Family of Casey Chadwick responds to delays in the case against her convicted killer

NEW LONDON — Any resolution to the case of a 48-year-old man twice convicted of stabbing a Norwich woman to death has again been delayed, much to the consternation of the victim’s family members.

Jean Jacques, found guilty by separate juries - first in 2016 and again earlier this year - of murdering 25-year-old Casey Chadwick, was due to appear Thursday in New London Superior Court where his lawyer, Sebastian DeSantis, was scheduled to argue for a third trial for his client.

In a motion brief filed by DeSantis on Tuesday and approved by New London Superior Court Judge Shari Murphy on Wednesday, the lawyer said a conflicting court proceeding prevents him from appearing this week at the Huntington Street court.

The postponement also pushes off any sentencing date for Jacques.

“It’s frustrating and disappointing how we’re treated as victims,” Chadwick’s step-mother, Wendy Deane-Chadwick, said on Wednesday during a phone interview. “They just keep prolonging the agony of the families. It’s one thing after another.”

DeSantis wrote he is representing a client in a federal wiretap and drug case in Bridgeport for much of October. He said a separate federal trial that requires his presence will begin on Nov. 16.

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Murphy set a tentative date of Nov. 3 for Jacques’ new trial motion to be heard. The original motion, filed on Aug. 2, pushed off a planned Aug. 17 sentencing date for Jacques who was convicted in June of murdering Chadwick inside her Spaulding Street apartment in 2015.

Jacques had been previously found guilty of Chadwick’s murder in 2016, but that conviction – along with his 60-year sentence – was overturned by the state Supreme Court in 2019. The high court ruled a Norwich police search of Jacques’ Crossways Street apartment that turned up Chadwick’s cellphone and drugs taken from her apartment was not legal and any evidence seized was ordered suppressed.

In his new trial motion, DeSantis argues Murphy failed during the second trial to set a “fair standard” on how to deal with the previously suppressed evidence.

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“In fact, there was hardly any standard set forth,” DeSantis wrote, alleging Murphy’s inaction deprived his client of his federal and state constitutional rights to a fair trial.

DeSantis also insists the suppressing of the evidence that helped convict his client the first time made mounting a fresh defense challenging. He said Murphy warned him that any “opening the door” of certain topics during his cross-examination of state witnesses ran the risk of letting that evidence come before jurors.

“The standard was inconsistent making a cross-examination or setting up a defense nearly impossible,” DeSantis wrote. “If that evidence were to come in it would completely change the angle of the defense or make a defense impossible.”

Both the state, represented by Senior Assistant State’s Attorney Christa Baker and Assistant State’s Attorney Marissa Goldberg, and DeSantis navigated carefully around the suppressed search evidence during the 10-day trial this year.

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Prosecutors said Jacques killed Chadwick in a fit of rage and stole cocaine and marijuana stored at her residence by her boyfriend, assertions a jury agreed with – twice.

A medical examiner testified Casey, who was found stuffed in her apartment’s closet on June 15, 2015, had suffered more than a dozen stab and cutting wounds to her body during the attack that killed her. 

Police witnesses testified Jacques in the days before Chadwick’s murder was a drug dealer with no product to sell, but was suddenly in a position to sell cocaine just hours after the murder. Jacques’ blood was found inside Chadwick’s apartment and her blood was detected on his clothes and inside his residence.

Two confidential jail informants testified Jacques confessed to killing a woman, with one providing details – including a general time of death – only known to the killer.  

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During his closing arguments, DeSantis intimated it was Chadwick’s boyfriend and not his client who committed the murder.

Jacques is being held on a $1 million bond at Suffield’s MacDougall-Walker Correctional Institution.

Chadwick’s mother, Wendy Hartling, said on Wednesday said the post-trial process was “taking way too long” and lamented the long delay it took to get Jacques’ second trial even started.

“Dealing with this has not been fun,” she said.

John Penney can be reached at jpenney@norwichbulletin.com or at (860) 857-6965.