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Patriots offer to turn over Aaron Hernandez personnel records

FALL RIVER — Aaron Hernandez was moved Wednesday from a house of correction in North Dartmouth to the Nashua Street Jail in Boston, shortly after his lawyer argued in court that the New England Patriots should release all of the former NFL player’s medical and scouting records.

A judge approved the jail transfer this week so Boston-based defense lawyers preparing for trial can be closer to Hernandez, who is charged with killing three people in two different shootings.

Suffolk County Sheriff Steven Tompkins said that Hernandez will spend three to five days in booking at Nashua Street before being assigned to a section of the jail.

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“Mr. Hernandez is not going to be treated any differently than any other pretrial detainee,” Tompkins said.

He declined to comment when asked if Hernandez would be put into the general population.

Hernandez appeared earlier Wednesday in Bristol Superior Court , as lawyers for his defense team and for the Patriots debated the importance of his medical and scouting records in his two murder trials.

Andrew C. Phelan, a lawyer for the Patriots, said the organization will turn over 317 pages of Hernandez’s medical records to defense attorneys.

But the team does not want to release nine pages of scouting reports or a psychological report prepared by an outside company at the 2010 NFL combine, Phelan said. He argued that Hernandez’s lawyers are seeking records that are not relevant to the case.

“It is a fishing expedition,” Phelan said.

Michael Fee, a lawyer for Hernandez, said the records are significant because they offer insight into the former athlete’s psyche. Hernandez’s mental state is at issue because he is charged with first-degree murder, which requires prosecutors to prove that a defendant thought about a crime and acted with premeditation.

“State of mind is critical, and it’s the basis of this request,” Fee told Judge Raymond P. Veary Wednesday. “This is not a fishing expedition.”

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But Phelan and a prosecutor from the Bristol district attorney’s office, which is trying Hernandez in the killing of Odin Lloyd in North Attleborough, said the scouting and combine reports are several years old. They said the documents will not offer any insight into Hernandez’s mind-set on the night Lloyd, a Dorchester resident, was killed in June 2013.

Aaron Hernandez spoke with lawyer James Fee during a hearing Wednesday on his medical and scouting records.Dominick Reuter/Reuters

Fee countered that small blurbs in the scouting reports, written by team officials evaluating Hernandez’s personality and character, might address “prior bad acts” that could come up during the trial.

Authorities have said that Hernandez was involved in a number of violent incidents before the Lloyd slaying and the fatal shooting of Daniel Abreu and Safiro Furtado in Boston’s South End in July 2012.

Assistant District Attorney Patrick Bomberg said some of those incidents, including the alleged shooting of one of Hernandez’s acquaintances, happened long after the Patriots collected their scouting reports in 2009 and 2010.

“To say that a scouting report is a definitive study of the defendant’s prior criminality is something that is obviously not supportable on its face,” Bomberg said.

In a court filing this week, the Patriots said they offered to let Hernandez’s lawyers look at but not copy the combine report, a 1½ page Troutwine Athletic Profile prepared by a private organization, but the defense attorneys have not accepted the offer.

The judge did not rule Wednesday whether the Patriots could be compelled to release the documents. Another hearing was set for July 22.

Zachary T. Sampson can be reached at zachary.sampson@
globe.com
.

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