People v. Hariman (St. John's Gunman Case)
Oct 29, 2007OUTCOME: Case dismissed pursuant to CPL Section 730.30
On Sept, 28, 2007 Omesh Hariman was arrested for bringing a Musket onto the campus of St. John's University in Jamacia, NY. The media jumped on the story immediately as the incident happened just month ... s after the deadly attack at Virginia Tech University in Blacksburg, Va. Within 45 minutes of Mr.Hariman's arrest, the family contacted Mr. Colleluori. Our office jumped in before even being officially retained and contacted the Police to stop their questioning of the client. Although the Police did not take Hariman right back to the station house in order to avoid his having the opportunity to "Lawyer up" we e-mailed, faxed and called 911 and 311 to make sure our demand to have questioning cease be timed in. Thereafter our office worked with the press and the client's family to get his story out to the world. Mr. Hariman was a paranoid schizophrenic unable to distinguish reality from his dreams. Hariman was a brilliant student and exceptionally bright boy. He was a witness to the events of 9-11-01 standing only a block away from the disaster site. In fact Omesh was a tragic victim of 9-11-01. His fragile world completely torn apart like so many other New Yorkers that day. Suffering from Post traumatic stress disorder, Omesh volunteered for months at the disaster site, helping firemen and rescuers, and victims. Unfortunately Omesh's was to lose all support when he went on to study at Cornell Univ. His untreated PTSD slowly became organic and he began to become delusional. He was unable to study or get along with others. He also was diagnosed with scoliosis. In 2006, Hariman withdrew from Cornell. In spring of 2007, Hariman's Scoliosis became worse and he had to undergo surgery. Thereafter, he was unable to keep food and his medicine for the Paranoid Schizophrenia down. Now he was completely without pharmaceutical treatment. His PS worsened bringing on the deluded decision to bring the musket to school. Mr. Colleluori, drawing on his knowledge of Psychology and mental disorders was able to explain the diseases and causes to the press and we began to quickly see sentiment in the City swing toward sympathy for Hariman's plight. After making a motion to find the client incompetent to stand trial, Colleluori retained his own Psychologist to help make the determination. We attended all the Psychological testing and were able to use our intimate knowledge of the interviews to convince the District Attorney's office to join in the application to find Omesh incompetent. The charges against Omesh were thereafter dismissed.
