Darwin Bowman

Defense attorneys in the capital murder case of Darwin Bowman are seeking to block the commonwealth attorney’s office from allowing Jim Fisher to be appointed as a volunteer prosecutor on the case.

However Commonwealth Attorney Jim Plowman said Thursday he has no intention of tapping the former Loudoun prosecutor to voluntarily try the case.
Fisher was the lead prosecutor on the case until June 2011 when he left Loudoun to become the Commonwealth Attorney for Fauquier County.

Bowman, now 21, is facing two separate capital murder charges, as well as two robbery charges, abduction, rape, object penetration and aggravated malicious wounding charges in connection with the March 2009 beating death of William Bennett and the brutal attack on his wife, Cynthia.

Cynthia Bennett was found by deputies clinging to life near the intersection of Riverside Parkway and Rocky Creek Drive in Lansdowne.
William Bennett’s body was found discarded just steps from the road.

In his arguments to have Fisher banned as a special prosecutor in the case, defense attorney W. Michael Chick said the law doesn’t allow for special appointments to cases of cities with population’s of more than 35,000.

The law does, however, allow for special appointments of prosecutors due to illness or conflict of interest.

Plowman, in his arguments, said Bowman is being prosecuted in a county, and the law does not apply.

In fact, he said the commonwealth’s attorney’s office has tapped special prosecutors to voluntarily handle cases in the past.

Plowman has 60 days to decide whether he will tap Fisher as a special prosecutor on the case, according to Circuit Court Judge Thomas Horne.

“This case is not about Mr. Fisher participating in this case at all,” Plowman said. “He may not. He’s got his own duties to deal with.”

Thursday’s hearing was supposed to also deal with whether a contract between Bowman and the commonwealth prevents prosecutors from seeking the death penalty.

However that hearing was postponed until July 17.

In that argument, defense attorneys said that a breach may have been made when prosecutors indicted Bowman on capital murder charges in June 2010.
The two capital murder charges that Bowman is facing stem from a June 1, 2010, indictment and a June 14, 2010, indictment. Prosecutors argued the agreement applied to the second capital murder charge against Bowman, but not the first.

Bowman is the second defendant in the Bennett case.

In August 2011 Jaime Ayala, 19, was sentenced to life in prison for his role in the attacks. Ayala, of Sterling, was 17 years old at the time of the attacks.
Ayala was charged with first- degree murder in the case, along with aggravated malicious wounding, robbery, rape and animate object penetration.
He was later charges as an adult because of the violent nature of the crime. However, because of his age at the time of the attack, he was ineligible for the death penalty.

Ayala eventually pleaded guilty to second-degree murder and aggravated malicious wounding. However there was no sentencing deal worked out in the agreement, giving Judge James Chamblin the authority to hand down whatever sentence he chose.

The Loudoun County Sheriff’s Office and Commonwealth’s Attorney’s Office have also named Anthony Roberts, of Middleburg, as a suspect in the case. Although Roberts has not been charged yet in the Lansdowne attack, he is serving a prison sentence for a string of burglaries in Middleburg and Leesburg.