burlington, but that hearing was called off to allow more time for the Vermont Attorney General’s Office to wrap up a deal with Lewis on the state charge of attempted second-degree murder.
That federal plea agreement is contingent on the deal being finalized to the attempted murder charge in state court, according to a recent filing by attorney David McColgin, a federal public defender representing Lewis on the firearms charge.
“As a result,” McColgin wrote in the motion to continue Wednesday’s hearing in federal court, “the final version has not yet been signed by all parties. Counsel anticipates that the state court plea agreement will be finalized and signed by all parties within the next three weeks.”
Lewis has been charged in federal court with unlawfully possessing a stolen firearm and possessing a firearm after being found mentally defective. Each charge carries a maximum sentence of 10 years.
The federal charges stem from Lewis fleeing the shooting with one of Montague’s firearms, a Smith & Wesson Model K-22 caliber revolver, according to court filings.
Jessica Brown, a state public defender who has represented Lewis, could not be reached Thursday for comment. Vermont Defender General Matthew Valerio said Thursday he was aware that a “global” resolution was in the works involving both the federal and state charges against Lewis. He declined further comment.
George, reached Thursday, stated the Attorney General’s Office had not yet filed a state charge against Lewis.
However, George wrote in an email, given the recent filing in the federal court case, she can “only assume” that the Attorney General’s Office plans to do so soon and submit a plea agreement at the same time.
George said while she doesn’t know the specifics of the agreement, she is not surprised that Lewis would feel an “incredible amount of pressure” to resolve the federal and state cases rather than risk pleading out to the federal charges and still having the threat that the Attorney General’s Office would refile the state charges “looming over” her forever.
“She likely faced a choice between the lesser of two evils,” George wrote. “This is exactly how our system typically plays out.”
Montague, who was shot twice in the face and once in the abdomen, spent a year at the University of Vermont Medical Center in Burlington healing from his injuries. He is now disabled, unable to work, and still has problems with balance and memory.
He said Thursday that he is aware that plea agreements are in the works to resolve both the state and federal cases against Lewis, but he didn’t want to comment further on their terms since they haven’t yet been finalized.
Montague, who had strongly opposed dropping the attempted murder charge against Lewis, said he’s “cautiously optimistic” that justice will be served in the case.
“They know how I feel,” Montague said. “The decision is effectively in TJ’s hands.”
Read the story on VTDigger here: Donovan refiling second case dismissed by Chittenden County state’s attorney.