Toland to face charges in killing
Man a suspect in woman's '94 death
By Steven Cook
Gazette Reporter
February 9, 2001
FONDA - A longtime suspect in the 1994 murder of an Amsterdam woman
is
scheduled to be charged today with her death, knowledgeable sources
said
Thursday.
Charles W. "Dino" Toland Jr., who is serving time in a state prison after his conviction in a Schenectady murder, was named in a sealed indictment by a Montgomery County grand jury and is scheduled to be arraigned at 9 a.m. today on charges stemming from the death of 24-year-old Paulette Dempster, the sources said.
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Dempster was last seen alive in September 1994. Her body was found 14 months later and her death ruled a homicide.
The indictment is to be the subject of a 10:30 a.m. news conference today at Amsterdam City Hall, sources said. Amsterdam police scheduled the news conference, but declined to comment on the nature of the announcement.
Sources declined to elaborate on what has prompted the charges now or to detail the charges expected to be brought against Toland.
District Attorney Jed Conboy declined to comment Thursday on any possible new developments. Conboy, however, said in 1996 that Toland was the "prime suspect" in the case.
Dempster, the mother of a then-3-year-old boy, was last seen alive by relatives in September 1994 in Amsterdam. Toland acknowledged being with Dempster the last night she was seen alive, but has said he dropped her off in the Hamilton Hill neighborhood of Schenectady, according to court records.
Toland was questioned about Dempster's disappearance in August 1995 -- three months before her body was found.
Her skeletal remains were discovered in November 1995 by a deer tracker in a wooded area near Montgomery Meadows, a nursing home on the south side of Amsterdam.
Toland was convicted in 1996 in the death of Schenectady resident Jackie Polomaine, 28. Prosecutors used similarities between Dempster's death and Polomaine's to convict Toland in Polomaine's death.
Toland was the last person to see both Polomaine and Dempster alive, and Toland had once worked at the nursing home near where Dempster's body was found.
Polomaine was found hog-tied with a sash tied around her neck. Evidence suggested Dempster, too, had been subjected to some type of bondage, according to testimony in the Polomaine trial.
Toland was prosecuted in the Schenectady case by Philip Mueller, deputy chief assistant district attorney. Mueller declined to comment Thursday on any possible new developments in the case, but repeated his belief that Toland is "a serial killer" who murdered both Polomaine and Dempster.
"The [Polomaine] jury wasn't asked to conclude that he killed Paulette Dempster," Mueller said. "But . . . the evidence we were aware of and made public through the Jackie Polomaine case convinced me that he killed Paulette Dempster."
Toland is serving 55 years to life in connection with Polomaine's death. He has maintained his innocence in both cases, and his conviction in Polomaine's death is being appealed.
Posted February 25, 2001