Hans Reiser Leads Authorities to Wife’s Body

By Jeff Shuttleworth

July 8, 2008

A lawyer who has represented convicted murderer Hans Reiser off and on for three years said yesterday that he thinks that Reiser made “a mistake” in apparently leading authorities to the location where he buried the body of his estranged wife Nina.

John Fuery, who first represented Reiser in his divorce case with Nina in 2005 and was retained again by Reiser last week, said prosecutor Paul Hora contacted him last week about giving Reiser a lenient sentence if he told authorities where Nina’s body was buried.

Fuery said leading authorities to the location of a murder victim’s body “proves your guilt and is hard to undo” in the future when a convicted murderer goes before a parole board to ask to be released from state prison.
The Oakland Police Department hasn’t confirmed that Nina Reiser’s body has been found.

It only said that in conjunction with the Alameda County District Attorney’s office that police have discovered the remains of a body in the Oakland hills of Redwood Regional Park.

In a news release, Oakland police said, “The remains, which have not yet been positively identified, were found buried off a hiking trail.”

They said a news conference will be held sometime today.

On April 28, Reiser, a computer engineer, was convicted of first-degree murder today for the death of his estranged wife Nina even though the prosecution had no body, no murder weapon, no definite timeframe and no cause of death.

The verdict came at the end of two-and-a-half days of deliberations and a trial that lasted nearly six months.

Hora attributed the jury’s verdict to a mountain of circumstantial evidence against Reiser, 44, as well as Reiser’s 10 days of testimony, which apparently alienated jurors in the case.

Nina met Hans in Russia, where she was born and was trained as a physician and where he often spent time doing business for his computer file system company.

They married in 1999, but she filed for divorce and separated from him in 2004. Although Nina was awarded legal custody of their children, Rory and Nio, Hans had visitation rights.

Hans Reiser pleaded not guilty to the charges against him and attorney William DuBois, who represented Reiser during his trial, told jurors that they should either acquit him or only convict him of voluntary manslaughter.

In a declaration he signed on June 29 and was filed on July 1, Reiser said he wanted to dismiss DuBois and co-counsel Richard Tamor and hire Fuery.

In a handwritten note, Reiser said, “I believe Mr. DuBois has a deep bias against me. I have not had good judgment in life about who I trust when.”

But in a filing yesterday, DuBois said, “Hans Reiser herewith requests the court to correct the record to show that William DuBois and Richard Tamor are his counsel of record and Hans Reiser accepted John Fuery’s resignation as his attorney on July 1.”

However, Fuery said Reiser never told him that he was no longer representing him.

Fuery said he tried to meet with Reiser at the Santa Rita Jail in Dublin last week but was prevented from doing so both by DuBois and the Alameda County Sheriff’s Department.

Fuery said Reiser told him in a phone call last week that, “DuBois cut you off and I don’t like it.”

Reiser was scheduled to be sentenced by Alameda County Superior Court Judge Larry Goodman on Wednesday, but Fuery said the sentencing will be postponed while authorities determine if the body that was found today is in fact that of Nina Reiser.

Fuery said he had planned to go to court on Wednesday to argue that he’s still Hans Reiser’s attorney, but he said he isn’t sure what he will do now.

First-degree murder carries a sentence of 25 years to life in state prison. Reiser apparently hopes that his conviction will be reduced to second-degree murder, which carries 15 years to life.

But Fuery said he thinks Reiser may still have a hard time ever being released from prison.

Fuery said, “It will still be difficult to get out and he must prove that he’s been rehabilitated.” Neither DuBois or Hora could be reached for comment today.

FCJ Editor

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