The state’s courts had sufficient evidence to deny bail for Michael Gleason Jr. before he killed his estranged wife, Marisol Fuentes-Huaracha, in Berlin last month, an internal judicial review determined.
Due to the serious danger he posed and the high likelihood of intimate partner violence, the committee in its review said there was “sufficient evidence [that] existed to hold Gleason in preventive detention,” according to a summary of the case released Monday by the New Hampshire Judicial Branch.
Other irregularities occurred in the case. In April, Fuentes-Huaracha said Gleason stole around $9,000 along with her debit card, immigration documents, and other important papers. Yet his bail was set at $5,000, less than the amount she said he stole from her.
She accused him of sexually assaulting her, preventing her from going to work, and stealing her phone. Given the 25-year age difference between Gleason and Fuentes-Huaracha and the pattern of behavior he displayed in trying to control her, the potential for more violence was clear.
The law states he should have been denied bail if clear and convincing evidence existed “that release of the person is a danger to that person or the public.”
Despite being ordered to surrender his weapons, he stormed into the Mexican restaurant where she worked on July 6 and shot Fuentes-Huaracha multiple times before turning the gun on himself.
Gleason, 50, was involved in four separate cases.
On April 25, Fuentes-Huaracha reported to police the sexual assault and thefts that left her bruised and terrified.
He was arrested the next day, April 26.
Fuentes-Huaracha obtained an emergency protection-from-abuse order requiring Gleason to stay away from her, and he filed for divorce.
Despite these serious circumstances, magistrate Stephanie Johnson had set Gleason’s bail at $5,000 and released him on April 27.
The Berlin Police Department wanted Gleason to be held in preventive detention.
In its report, the committee noted that evidence of Gleason’s dangerousness was clear, including a four-page handwritten, detailed account of the assault on Fuentes-Huaracha that had been presented to the magistrate.
Fuentes-Huaracha had also reported to police that she was “petrified of what would happen to her” after the assault.
The magistrate also had information indicating intimate partner violence, which includes “physical or sexual violence, stalking, emotional abuse, psychological abuse, and financial or economic abuse.”
The committee also points to the emergency domestic violence protection order issued by the Circuit Court, which indicated that Fuentes had made a showing of “immediate and present danger of abuse.”
Apart from the decision to release Gleason on bail, the committee found that the criminal bail order of protection form had the box checked to impose the condition that Gleason ‘not be at the following address/location,’ yet no address or location was specified.
The Circuit Court was also found to have had enough evidence to deny bail.
There was also a stalking complaint filed on July 1 by a 17-year-old woman, just five days before Fuentes-Huaracha was killed.
Advocates against domestic abuse, along with critics of the magistrate system, have voiced strong concerns over how the courts handled the case following the shooting.
The magistrate system, which took effect in January, will come to an end in September after Gov. Kelly Ayotte signed a bill to dissolve it.
While the committee highlighted several facts known at the time of the bail decisions in Gleason’s case that were “indicative of Gleason’s dangerousness and his intimate partner violence towards Fuentes,” it also called attention to areas needing improvement.
Among other things, it called for improvement in court training and process to ensure that survivors of intimate partner violence receive effective protection from the courts.