Sharpe acquitted in slaying plot

DEDHAM -- After just four hours and a devastating closing argument by the defense, a Norfolk Superior Court jury acquitted former cross-dressing doctor Richard J. Sharpe yesterday of plotting with another state prison inmate to kill the prosecutor who put Sharpe behind bars for murdering his estranged wife.

Sharpe was accused of attempting to solicit the murder of Robert N. Weiner, who was first assistant Essex district attorney when he obtained a first-degree murder conviction in the death of Karen Sharpe.

In a telephone interview after Sharpe's acquittal, Weiner suggested the jurors must not have believed the key prosecution witness, Norman Watne, a convicted rapist. Weiner said he was unnerved when he learned in 2002 that Sharpe had allegedly launched an effort to kill him.

"But I felt he was sort of inept in what he was doing, so it didn't concern me that much," Weiner said of Sharpe. "But it always gives one pause."

Sharpe hugged his attorney, Janice Bassil, as the verdict was announced.

"He was very relieved, very grateful," Bassil said. "He thanked me profusely."

The crime carried a maximum sentence of 2 1/2 years in the House of Correction. Sharpe is serving life without possibility of parole, but Bassil said a conviction would have meant Sharpe would have been housed solely in super-maximum or maximum prisons.

Assistant Norfolk District Attorney John Stapleton declined to comment.

The verdict followed a four-day trial in a case that has drawn national attention because of Sharpe's past penchant for wearing women's clothes.

After his arrest in the killing of his wife, photographs were published of the former doctor wearing slinky dresses. In court yesterday, Sharpe appeared calm and wore a neat shirt and tie and dark pants.

Sharpe was convicted of shooting his wife at close range with a hunting rifle. Prosecutors said he was angry over the prospect of losing $3 million in their divorce. His defense argued that Sharpe had a history of mental illness caused by childhood abuse and used a temporary insanity defense.

In his closing argument in the recent case, Stapleton told jurors that Department of Correction and State Police investigators had corroborated Watne's statements that Sharpe offered to hire him to find someone to kill Weiner. Watne and Sharpe had adjoining cells in fall 2001 and early 2002.

Standing next to a poster board listing 10 reasons to doubt Sharpe's guilt, Bassil lambasted Watne, telling jurors he was "crazy" and "manipulative" and had hallucinations. She said he was motivated to lie to ingratiate himself with the Department of Correction, which had revoked his right to use a phone, have visitors, watch television, or listen to a radio for almost three years.

Bassil applauded the jurors, who declined to comment.

"I am really impressed that the jury could set aside the fact that the defendant had already been convicted of first-degree murder and still give him a fair shake," Bassil said.