PORTLAND (AP) – A divided Maine supreme court Tuesday denied an appeal by an author who maintains the innocence of convicted child murderer Dennis Dechaine and sought access to records of an advisory group that reviewed his case.

In a 3-2 ruling, the Supreme Judicial Court decided that the three lawyers who conducted an independent investigation at the behest of the attorney general’s office were acting as private citizens and were thus not subject to document disclosure requirements of Maine’s Freedom of Access Act.

The decision upheld a lower court’s ruling against James Moore of Brunswick, author of the 2002 book “Human Sacrifice” that concluded Dechaine was innocent and alleged that investigators and prosecutors had acted improperly.

Dechaine, 50, is serving a life sentence for the 1988 murder and rape of 12-year-old Sarah Cherry, who was abducted while babysitting in her hometown of Bowdoin. A vocal group of Dechaine supporters maintains that he was wrongly convicted and wants a new trial.

The independent investigators – retired U.S. Magistrate Judge Eugene Beaulieu and attorneys Charles Abbott and Marvin Glazier – expressed no opinion on Dechaine’s guilt or innocence, confining their review to how the case was handled by police and prosecutors. They found no misconduct.

Moore, a former Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms agent, argued in his appeal that the investigators constituted an “agency or public official” of the state and that the files, records and reports compiled during their review had to be disclosed.

The Supreme Judicial Court noted that the investigators were not paid for their services, their advice was nonbinding and Attorney General Steven Rowe had no legislative mandate to appoint them.

“Essentially, the defendants were requested, not mandated, to perform the investigation, and they were asked to do it as independent private citizens, separate from the government and without being requested or expected to make any recommendations,” Justice Donald Alexander’s majority opinion stated.

In the dissent, Justice Jon Levy concluded that the review panel was acting as an arm of the attorney general’s office and that the public nature of the investigation does not necessarily change when the probe is conducted by an outside group.

“The fact that three volunteers appointed by the attorney general conducted the investigation, and not paid, professional members of his department, offers no rational basis to diminish the public’s right, pursuant to the Freedom of Access Act, to seek access to the materials resulting from the investigation,” Levy wrote.

Moore expressed disappointment at the ruling, saying he sought the documents to show that the investigators had no evidence to support their conclusion.

“I guess the attorney general’s commission gets to keep on pretending that they had some evidence for their ‘no official misconduct’ finding, and some people will believe them,” Moore said. “Maybe somebody can explain to me why they tried so hard to hide information that would make the officials look good.”

Beaulieu had yet to read the opinion and said it would not be appropriate to comment on it. When asked why it was important to keep the documents under wraps, the former judge said all three panel members agreed to that policy and he didn’t feel that he should speak for all of them.

Neither Abbott and Glazier could be reached immediately for comment, but Bangor attorney attorney Seth Harrow, who represented Glazier and Beaulieu, said the court came to the correct conclusion.

“These gentlemen agreed to volunteer their time to this panel, but by doing so they did not become public officials making every thought they jotted down subject to public scrutiny,” Harrow said.

Moore’s appeal drew support from the Maine Civil Liberties Union, the Maine Press Association and the Maine Freedom of Information Coalition.

Although disappointed in the outcome, Zachary Heiden of the MCLU said he was encouraged that both the majority and the dissenters reaffirmed that public disclosure is important and appropriate when private individuals act as the “functional equivalent” of the government.

He noted that the justices all agreed on how to test for such equivalence but were at odds on how the facts in Moore’s appeal should be applied.

AP-ES-06-17-08 1615EDT

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