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	Trial of Man Charged with Killing Chatham Priest Begins with Prosecutor Saying Phone Is Key Piece of Evidence By Peggy Wright Daily Record October 20, 2011 http://www.dailyrecord.com/article/20111020/NJNEWS10/310200014/Trial-of-man-charged-with-killing-Chatham-priest-begins-with-prosecutor-saying-phone-is-key-piece-of-evidence Calling murder suspect Jose Feliciano a liar and a job slouch who was earmarked for firing from his custodian job at St. Patrick Church in Chatham, Morris County Prosecutor Robert A. Bianchi told a jury today that the accused killer failed to cover his tracks. Feliciano, now 66, broke the cellular telephone that belonged to victim Rev. Edward Hinds, 61, but in doing so, made the device malfunction so detectives were able to trace hits it was making to cell phone towers out in Easton, Pa., where the janitor lived with his wife and two children, Bianchi said. “That is the miracle of the case. The cell phone is the thing that took him down. One little mistake released an avalanche of evidence,” Bianchi told a Morris County jury in a passionate opening statement today. Defense lawyer Neill Hamilton is slated to give his opening statement this afternoon in Morristown about the homicide on Oct. 22, 2009, of the cleric in the kitchen of the church rectory. Custodian of the church for 18 years, Feliciano had been “on the radar” as a “sub-par” employee destined for firing as the church struggled through tough economic times, Bianchi said. But the clincher, he said, was that the church was in the process of complying with a U.S. Catholic Conference of Bishops mandate that all volunteers and employees with access to children go through training, fingerprinting and background checks. The state will present evidence that Feliciano was balking on complying and that Hinds grew suspicious and undertook his own investigation into the janitor’s past. The state also will present Hinds’ diary, where he had written that Feliciano was to be terminated on Oct. 23, 2009, but paid until Oct. 31, Bianchi said. Making lengthy eye contact at times with the defendant, who mostly kept his head averted and squeezed his hands throughout the two-hour opening, Bianchi said that Feliciano was in the process of stabbing Hinds to death in the rectory when the pastor was able to make a 911 call at 5:26 p.m. on Oct. 22, 2009, from his cell phone. Bianchi played that call for jurors. The priest told the dispatcher in a weak, gasping voice his location but then the call was ended. Bianchi charged that Feliciano saw the priest making the call, “pounced” and hung up. The dispatcher called back, getting Hinds’ voice mail. The dispatcher called again, this time with Feliciano picking up Hinds’ phone and assuring the woman there was no emergency. “It’s a horrible call but it’s a beautiful piece of evidence,” Bianchi said. “Father Hinds’ voice may not have been heard by the New Jersey State Police but it will be heard here, loud and clear.” Bianchi asserted that most of the wounds suffered by Hinds were not life-threatening and that evidence will show he struggled desperately for his life, with knife wounds to his abdomen, hands, and the front and back portions of his body. Feliciano, he said, took phones from the rectory so the priest would bleed out and couldn’t call for help. The following day, when Hinds’ body was discovered in the rectory, Feliciano made a theatrical spectacle of himself by rushing to the body, lifting the priest’s shirt and performing half-hearted resuscitation efforts. In a mocking tone, Bianchi mimicked witnesses seeing Feliciano cry out: “What could have happened to Father Ed?’’ Bianchi said that Feliciano acted like a hero at the scene and later played the victim when he claimed the trauma of seeing the body raised his blood pressure and heart rate. Peggy Wright: 973-267-1142; pwright@njpressmedia.com
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