The defendant was charged with murder and criminal use of a firearm on a claim that he shot and killed a man outside a Norwich rooming house. After a two-week trial, the jury was deadlocked and a mistrial was declared. Several months later, a plea bargain was reached and the defendant received a ten and a half year prison term on the reduced charge of first-degree manslaughter with a firearm.

In this capital felony case which arose in East Lyme and inspired the book Lethal Guardian and a television movie, Mike represented Mark Despres, the alleged “hit man” hired by lawyers Haiman Long Clein and Beth Ann Carpenter to kill a purported child molester. During jury selection, Mike secured a favorable plea bargain, saving Mr. Despres from both the death penalty and life imprisonment.

In this capital felony case which gripped Connecticut and the law enforcement community, Mike represented Nency Forty, an accomplice in the tragic killing of East Hartford Police Officer Brian Aselton. Mike established her diminished role in the crime, saving her from both the death penalty and life imprisonment.

During his representation of convicted serial killer Michael Ross, Mike became the first defense attorney to brief and argue before the Connecticut Supreme Court the legal issue known as proportionately review. His work became a model for other lawyers working on death penalty cases in Connecticut.

In this appeal before the Connecticut Supreme Court, Mike teamed with famed Attorney Barry Scheck and other members of the Innocence Project on an amicus brief that persuaded the Supreme Court to require trial judges to instruct future juries on the risks inherent in certain eyewitness identifications.

In this post-conviction case which focused on the illicit relationship between Boster mobster James “Whitey” Bulger and corrupt FBI Agent John Connolly, Jr., Mike represented Frank Colantoni in an effort to overturn Mr. Colantoni’s conviction for participating in the killing of organized crime figure William “The Wild Guy” Grasso.

In this highly publicized and controversial New Haven case, Mike litigated post-conviction petitions over a nine year period, seeking to overturn Stefon Morant’s double homicide conviction on the basis of an FBI report that suggested Mr. Morant was framed. Mike also developed evidence that showed the prosecution’s key witness was improperly influenced by a police officer. The evidence developed by Mike became the basis for the 2015 exoneration of Mr. Morant’s co-defendant Scott Lewis, who had been serving a 120-year sentence, and the subsequent reduction of Mr. Morant’s 70 year sentence to time served. See Lewis v. Commission, U.S. Court of Appeals, Second Circuit, No. 14-193-pr (May 14, 2015).

In a case that drew national attention, Elson Morales and two other Bridgeport police officers were accused of using unreasonable force in the apprehension of a fleeing suspect. The Government was prepared to indict Officer Morales on a ten-year felony. After several months of negotiation, Mike secured a plea bargain that more accurately reflected the defendant’s culpability—a plea to a misdemeanor civil rights violation and a three-month jail term.

The defendant was charged with first-degree assault and faced up to twenty years in prison for the alleged near-fatal stabbing of her boyfriend in a Bridgeport apartment. At trial, the defendant testified that her boyfriend was beating her over the quality of her cooking and that she acted in self-defense. Mike supported her testimony by calling as a witness an expert on Battered Woman Syndrome. The jury found the defendant not guilty.

The defendant was charged with capital felony, murder, felony murder, and first and second-degree sexual assault on the claim that he and another man raped and strangled a young, mentally impaired woman. The State announced its intention to seek the death penalty. The trial, which took approximately two weeks, centered on the defendant’s mental state and role in the crime and also the cause and moment of death. The jury deliberated for three days, finding the defendant not guilty of capital felony, felony murder and first-degree sexual assault, but guilty of murder and other offenses. As a result, the defendant was spared a penalty hearing and possible death sentence.

The defendant was charged with capital felony, murder, kidnapping and other crimes on the claim that he participated in the abduction of the victim and that he subsequently shot and killed the victim with an assault weapon. The State announced its intention to seek the death penalty. At the two-week trial, Mike established that the prosecution’s key witnesses were biased and had falsely implicated the defendant. The jury deliberated less than three hours and found the defendant not guilty of all charges.

The Defendant was charged with murder for allegedly shooting the victim following an argument in Norwalk. Mistaken identification was the focus of Mike’s defense strategy. After a six-day trial, the jury found the defendant not guilty in forty minutes.

The defendant was charged with murder, attempted murder and three counts of first-degree assault on the claim that he shot and killed one man and injured three others in The Sportsman’s, a notorious Norwich bar. The trial took several weeks, with the prosecution calling more than fifty witnesses. After eight days of deliberations, the jury was deadlocked and a mistrial was declared. At the retrial in 2003, the jury was again deadlocked, this time deliberating for six days. In 2004, a third trial was held. After several days of deliberations, the jury found the defendant not guilty of murder and attempted murder, but guilty of first-degree manslaughter, first-degree assault and firearms possession.

The defendant was charged with multiple counts of sexual assault and risk of injury to a minor on a claim that he molested his mentally impaired grandchild. After a two-week jury trial, where Mike established that the child’s memory was tainted, the defendant was found not guilty on five counts, with the jury deadlocked on the remaining four counts. Thereafter, a favorable plea bargain was reached.

Following a fatal motor vehicle accident on I-84 in Danbury, the defendant was charged with first and second-degree manslaughter, evading responsibility and other offenses. Mike’s defense strategy included calling as a witness an accident reconstruction expert and presenting a computer simulation of the crash. After a three-week jury trial, the defendant was acquitted of nearly all charges, including the most serious ones.

Alerted by a call from a concerned citizen, Fairfield police arrested the defendant and charged her with driving while intoxicated. No breath test was taken. At trial, Mike established that the prosecution’s evidence was equally consistent with distracted driving and that the police failed to properly administer the roadside sobriety test and to preserve important evidence. The jury found the defendant not guilty in one hour.

The defendant was charged with capital felony on a claim that he bound, strangled and carved his nickname into his prison cellmate’s chest. The State announced its intention to seek the death penalty. The trial took several months, with the jury finding the defendant guilty of capital felony. In the penalty hearing, after Mike’s closing argument, the jury found the killing was not heinous, cruel or depraved and the defendant was spared a possible death sentence.