MEMPHIS, TN (abc24.com) - Bruce Tuck is a grand slam breakfast kind of guy. He also rapes women. He confessed to attacks in Martin, Tennessee and Shelby County in 2009. Bruce Tuck has a nickname, the Big Bellied Rapist. He is a lot slimmer now, and his lawyer hopes his days in the slammer might be slimmer as well.
Paul Guibao is Tuck’s lawyer and he is filing a post conviction motion. “What this does, “he explains, “is looks to see if there was anything unconstitutional that went on in previous proceedings, including ineffective assistance of his previous counsel.” By the way, Guibao is court appointed, meaning you folks pay for all of this with your taxes.
Bruce Tuck might have learned one thing. Horizontal stripes aren’t a good look on a person big of belly. He wore a plain jailhouse jumpsuit, but in the past has been in jailhouse stripes. His victims don’t give a damn how he looks now. They will remember him as an almost grotesquely overweight, cruel, sadistic attacker. He confessed to the rapes, but later changed his mind, saying investigators beat him until he admitted doing something that he now says he didn’t do. “He already had a direct appeal to the criminal court of appeals that was denied,” Guibao says, “and now it’s our job to go back and look again.”
They will look for any signs that Tuck’s public defender didn’t do the job. They look at everything, again and again and again. You pay for all of it, by the way. The law says everybody gets a lawyer, and if they can’t afford to pay for one, taxpayers pick up the tab. Bruce Tuck will get the best lawyering your money can buy. It’s his right, says Paul Guibao. “Post conviction is actually an essential part of the proceedings in Tennessee.”
In previous court hearings, Tuck has complained about the jail food, claiming he was forced to eat lettuce. He claimed his confession wasn’t any good, and he wanted to serve his 80 years in a mental health facility. “The relief given if you’re successful in post conviction relief,” according to lawyer Guibao, “is to come back to square one here in criminal court. You would basically go back to the first day you stood before the court and were arraigned.”
Tuck is scheduled to be back in Shelby County court on December 14.
