New Details Emerge on Former Prep Student Owen Labrie's Life in Jail as He Requests New Trial
— -- New details have emerged about former star prep student Owen Labrie's life in a New Hampshire county jail – and he has filed a request for a new trial following his sexual assault conviction last August.
A motion requesting a new trial filed Tuesday takes issue with Labrie's original defense team, including his high-powered former attorney Jay Carney, claiming that not enough was done at trial in the 2015 rape case.
Court documents state Labrie was denied his right to effective assistance of counsel.
Carney, who is best known for representing mob boss Whitey Bulger, and his team failed to challenge Labrie's felony charge of luring a minor for the purposes of sex by computer, a 28-page memorandum in support of the motion for a new trial states. Carney has not responded to ABC News' request for comment.
Labrie was found guilty in August of a felony charge of using a computer to lure an underage female schoolmate at St. Paul’s School in Concord, New Hampshire, into a sexual encounter. He was also convicted of three misdemeanor sexual assault charges and one misdemeanor charge of child endangerment and sentenced to one year in jail.
Meanwhile, new details of Labrie’s life behind bars have emerged. The once Harvard-bound Labrie is currently assigned to solitary confinement for his own safety and is only able to leave his jail cell for one hour per day.
While his close family and friends visit regularly, he has been passing the time by reading and writing, his new defense lawyer, Jaye Rancourt, told ABC News.
“That’s mostly what he does, is sit in his cell and read books," Rancourt said.
Labrie had been out on bail following his conviction pending an appeal, but that bail was revoked last month after a judge found that he had violated his court-ordered curfew. He will remain in jail until the request for a new trial is decided. He could possibly serve his entire 12-month sentence before the decision is made.
The memorandum filed Tuesday also claims that the defense failed to obtain information from Labrie's accuser's Facebook, which "may have been used to challenge [the accuser's] credibility" regarding the allegations made against the now 20-year-old.
In addition, the memorandum argues that Labrie's lawyers failed to ensure the jury received proper instructions, claiming that if they had, they would have not convicted him of the felony computer charge.
“Attorneys make mistakes, and when they rise to the level of creating a constitutionally deficient performance at the trial, then the remedy is ineffective assistance of counsel and a new trial,” Rancourt told ABC News.
Rancourt previously filed an appeal on Labrie's behalf, but filed a motion to stay the pending appeal today "pending litigation of the issue of ineffective assistance of counsel in the trial court."
Dan Abrams, ABC News' Chief Legal Affairs Anchor, said that in order to win an ineffective assistance of counsel argument, the lawyer typically would have had to commit errors such as being drunk or not showing up to court.
"You can't win saying, 'I wish my lawyer would have made other strategic choices,'" Abrams said.
After graduation from St. Paul’s, one of the country’s most prestigious prep schools, Labrie had intended to attend Harvard University. But the Ivy League school rescinded its offer after he was accused of sexual assault.
