Harrisburg, Pa. (AP) — A judge cleared the way Thursday for the possible release of an Indian national who was held in Immigration and Customs Enforcement custody last year after his Pennsylvania murder conviction was overturned after four decades in prison.
The decision came after a four-hour hearing in which Subramanian Vedam did not shoot and kill Thomas Kinser in 1980 and was questioned by Department of Homeland Security attorneys. Vedam attended Wednesday’s hearing remotely from the Moshannon Valley Processing Center in Phillipsburg, Pennsylvania.
“I was young and stupid and did a lot of stupid things back then,” Vedam said. The federal government wants to extradite the 64-year-old to India, which he left as a child in 1962.
U.S. Immigration Judge Adam Panopoulos said Vedam proved he was truly rehabilitated and not a threat to the public. He cited Vedam’s efforts to improve literacy among prisoners and his close relationship with his family, including nieces who never knew him as a free man.
Vedam has “grown as a person” and has “dedicated himself to enriching other people’s lives and ultimately his own life through academic study and enrichment,” the judge said Thursday.
A DHS attorney said he could still be deported on an unrelated drug distribution charge.
Vedam, known as Subu, was born in Mumbai, India and brought to America when he was 9 months old. He grew up in State College, Pennsylvania, where his father was a physics professor. He is a legal permanent resident of the United States and was days away from becoming a naturalized citizen when he was arrested.
DHS has one month to appeal
The US Department of Homeland Security has one month to appeal. Vedam’s lawyer indicated that he plans to release his client on bail.
His attorney, Ava Benach, said Vedam hopes to live with relatives in Sacramento, California, and has been offered a position in a doctoral program in applied anthropology at Oregon State University.
Late last year, State College prosecutors refused to retry Vedam after a Center County judge determined prosecutors had not disclosed relevant ballistics evidence during two of Vedam’s trials. Vedam was on the verge of being released in October when ICE agents detained him and tried to deport him.
Vedam told Panopoulos that he rejected a plea bargain offer during his first trial and that prosecutors made a similar overture during his retrial. Both ended up being charged with first-degree murder.
“I have never stopped saying that I am innocent of this charge,” Vedam told the judge. He has been in jail since March 31, 1982.
Vedam and Kinser were high school friends and were both 19 when Kinser disappeared. He was last seen alive in December 1980 when he took Vedam to buy drugs. Kinser was found outside her apartment at Van State College, and more than nine months later hikers found her remains in a sinkhole miles away. He was shot in the head. The gun was never found.
Vedam was arrested on drug charges and eventually convicted of Kinser’s murder.
The prosecutor refused the third trial
Jurors were told Vedam bought a stolen .25-caliber gun and ammunition when Kinser disappeared, but the FBI report said the bullets were too small for the size of the wound in Kinser’s head.
Announcing his decision not to retry Vedam in an Oct. 2 statement, Center County District Attorney Bernie Cantorna called it “a compelling circumstantial case,” but a third trial would be difficult because of the passage of time. Cantorna cited “the fact that 44 years is a sufficient sentence for murdering someone at the age of nineteen.”
The prosecutor noted that Vedam initially denied purchasing or owning a .25-caliber pistol, then testified at a second trial that he bought the gun after Kinser disappeared. Cantorna also wrote that the FBI matched “distinctive markings” on the bullet casings found with Kinser’s remains from where the gun dealer said Vedam had fired the test.
Despite his acquittal of Kinser’s murder, Vedam’s no contest plea to the LSD distribution charge put him at risk of deportation. During Wednesday’s hearing, DHS attorney Tammy Dusham pressed Vedam about his other arrests, including charges of driving under the influence and theft.
Dusharm told the judge that Vedam was ineligible to live in the U.S., because he had “committed crimes related to drug use and dealing, driving under the influence, theft.” She also raised Vedam’s statement that he only sold LSD a few times.
“I find it absolutely incredible that it appears that every time he’s sold drugs, he’s done it to an undercover officer,” Dusharme said.
