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Marion Murder Suspect Withdraws Plea

Mark Bolton Ames is charged with killing his neighbor in January 2014

By Justin Franz

A Marion man accused of shooting and killing his neighbor in January 2014 has filed a motion to withdraw his Alford plea and is asking that the matter go to trial.

Mark Bolton Ames, 53, made the motion on Feb. 25, a month after he filed a motion to dismiss his council because one of his public defenders, Nick Aemisegger Jr., “became visibly angry with me and raised his voice toward me while I was attempting to discuss important details of my case,” Ames asserted in the motion. Ames, who is accused of deliberate homicide, had reached a plea deal in the case in September 2014.

According to court records, Ames lived in a duplex apartment next to Harold Gordon in Marion. Just after midnight on Jan. 12, 2014, Ames fired several rounds from an AK-47 into Gordon’s apartment. Gordon grabbed a shotgun and was about to confront his neighbor when Ames allegedly shot and killed him with a .32-caliber semi-automatic pistol.

Ames and Gordon had a long and troubled history. Gordon had filed a restraining order against Ames, but he was still living in the duplex apartment that Gordon owned.

In a plea deal from Sept. 6, 2014, prosecutors agreed to amend the charge from deliberate homicide to mitigated deliberate homicide if Ames pleaded guilty by Alford. An Alford plea is filed when a defendant believes they are innocent but acknowledges that the prosecution has enough evidence to find them guilty beyond a reasonable doubt. The plea agreement stated that prosecutors would recommend to the court that Ames be sentenced to 40 years in Montana State Prison with 20 years suspended.