By Ann Needle
Progress seems to have stalled in the kidnapping charges against Michael Gadomski in Marlboro District Court. The Stow resident continues to attempt to renegotiate his terms of confinement and to seek out a new lawyer.
Though claiming he has followed all of the terms of house arrest set down by the court, Stow’s Gadomski failed in convincing a Judge last week to further relax the terms around his confinement as he awaits trial.
Gadomski faces two counts of kidnapping, along with assault and disorderly conduct, after a March 2 incident where he allegedly trapped two girls in a bathroom at Hudson’s Seventh-Day Adventist Church. Gadomski initially was placed on 24-hour house arrest in his North Shore Drive home, and required to wear a tracking anklet, but the terms were reduced to confinement to a daily curfew from 9 p.m. to 6 a.m. and staying at least 500 yards away from the Adventist Church. After dismissing his previous lawyer, Gadomski was asked to re-appear in court July 26 with an update on whether he contracted new counsel.
That day, Gadomski told Justice Janet McGuiggan that none of the potential lawyers he attempted to reach returned his calls. However, Gadomski also filed a plea to be released from his tracking anklet, alleging it has been an inconvenience. Gadomski said he needed the anklet removed in order to travel to Jamaica, where he said he would be “a witness to this woman who assaulted me. I’m a victim of domestic violence. I can’t go there with an ankle bracelet.” Gadomski insisted he has honored the terms of his confinement.
McGuiggan told him to return to court July 31 to make the release plea to Justice Meghan Spring, who initially ordered the confinement terms with the anklet.
Plea Denied
Asked by Judge Spring on July 31 why he believed he should be released from the anklet, Gadomski contended that he was a veteran, involved with a mental health counseling program for the last 2 years, and had several letters to present from his therapists. (He did not mention anything about having to travel to Jamaica). Spring then told Gadomski to take a recess and come back with an argument on precisely why she should modify the conditions of his confinement.
Returning after that recess, Gadomski explained that he was allowing a friend he hired to re-do his bathroom to stay with him due to a rocky domestic situation, something that not everyone would do in a similar situation. Gadomski also continued to assert that he should be released from the anklet because he had been following the terms of his house arrest.
“You violate [conditions], you go to jail. If you don’t violate it, you get to stay out,” Spring asserted. “So telling me that you’re doing what you’re supposed to be doing is not an added thing, it just means I don’t have an opportunity to send you to jail. You don’t get extra credit for doing what you’re supposed to be doing.”
With Gadomski questioning what Spring would advise he do, she noted she cannot advise him and continued to urge that he retain an attorney. Spring scheduled Gadomski’s next hearing for Sept. 4.