Former Judge Richard Baumgartner's addiction to prescription painkillers was not a secret around the Knox County courthouse, 155 pages from a Tennessee Bureau of Investigation file show.
Records obtained by the Knoxville News Sentinel and others on Friday show Baumgartner's clerk or the district attorney rescheduled Baumgartner's daily schedule when he appeared too impaired to work and that it was clear to others something was wrong (http://bit.ly/tMbUqk).
Special Judge Jon Kerry Blackwood released the pages a day after he threw out the convictions of four people tried in the sexual torture and murder of Channon Christian and Christopher Newsom.
Blackwood ruled that Baumgartner was intoxicated during parts of the trials of Lemaricus Davidson, who received the death penalty, Letalvis Cobbins, George Thomas and Vanessa Coleman.
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Information from: The Knoxville News Sentinel, http://www.knoxnews.com