‘There’s no one here that is God, correct?’ Pleasanton man, charged with murdering mom, becomes his own lawyer
DUBLIN — Before his arrest on murder charges, 32-year-old Malcolm Tilley earned “one-half” of a bachelor’s degree and worked in the hospitality and manufacturing fields, according to a form he filled out from behind bars.
Now, the Pleasanton man can add “self-lawyering” to his list of professions. Charged with murder for allegedly butchering his mother during an argument about his station in life, Tilley decided to navigate the complicated waters of criminal law by himself. Anyone charged with a crime is constitutionally entitled to do so, though judges typically — and often without success — try to convince defendants that it’s a terrible idea.
With his pro per status affirmed last July, Tilley’s first big challenge was a Dec. 1 preliminary hearing, a pretrial hearing where prosecutors must reach the low legal threshold of probable cause in order to convince a judge to advance the case. At the hearing’s end, Tilley got his first chance to argue why he shouldn’t go to trial on charges of murder with an enhancement for alleged use of a knife.
“Simply as the prosecution has already found to be some sort of error uncontestably (sic) that the validity of such a charge is unfounded,” he said, prompting the prosecutor to clarify that there has been has been no legal finding of “prosecutorial error.”
“To respond, it’s just quite inferable and that is part of being a lawyer I think is in an inference,” Tilley responded. “There’s no one here that is God, correct?”
“You finished your argument, sir?” Judge Toni Mims-Cochran asked in response.
“Complete,” Tilley responded. Then Mims-Cochran held him to answer on the murder charge, ending the hearing.
Even the most skilled, experienced litigant would have a tough time throwing out a case like this at a preliminary hearing stage. According to prosecutors, last April 1, Tilley stabbed his mother repeatedly in the kitchen of their Pleasanton home, using a four-inch blade until it broke, then a butcher knife. Then he took a shower and walked to the Pleasanton Police Department to confess, according to court records.
Tilley’s mom, 71-year-old Marjory Methvin Tilley, was found dead, in a fetal position, more or less exactly where Tilley said she’d be, police testified at the hearing.
“They continued to argue and at some point he just had enough with arguing and stabbed her,” Pleasanton police Detective Jonathan Chin testified at the hearing, adding that Tilley continued to stab her after a pause, “just in case she got back up.”
In his confession, Tilley described the argument as “similar to other ones,” Chin said, with, “her kind of not agreeing with his life situation that he was currently in with school and unemployment.”
During cross-examination, Tilley peppered police with questions about Miranda rights, proper procedure and whether they filed their reports accurately. When one Pleasanton police investigator testified that Tilley had described the homicide as a “fight” between him and his mom, Tilley said he had no more questions but sounded pleased about what was elicited.
“Prosecution did me a favor there,” Tilley said.
He has also accused police of “egregious errors.” In court filings, he has accused police of logging a different account to his interrogation than what the video shows, and filed subpoenas for his mother’s medical records, and his academic records at Las Positas College and Diablo Valley College. An Alameda County judge even threatened the Las Positas College president with contempt of court when Tilley’s records weren’t provided on time, court filings show.
Before court was concluded on Dec. 1, Tilley said he wanted to explore the possibility of adding a public defender as a “second chair” in his defense team. When he returned to court on Dec. 17 to plead not guilty, the minute order lists a deputy public defender as his lawyer and Tilley no longer appeared as a pro per litigant.
Tilley remains in custody without bail at Santa Rita Jail in Dublin. His next court appearance has been set for Jan. 15, records show.