The incarcerated wildlife impresario once known as Joe Exotic is making a new bid to get out from behind bars, this time assisted by an attorney who is also a libertarian political aspirant in Montana.
In an opening appeal brief filed Wednesday, defense attorney Roger Roots contended that ineffective defense counsel led to Joseph Allen Maldonado being convicted in 2019 on two counts of murder for hire.
“Let’s just put it this way: Several of the most important witnesses have recanted the most important parts of their testimony,” Roots said in an interview. “Clearly, he’s entitled to a new trial. He was wrongly convicted of crimes he did not commit.”
A former roadside zoo owner from Oklahoma, Maldonado was convicted of eight counts of falsifying wildlife records and nine counts of violating the Endangered Species Act in addition to the murder for hire charges. He is now serving out a 21-year sentence after becoming a household name through the 2020 Netflix reality show “Tiger King: Murder, Mayhem and Madness.”
