Ship’s cook gets
chance for trial

The Chinese man is allowed
to withdraw his earlier guilty
plea to the alleged murder

A Chinese cook aboard a Taiwanese fishing vessel accused of fatally stabbing his captain and the ship's first mate will have a chance to go to trial.

Shi Lei: The ship's cook is granted a request to have his murder case go to trial

U.S. District Judge Helen Gillmor granted Shi Lei's request to withdraw his guilty plea earlier this month after denying earlier requests.

"We worked hard for this relief, and he got what he asked for," said Richard Pafundi, the court-appointed attorney who renewed the request for Shi after his former attorney was dismissed from the case.

Pafundi had argued that at the time Shi entered his guilty plea in January 2004, he was told federal sentencing guidelines were mandatory.

By the time Shi was to be sentenced, the sentencing guidelines had became advisory under a recent U.S. Supreme Court decision, essentially modifying the terms of his "contract," Pafundi said.

Shi maintained that had he known the court would not be bound by mandatory sentencing guidelines, he would have gone to trial instead of pleading guilty.

Assistant U.S. Attorney Tom Brady could not be reached for comment.

The government had argued in its briefs that earlier U.S. Supreme Court decisions that were later affirmed in its Jan. 12 ruling did not affect Shi's plea because he had entered into an agreement with the government stipulating to a sentencing range of 24 to 30 years in prison.

While the government might be correct on the terms of sentencing in the plea agreement, it does not address Shi's decision to enter into a plea agreement in the first place, Gillmor said.

She ruled that the Jan. 12 U.S. Supreme Court decision created a "fair and just reason" for Shi to withdraw his plea, one that did not exist when he pleaded guilty.

Shi is charged with interfering with a ship's navigation by seizing control of the Full Means No. 2 in March 2002 after stabbing the captain and first mate. Crew members overpowered him two days later and locked him in a storage compartment where Coast Guard officials later found him.

The U.S. attorney general had decided previously that prosecutors would not seek the death penalty in this case.