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Friday, Dec 09, 2005
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Posted on Thu, Dec. 08, 2005

Bay Area Briefs


LOS GATOS

Attorney announces strategy for client accused in slaying

The attorney for architect Maurice Nasmeh, accused in the slaying of 42-year-old Jeanine Harms of Los Gatos, will ask a Santa Clara County Superior Court judge Friday to suppress evidence found in Nasmeh's vehicle after the woman disappeared.

Attorney Daniel Jensen said his motion will ask Judge Randolf Rice to set aside the evidence because police officers went beyond the scope of their search warrant and seized Nasmeh's car, a Jeep Grand Cherokee.

``They named several things they were looking for, then they seized the vehicle,'' Jensen said. ``They never asked permission to take the Jeep.''

The vehicle was impounded for several days, Jensen said. Police got the warrant and searched the vehicle in early August 2001, within days of Harms' disappearance. She was last seen on the night of July 27, 2001, after a date with Nasmeh, whom she had met for the first time earlier that evening at a bar.

After months of intensive crime lab work, the evidence from the vehicle yielded fibers that led to Nasmeh's arrest in December 2004. Tiny fibers from a rug project that Harms had worked on in her home were found in the cargo area of the Jeep and on a carpet that authorities believe was used in disposing of her body.

Harms' body has never been found. Nasmeh, 41, has pleaded not guilty.

-- Connie Skipitares


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