Judge hears testiomony in gag order appeal

Associated Press WriterLaFAYETTE, Ga. (AP) -- Investigators, politicians and the media have created a "carnival atmosphere" around the search for bodies at a Georgia crematory, preventing its operator from getting a fair trial, an attorney told a judge Friday.

The investigation has provided "an open mike for anyone who is up for election," including Gov. Roy Barnes, two U.S. senators and various congressmen, said Ken Poston, who represents Tri-State Crematory operator Ray Brent Marsh.

Poston was urging Superior Court Judge William R. Hill to retain a Feb. 21 gag order in the case. Hill did not say when he would rule on the request by news organizations to lift the gag order. The judge's questions indicated that he may at least clarify the order because officials seemed confused over what it means they can and cannot say.

Lawyers for 10 news organizations, including the Chattanooga Times-Free Press and The Atlanta Journal-Constitution, have asked Hill to rescind the order. Georgia Attorney General Thurbert Baker also wrote Hill, asking for a reconsideration.

Tom Griscom, executive editor of the Chattanooga Times-Free Press, testified that the order has prohibited the newspaper from reporting information not related to the investigation, such as state regulation of the funeral industry and information that families need.

"We are trying to understand and explain some of the issues as it relates to the Tri-State Crematory, what kind of complains there were in the past, have they been acted on," Griscom testified.

The media lawyers told Hill there is no evidence of any information being revealed that would affect prospective jurors. Testimony was to continue through midday.

Workers on Thursday spent a second day without finding additional copses, recovering instead just some body parts, bones and cremated remains. The count of dumped corpses remains at 339.

Walker County Emergency Management Agency Director David Ashburn said there no "major pockets of remains" discovered by search crews Thursday, a second day of no additional bodies.

"It's an answer to our prayers," Ashburn said, although he warned the unchanged body count likely didn't mean all of them have been found.

Marsh is charged with more than 100 counts of theft by deception, accused of taking money for cremations he never did.

Marsh, 28, told authorities the incinerator was broken, keeping him from performing the cremations.

Marilyn Elam, a spokeswoman for the Tennessee Department of Commerce and Insurance that oversees the state board of funeral directors and embalmers, told the Chattanooga Times Free Press that operators of a Chattanooga funeral home where Marsh's sister works were being questioned to see what they knew about the crematory.

Rhames LaShea Marsh, 32, has been licensed funeral director and embalmer at Franklin-Strickland Funeral Home since June 14, records show. Her apprenticeship at the funeral home started in February 1993.

She has refused to talk with reporters.

Funeral home co-owner Reuben Strickland said he could not talk about the Marshes or the work they did. He said the judge's gag order in the crematory case applies to him. Records show Franklin-Strickland Funeral Home sent 32 bodies to the Tri-State Crematory since 1998.

Elam said licensing rules would hold a funeral director responsible for having "'direct knowledge that the bodies were not being cremated as they were supposed to be" and not reporting it.

Ashburn said about two-thirds of the property has been excavated since the first bodies were discovered Feb. 15.

He said crews clearing the 16-acre pine grove around the crematory Thursday found some body parts, "bones associated with skeletons" and human remains that have been cremated.

Ashburn said work was progressing to start draining a 3-acre lake where a skull and torso were previously discovered. He said work in the lake bed could not start for at least two weeks.

Ashburn said 77 recovered bodies had been identified, dating back to deaths in 1997.

Dr. Kris Sperry, Georgia's chief medical examiner, said 387 sets of cremains returned by families whose relatives hired funeral homes that used Tri-State have been examined and "between 10 and 15 percent of those" were not cremains.

Sperry encouraged families to continue providing DNA samples to be compared with bodies that are recovered. He has said the cremated remains cannot be positively identified.

------On the Net:

Information for families: http://www.gema.state.ga.us

Walker County sheriff: http://www.co.walker.ga.us/cd(underscore)14.htm

Georgia Bureau of Investigation: http://www.state.ga.us/gbi

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