Harford County Murder Case: New Plea, 36 Years Later

A man who has been convicted twice of two drug-related murders in Harford County is free after more than 30 years in prison and multiple appeals. And his case may not be heard in court again.

John Norman Huffington, 55, entered an Alford plea in Frederick County Circuit Court on Thursday in connection with two homicides from 1981 in Harford County, according to reports. An Alford plea is not an admission of guilt but is an acknowledgement that prosecutors have sufficient evidence to him.

The plea was related to the murders of Diana Becker and Joseph Hudson, who were killed on May 25, 1981, in what prosecutors argued was a cocaine deal gone bad.

Court filings in the case obtained by Capital News Service indicated that Huffington and another man purchased cocaine from Hudson, then took him to a farmhouse near Wheel Road, where they said there was another buyer; then they shot Hudson in the back of the head multiple times and took his drugs.

Next, Huffington and his accomplice allegedly went to his mobile home near Abingdon and stabbed the victim's girlfriend, Becker, before taking her cocaine while her 4-year-old was asleep in the next room.

The case was "considered among the most sensational acts of violence" in Harford County at the time and dubbed the "Memorial Day murders," according to The Aegis.

Huffington's case was moved to Caroline County in 1981, where he was convicted and sentenced to die in the gas chamber, according to Capital News Service. The Maryland Court of Appeals overturned the ruling, leading to a new trial in 1983 in Frederick County, where Huffington was again convicted and sentenced to death. Huffington appealed the death sentence, which Maryland has since repealed, and he was given two life sentences.

Huffington was released in 2013 after a judge in Frederick County vacated his conviction in part based on new findings that evidence used to link him to the scene was faulty, including DNA, shell casings and the testimony of an FBI agent who has been discredited, his attorneys said. The judge issued a writ of innocence due to a 2009 Maryland law that allows for fresh evidence to reverse a prior conviction.

Because of the vacated conviction, Huffington was set to have a third trial in the case, which led to the entering of the Alford plea on Thursday in Frederick County.

Much of the court cases hinged on the testimony of the Deno Kanaras, who was paroled in 2008 for the murders and was said to have been in on the drug scheming with Huffington, The Washington Post reported.

Huffington maintained his innocence and said that although he had been with Kanaras and the victims earlier, he went to bed, and a fingerprint on a vodka bottle in Becker's trailer was from a prior visit to the mobile home, according to The Post, which reported Huffington racked up more than $1 million in legal fees over the years contesting his case.

Upon the news of the Alford plea, one of the victims' relatives took issue with the fact that Huffington was not taking responsibility for the deaths, according to the Frederick News-Post. Huffington is expected to be given probation at the Dec. 3 sentencing hearing, since he served a life sentence of 33 years in prison already.

An Alford plea means Huffington may not appeal the case again.

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