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The Cedar Rapids Gazette , Wed., Oct. 14, 1998 MUNSON FOUND INNOCENT MANCHESTER - Cedar Rapids Finance Commissioner Ole Munson was acquitted of a gun charge Tuesday because of the jury's uncertainty about a technicality of Iowa's gun law, juror Sam Holden said last night. Holden, director of agricultural operations at Exide Battery Corp. in Manchester, said the technicality, raised by defense attorney Tom Riley near the end of testimony, left doubt in jurors' minds whether Iowa law places more restrictions on weapons carried by reserve peace officers, like Munson, than on full-time peace officers. Munson's reserve-officer permit, like all such permits, states he can only carry his gun to and from duty and while on duty. He was not on duty Aug. 10 when he was arrested after a family squabble at Lake Delhi. But Holden noted that Riley had read aloud one section of Iowa law that considers reserve officers to be peace officers just like full-time officers. So it was unclear to jurors if the two classes of officers had different weapons permits, or if reserve officers really could carry a handgun anywhere, anytime, like full-time officers, he said. "It was not something in the trial that was a major part of the trial," Holden said. "It was certainly not something that either side spent a lot of time on. But it was something that weighed heavily in the eyes of the jury." Neither Riley nor the prosecutor, Delaware County Attorney John Bernau, mentioned the crucial issue in closing arguments, Holden noted. The jury, he added, acquitted Munson on a companion charge, possession of marijuana, because it did not believe the state proved Munson knew the drug was in his duffel bag. Munson was available for comment last night, but is expected to be at a press conference this morning. Riley, however, said Munson was gratified by the verdict, which the Delaware County jury delivered after deliberating about four hours. The verdict, he said, shows the jury believed Munson was telling the truth. "These charges should never have been filed in the first place," said Riley, a Cedar Rapids attorney. "Fortunately, the jury was able to disregard the character assassination efforts that characterized the county attorney's approach to the prosecution of this case." Munson was charged with going armed with a concealed and loaded weapon, an aggravated misdemeanor, and possession of marijuana, a serious misdemeanor. The charges stemmed from a family fight between Ole Munson and his brother Gunnar and sister-in-law Jean that began at a Lake Delhi bar the evening of Aug. 9 and spilled over at the Munson family cabin until shortly after midnight. Gunnar removed the bullets from the clip of Ole's police-issue .40-caliber handgun, put the gun back in Ole's duffel bag and set the duffel bag outside the family cabin. Ole went to a friend's cabin to spend the night, where he reloaded the gun and put it under a cushion on the couch where he was sleeping. Police went to the friend's cabin after Gunnar contacted them about hang-up calls and fears about Ole's gun. They repeatedly asked Ole Munson if he had a gun, and he denied it until just before his arrest. Ole Munson said during trial those denials were something he was "ashamed of." Late Tuesday afternoon, Bernau, the prosecutor, called the verdict disappointing. But he said he would file the charges again "in a heartbeat" if he had the case to do over. "There's no question in my mind, when I review the facts of this case as I know them to be, that the state had a very good case," Bernau said. "Unfortunately, the outcome isn't as I anticipated it would be." "Whenever you have a gun, a drug, intoxicated people and anger, you have a formula for disaster. And I think we are very lucky that somebody didn't get shot." Gunnar Munson said last night that he and his wife stand by what they said during the trial. In his closing statement Tuesday morning, Riley questioned just what Ole Munson had done wrong and asked the jury to "give Ole Munson back his reputation." He accused the prosecutor of taking the word of Gunnar Munson over Ole's - or that of "a pot smoker over a law-abiding citizen." "And the news frenzy about this case - I don't know if Mr. Munson's reputation will ever recover from all of the hearsay and other things that took place here," Riley said. Riley acknowledged that Munson had lied to police but asked jury members to put themselves in Ole Munson's shoes. "What Ole did in denying he had a gun was done under the stress of being awakened from a deep sleep and from the confrontation. ...," Riley said. "And he's human. He made a snap judgment, and it was a wrong judgment." Why, he asked the jury, would Munson have given police permission to search his duffel bag if he'd known marijuana was in there? Riley noted Munson passed two different drug tests in the days after his arrest, and so hadn't used marijuana recently. Riley said Munson was a trained reserve officer and responsibly handled his weapon the night of his arrest. Placing it under the couch cushion was the safest thing to keep it away from a 12-year-old boy who was also staying in the cabin. Riley scoffed at the technicalities of Iowa weapons' law. But Bernau, the prosecutor, said in his closing argument that concealing a weapon is a crime because no one other than the person with the gun can anticipate the gun is there. One police officer, he said, had said Munson's bag would never have been searched and marijuana never found if Munson had simply turned over the gun, he said. He also detailed discrepancies in Munson's version of events. Munson, for instance, testified he loaded his gun because he heard a banging on the door and thought his brother was coming after him. At a news conference after his arrest, Munson said he loaded his gun so that the ammunition and gun were in one place and so best out of reach of the boy. Holden, one of the jurors said last night that Bernau did the right thing in bringing charges against Munson. "I think sometimes people think he should never have brought charges," Holden said. "But if he had that attitude, he may never bring any charges. Because it's hard. "There was enough there that he was well within his rights to bring the charges with firearms, a dispute, an assault at a bar, drugs," Holden said. "I think you want your county attorney to enforce the laws, and he had enough there to go with." If Munson had been convicted of an aggravated misdemeanor, he could have faced removal from office. Tom Riley Law Firm, P.L.C.
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