HOUSTON, Texas – CRICKET financier turned fraudster accused Robert Allen Stanford has once again asked the judge presiding over his trial to free him from jail until he has his day in court, claiming that adverse conditions in the prison have turned him into a “wreck of a man”.
A motion filed earlier this week by Stanford’s attorneys marks the third time that his counsel has asked that their client be allowed to leave federal prison and be placed under house arrest until his trial begins in January 2011. The court had denied the two previous appeals, reasoning that Stanford posed a very high flight risk.
According to media reports, the 36-page motion describes Stanford as forgetful of conversations with his attorneys, in the “throes of a major depression”, incapable of focusing to prepare for his trial and even partially blind in one eye following an attack he received from another inmate in September of last year.
“Mr. Stanford's pretrial incarceration has reduced him to a wreck of a man: he has suffered potentially life-impairing illnesses; he has been so savagely beaten that he has lost all feeling in the right side of his face and has lost near-field vision in his right eye,” Stanford’s lawyer Robert Bennett stated in the document.
Having been “subjected to substantial and undeniable punishment”, Bennett requested that Stanford be placed under house arrest with an ankle bracelet and other travel restrictions at his fiancee’s sister’s home.
As reported in the Huffington Post, an affidavit written by Stanford’s friend and legal assistant Evelyn Saravia was attached to the motion. It described him as a “sharp and intelligent” man prior to being remanded to prison.
Since that time, Saravia said he is “depressed, tired and appears medicated” and even confessed to her that he feels he is “losing his mind”.
Bennett also criticized the Houston federal detention center Stanford is housed in, arguing that his client is only allowed to keep a limited number of documents in his cell and does not have internet access to properly prepare him for the trial.
The attorney said he believes the Texas-billionaire’s confinement has been an unconstitutional violation of his rights to a due process, an expeditious trial and effective assistance from his counsel.
Stanford is currently scheduled to stand trial with three executives from his former company, the Stanford Financial Group, for an alleged $7 billion ponzi scheme revolving around falsified certificates of deposit. All parties involved in the case have pleaded not guilty.
Prior to being arrested, Stanford was famed throughout the Caribbean for his flamboyant financial backing of Twenty20 cricket in the region and his multi-million dollar investments throughout the Eastern Caribbean, particularly Antigua and Barbuda.
