Ronald Phillips: Breakdown of Criminal Justice

Posted on July 17, 2017 by Justice for Willie

A ruling by a federal court makes it more likely that executions will resume in Ohio on July 26, despite warnings that the state’s drug protocol could cause immense pain. The first person due to face this pain is Ronald Phillips.[i]

Phillips is used to suffering pain: his childhood consisted of intense, frequent “abuse, chaos, and dysfunction… in which criminal activity, sexual deviancy, and physical abuse were not only acceptable but were the norm”. His father first raped him when he was 4. His parents taught him and his siblings to lie to officials to conceal the criminality, thus blocking escape routes for the children. As a result, Phillips grew up a confused, ashamed, angry, and guilt-ridden individual.

Phillips finally fled home at the age of 17, having acquired from his upbringing a personality disorder with borderline and paranoid features that left him unable to trust others. Often such individuals gravitate to others with similar disorders; thus it was that Phillips took up with a woman whose problems with sexual boundaries compounded his own ignorance of what constituted abuse.

Phillips insists that when he was abusing his girlfriend’s daughter, Sheila, it never occurred to him that what he was doing was wrong. One psychologist who assessed Phillips explains:
“To someone like Phillips, abusing Sheila was not something that would be clearly wrong in his mind.” 

Sheila died as a result of the abuse at the age of 3½, in 1993.

At the time of his trial, still terrified of his father, Phillips was unwilling to report his own catastrophic childhood abuse, but disclosed it much later; his reluctance to confront the impact of his disastrous past is typical of such cases. His trial counsel failed to ask his step-sister, Mary Phillips, to testify about the abuse in his childhood home. His lawyers and investigator also failed to produce Children’s Services Board records that could have alerted jurors to mitigating factors in Phillips’s case; this resulted in “a complete breakdown of the criminal justice system”. 

On death row a prison Christian group has provided Phillips with the therapy of interacting with people he trusts and feels comfortable with; this is allowing him to recover. Phillips now deeply regrets the abuse he inflicted on Sheila, and believes he is “a salvageable human being”.

Executing Phillips will not prevent deaths like that of Sheila; additional intervention and support for those who are severely damaged, like Phillips, might do so. Family and friends of the victim are unlikely to derive the peace they hope for from another death.[ii]

On the other hand, Phillips’s execution will probably traumatize a whole range of innocent people, including his step-sister, siblings, friends, jurors, and attorneys, as well as other death row inmates and prison staff, especially the executioners. And many other Ohioans will be shocked and ashamed that their state is planning to kill a man who caused death while his mind was disordered because of his horrific childhood.

The American Civil Liberties Union of Ohio has started a petition asking Ohio’s Governor Kasich not to carry out this and other scheduled executions (including that of Jeffrey Wogenstahl). We urge you to sign it. 

Update: Employees of the State of Ohio killed Ronald Phillips on July 26, 2017.

[i] Most of the information for this post can be found in the minutes of the Parole Board meeting, Re Ronald Phillips, CCI #A279-109, held October 16, 2013.  Phillips’s more recent clemency appeal, in December, 2016, was also rejected.  
[ii]See, for instance, the experience of families of victims of the Oklahoma City bombing: “Six months after the bombing a poll taken in Oklahoma City of victims’ families and survivors showed that 85 per cent wanted the death penalty for Tim McVeigh. Six years later that figure had dropped to nearly half, and now most of those who supported his execution have come to believe it was a mistake. In other words, they didn’t feel any better after Tim McVeigh was taken from his cell and killed.”
Posted in attorneys, capital punishment, Chillicothe Correctional Institution, criminal justice, death penalty, executions, Jeff Wogenstahl, Jeffrey Wogenstahl, mitigating factors, mitigation, Ohio, prison staff, Ronald Phillips, USA | Tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , | Leave a comment

Jeff’s Jurors Reconsider

Posted on June 30, 2017 by Justice for Willie

Jeffrey Wogenstahl claims his conviction represents a fundamental miscarriage of justice: he states that if the evidence now available to him had been heard at his trial “no reasonable juror would have found [him] guilty”.[i]

Such an assertion may sound extreme; but the comprehensive evidence that has now come to light fully supports Jeff’s claim.

The list of points that demonstrate a miscarriage of justice is extensive and varied, ranging from false hair comparison testimony, to perjury, to plentiful alternate suspects that were not investigated, etc. etc. And recent reports by experts on forensics, forensic pathology and eyewitness identification raise yet more questions about Jeff’s conviction.[ii]

Significantly, some of Jeff’s jurors have stated that their decision could well have been different if they had heard all the evidence that is now available. Even at the time of trial, one juror did not think the evidence in the first phase was overwhelming, but she was convinced by the [faulty] hair evidence that Jeff was guilty. When told of the recently divulged evidence she said,
“Information about Eric Horn’s drug selling would have had an effect on my decision to convict. . . Information about a strange man who stood outside Amber’s window and Amber’s journal entries about being attacked by someone a few months before her murder would have cause[d] reasonable doubt on my part.”[iii]

Another juror stated, “I suspected the older brother, Eric, was involved. He seemed weird. . . . If the defense attorneys had emphasized the problems with the mom and brother’s stories more, it may have affected my sentencing decision.”[iv]

And a third juror said that if she had known the brother was lying about selling drugs her verdict might have been different. She said that Eric Horn’s story about how Mr. Wogenstahl tricked him to get him out of the house was one of the most important pieces of evidence.[v]

As Jeff’s Merit Brief concludes,
“The jury that convicted Jeff Wogenstahl in 1993 was not given all of the evidence. In fact, some of the evidence that they were given was misleading and false. Wogenstahl deserves a new trial, in front of a new jury, that can hear all of the evidence surrounding this case and crime, not just the evidence that the State cherry-picked for them to hear.”[vi]

We Agree.

[i] Jeffrey A. Wogenstahl vs. Charlotte Jenkins, 1:17-cv-00298. Jeffrey A. Wogenstahl’s Merit Brief. In the United States District Court for the Southern District of Ohio. June 5, 2017. Page 23 (page 28 of pdf). (Office of the Ohio Assistant Public Defender). Print.
[ii] Jeffrey A. Wogenstahl vs. Charlotte Jenkins, 1:17-cv-00298. Jeffrey A. Wogenstahl’s Merit Brief. In the United States District Court for the Southern District of Ohio. June 5, 2017. Pages 23 – 27 (Pages 28 – 32 of pdf). (Office of the Ohio Assistant Public Defender). Print.
[iii] Jeffrey A. Wogenstahl vs. Charlotte Jenkins, 1:17-cv-00298. Jeffrey A. Wogenstahl’s Merit Brief. In the United States District Court for the Southern District of Ohio. June 5, 2017. Pages 26 – 27 (Pages 31 – 32 of pdf). (Office of the Ohio Assistant Public Defender). Print.
[iv] State of Ohio vs. Jeffrey Wogenstahl, 2016-0423.  Appellant Jeffrey Wogenstahl’s Motion to Remand Case to the Trial Court. In the Supreme Court of Ohio. October 7, 2016. Page 58.
[v] State of Ohio vs. Jeffrey Wogenstahl, 2016-0423.  Appellant Jeffrey Wogenstahl’s Motion to Remand Case to the Trial Court. In the Supreme Court of Ohio. October 7, 2016. Page 59.
[vi] Jeffrey A. Wogenstahl vs. Charlotte Jenkins, 1:17-cv-00298. Jeffrey A. Wogenstahl’s Merit Brief. In the United States District Court for the Southern District of Ohio. June 5, 2017. Page 27 (page 32 of pdf). (Office of the Ohio Assistant Public Defender). Print.

 

Posted in capital punishment, criminal justice, death penalty, Jeff Wogenstahl, Jeffrey Wogenstahl, jurors, Ohio, USA | Tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , | 3 Comments

Amber’s Disappearance: Evidence Suppressed

Posted on June 14, 2017 by Justice for Willie

The prosecution in Jeffrey Wogenstahl’s case advanced the theory that the victim, Amber Garrett, was snatched hastily from her bed as she slept. However, it appears that to convince the jurors of this theory, prosecutors suppressed significant evidence.* This evidence remained hidden until 2016, when the State of Ohio was forced to hand over a previously suppressed police file.
When Amber Garrett was reported missing, her glasses were still in the family apartment. At Jeffrey Wogenstahl’s trial, Peggy Garret testified that her daughter could hardly see without them. The prosecution built on this, declaring
“[S]he was almost blind without her glasses… [S]omeone took her out of that house… they removed her without letting her… get her glasses that she needed in order to see.” 
In fact, several people informed law enforcement officers that Amber could manage without her glasses. These reports contradicted and impeached both Peggy’s testimony and the prosecution’s argument that Amber’s lack of glasses indicated that someone had snatched her from her bed. But neither the defense nor the jurors were shown these reports; they were suppressed.
Similarly, the jurors were misled about Amber’s clothing. The prosecution told them:
“…Amber’s body was found out in Bright, Indiana still wearing these panties and these clothes that she had worn in the bed on the evening of Saturday, November 23rd.”
This was not true. The suppressed police file shows that Peggy told investigating officers that Amber was wearing different clothes from those she wore to bed when her body was found:
“[E]ven the nightshirt she slept in was still there [in the house].”
Amber was wearing a red dress when she was murdered, not the nightshirt she had slept in. The dress had been lent to her to wear to church on Sundays.
If evidence about Amber’s glasses and clothing had not been suppressed, the jury would surely have questioned the State’s version of events.
The suppression of this evidence underlines once again how severely Jeff’s trial was tainted. We hope it is not long before a court agrees.

*The information in this post is taken from Jeffrey A. Wogenstahl vs. Warden, Chillicothe Correctional. 1:17-cv-298. Jeffrey A. Wogenstahl_s Petition for Writ of Habeas Corpus Pursuant to 28 U.S.C. § 2254 Filed May 3, 2017. Pages 101 – 103 (pages 105 – 107 of pdf) (Office of the Ohio Assistant Public Defender). Print.
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Other Suspects: Extensive Suppression of Evidence

Posted on May 28, 2017 by Justice for Willie

Suppressed police files show that Jeff’s prosecution withheld information about suspicious males, and about the victim’s mother, Peggy Garrett.*

Evidence existed, but was suppressed, that: 
-Amber Garrett was stalked by a “creepy guy” who would show-up at her bedroom window, and was followed in the woods by another man. (Exhibit 43 Vol 2, p. 36)
-Amber was subject to importuning, (Exhibit 13b Vol 1, p. 85, and Exhibit 44 Vol 2, p. 40), sexual assault (Exhibit 17, Vol 1 p. 94, and Exhibit 41 Vol 2 p. 30) and rape. (Exhibit 42 Vol 2, p. 31, and Exhibit 54 Vol 2, p. 52)

-Amber had an “older boyfriend” that no one ever investigated. (Exhibit 45 Vol 2 p. 41)
-a man (who lived above Peggy Garrett) predicted that Amber’s body would be found in Bright, Indiana. (Exhibit 59, Vol 2 p.57) 

The prosecution also suppressed reports that Amber’s mother, Peggy Garrett, was involved in Amber’s murder; the reports included information that Peggy may have sold Amber to an individual to whom she owed money for drugs.

During the investigation, several people told police that Peggy Garrett used and dealt drugs. (Exhibit 49, Vol 2 p. 47) Various individuals reported to the police that Peggy Garrett was heavily in debt to the individuals who supplied her drugs. (Exhibits 51-53, Vol 2 pp. 49-51) One report notes that Peggy Garrett was seen ‘doing Coke’ with ‘2 guys: “Bikers”’ at 12.30 a.m. on the day when Amber was reported missing at the Escape bar. (Exhibit 23, Vol 1, p. 108)

The police received reports that Peggy Garrett had sold Amber to someone to whom she owed money for drugs. (e.g. Exhibit 53 Vol 2 P. 51)  One individual informed an investigating officer that Peggy Garrett was in the waffle house crying and stating that she had really “fucked up” because she had sold Amber for fifteen hundred dollars. (Exhibit 56, Vol 2, p. 54)

Another person similarly advised the police that the day prior to Amber’s disappearance, Peggy Garrett was at the Waffle House and had no money; but two days later Peggy returned to the Waffle House claiming to have fifteen hundred dollars in her purse. (Exhibit 57, Vol 2 p. 55)

In addition, a police sergeant was informed that after Amber’s body was found Peggy Garrett stated “He said that he wasn’t going to beat her that bad.” (Exhibit 58, Vol 2, p. 56)

The above is only part of the information concerning Peggy Garrett that was suppressed (for instance, see here.)

Had Jeffrey Wogenstahl’s defense possessed all this information, they could have conducted their own investigation into Peggy Garrett and the men in the police reports; and they could have attacked the reliability of the police investigation for failing to investigate other potential suspects. All this could have changed the verdict at Jeff’s trial.

This extraordinary display of incompetence or worse by the state indicates the only just outcome for Jeff’s case. He should be granted a new trial.

*The information in this post is taken from Appellant Jeffrey Wogenstahl’s Motion to Remand Case to the Trial Court, filed in the Supreme Court of Ohio, October 7, 2016 – Case No. 2016-0423. In the text, Vol 1 refers to Volume 1 of Appendix to Appellant Jeffrey Wogenstahl’s Motion to Remand Case to the Trial Court, filed in the Supreme Court of Ohio, October 7, 2016 – Case No. 2016-0423; and Vol 2 refers to Volume 2 of Appendix to Appellant Jeffrey Wogenstahl’s Motion to Remand Case to the Trial Court, filed in the Supreme Court of Ohio, October 7, 2016 – Case No. 2016-0423.  
Posted in capital punishment, criminal justice, death penalty, Hamilton County, injustice, investigators, Jeffrey Wogenstahl, law enforcement, miscarriages of justice, Ohio, police, USA | Tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , | 3 Comments

The USA: A Shameful Record

Posted on May 12, 2017 by Justice for Willie

The USA has a poor reputation when it comes to executions. A report* by Amnesty International found the following:
-Most UN member states were execution-free last year;** but the USA continued to execute.
-The USA was the only one of the 35 member states of the Organization of American States that performed an execution in 2016.***
-Japan and the USA were the only countries in the G8 to perform executions last year.****
-The USA is one of the few countries to execute people with intellectual disabilities.†

For the first time since 2006, the USA did not feature among the top five global executioners.‡ Nevertheless, it remains seventh§ in the top ten globally for executions, in a list of countries where violent intimidation is widespread:
China
Iran
Saudi Arabia
Iraq
Pakistan
Egypt
USA
Somalia
Bangladesh
Afghanistan

To be sure, there were fewer US executions in 2016 than in 2015, but that fall was partly linked to the procurement of lethal injection chemicals and related legal challenges.‖ Recent US Supreme Court rulings in cases from Arkansas may make it easier for execution fanatics to have their way (see, for instance, the case of Ledell Lee, a mentally disabled  African American man who was refused DNA testing despite huge doubts about the safety of his conviction).

There is, however, some hope for the future: 2016 brought a 38% decrease in death sentences imposed in the USA.¶ Let us hope that this reflects a real change of heart among the American people.  Jeffrey Wogenstahl’s case is but one example of the injustice inherent in the US death penalty. This barbaric practice must be condemned to the past.

“Revenge must never be confused with justice, and the death penalty only serves to compound injustice.”  Zeid Ra-ad Al Hussein, UN High Commissioner for Human Rights, 9 August 2016#

*Amnesty International Global Report: Death Sentences and Executions 2016 
**See above report, page 8 (page 10 of PDF).
*** See above report, page 8 (page 10 of PDF).
****See above report, page 8 (page 10 of PDF).
†See above report, page 7 (page 9 of PDF).
‡See above report, page 11 (page 13 of PDF).
§See above report, page 28 of PDF.
‖See above report, page 12 (page 14 of PDF).
#See above report, page 3 (page 5 of PDF).

 

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Incarcerated by Fellow Citizens

Posted on April 25, 2017 by Justice for Willie

Those on death row suffer unimaginable torture; the inmates who have been wrongly convicted do so even more. Like kidnap victims, those with wrongful convictions have been seized and held against their will; but, unlike kidnap victims, they are not viewed sympathetically by their local community. Indeed, it is their fellow citizens who have wrongly declared them guilty, and subjected them to incarceration and a sentence of death. And for many this must be the hardest to bear.*

Jeffrey Wogenstahl claims he was wrongly convicted by Ohio; there is extensive evidence to support his claim. His suffering would be understood by two exonerated victims of wrongful death penalty convictions, Sunny Jacobs and Peter Pringle. Sunny was convicted in Florida, Peter in Ireland.**

Sunny describes how she coped with her wrongful conviction:
“Hopelessness just didn’t appeal to me … they can keep me here, but what goes on within the confines of these walls is mine to create. They cannot imprison my soul!”

Sunny used yoga and meditation to help her maintain a positive mindset on death row, even when her husband was executed, and even after her parents were killed in a plane crash.

For Peter, the challenge was different: he was understandably angry about his wrongful conviction, and needed to calm himself in order to read law and contest his conviction. He, too, found that yoga and meditation helped him.

Sunny and Peter now run a center for victims of wrongful conviction from all over the world. Many of these guests suffer from post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD); not surprisingly, they are shown the basics of yoga and meditation. The tranquil setting of Sunny and Peter’s house is also beneficial: silence helps PTSD sufferers regain a sense of being safe in the world, and in control of their lives.***

Silence must seem an unimaginable luxury to Jeffrey Wogenstahl, forced as he is to listen to the noise of Ohio’s death row. But perhaps even there he can learn from Sunny and Peter’s experience. We hope he can. He deserves to find peace.

* Professor Gordon Turnbull, consultant psychiatrist at the University of Chester, UK, speaking on the BBC Radio Ulster program, Stories in Sound: Exonerated, at 16:00
**Ireland had the death penalty until 1990.
*** Professor Gordon Turnbull, consultant psychiatrist at the University of Chester, UK, speaking on the BBC Radio Ulster program, Stories in Sound: Exonerated, at 09:55

 

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Hope in the Chief Justice’s Remarks

Posted on April 17, 2017 by Justice for Willie

Ohio Supreme Court’s Chief Justice Maureen O’Connor has cast doubt* on the validity of some of the evidence presented at Jeffrey Wogenstahl’s trial.

During oral argument to establish whether the trial court had jurisdiction to try Jeff, the state was trying to establish that there were pointers at trial which showed that the murder could have happened in Ohio. In the process, Chief Justice O’Connor refuted the validity of testimony given by Jeff’s cellmate, Bruce Wheeler, and quashed the state’s argument that blood in Jeff’s apartment** had any relevance.

Cummings***: [Jeff’s] cellmate, Bruce Wheeler, testified that Wogenstahl
                            described how he…
O’Connor:         But that jailhouse – you know – informant – his account was so
                           discredited, with some of the information that he threw in
                           there, that both sides said, “Well, that’s not right. That never
                           happened. That’s not even part of our case.” So…
Cummings:       Yes.
                                                          *****
Cummings:       There was blood evidence in his apartment, which is in Ohio.
O’Connor:         But it wasn’t her blood.
Cummings:       It wasn’t determined at trial whose it was – that’s correct…
                                                          *****
O’Connor:         The blood never tested in the apartment – we don’t know
                           whether it was human or animal blood, so that’s not
                           probative.

It is encouraging that the Chief Justice emphatically dismissed the state’s points, which the prosecution had used against Jeff at his trial. We hope that this means the tide is turning at last. We hope that Jeff will have the chance to refute more of the state’s arguments against him. He deserves to have a new trial.

*Oral argument for Case No. 1995-0042 State v. Wogenstahl, 30:35 – 32:46 
**“[T]he only confirmed human blood found in Wogenstahl’s apartment did not match the victim.”
See Appellant Jeffrey Wogenstahl’s Motion to Remand Case to the Trial Court, filed in the Supreme Court of Ohio, October 7, 2016 – Case No. 2016-0423; P. 46.
See also 2015 Forensics Report on Jeff’s case, by Gary Rini, M.F.S:
“The lack of detection of blood, or indications of blood clean-up, within Wogenstahl’s apartment, make it highly unlikely that the victim was murdered within Wogenstahl’s apartment. It appears that crime scene investigators removed the plumbing from Wogenstahl’s bathroom to examine the contents of the drain pipes for evidence of blood. If blood had been present, it would have been found in the drain pipes. The lack of blood in the drain pipes indicates that no blood was present, nor was there any evidence of the use of any cleansing agents that would have removed any traces of blood… ­
…The state’s contention that the victim was murdered elsewhere, or in Wogenstahl’s car, which was then used to transport the victim to the scene, is not supported by the physical evidence in the car, at the scene or on the victim.”
Volume 2 of Appendix to Appellant Jeffrey Wogenstahl’s Motion to Remand Case to the Trial Court, filed in the Supreme Court of Ohio, October 7, 2016 – Case No. 2016-0423; Pp 120 -126
***Philip Cummings, representing State of Ohio
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Oral Argument Information

Posted on April 1, 2017 by Justice for Willie

The Supreme Court of Ohio will hear oral argument in Jeffrey Wogenstahl’s case about jurisdiction on Tuesday morning next week (Tuesday, April 4, 2017). The session will be held at the Thomas J. Moyer Ohio Judicial Center in Columbus. The Court will convene at 9 a.m. ET, but Jeff’s case is likely to be heard mid-morning (two other cases will be heard before Jeff’s). Jeff’s argument is due to last for one hour, with the defense and the prosecution having 30 minutes each to present their arguments before the Court.

Jeff’s oral argument will be broadcast live on The Ohio Channel and streamed live online at the Court website’s home page. Soon afterwards it will be archived.

Two of the seven judges, Judge Donna Carr and Judge Eileen T Gallagher, were assigned to Jeff’s case in February, following the recusal of Justice Patrick Fischer and Justice Patrick DeWine from the case in January.

Hamilton County Prosecuting Attorney, Joseph Deters, asked Justice William O’Neill to recuse himself from the case because of his anti-death penalty stance, but he declined to do so, saying:
“This is a death penalty case and both the Defendant and the citizens of Ohio deserve a review by the whole Court.” 

The Court will be considering whether Ohio had jurisdiction to prosecute Jeff’s case. The victim in this case, Amber Garrett, lived in Harrison, a city northwest of Cincinnati on the Ohio-Indiana border adjacent to the Indiana town of West Harrison. At Jeff’s trial the state used witnesses and showed the jury a map to propose that Amber was murdered in Indiana. Her body was found in a wooded area near West Harrison, Indiana.

This oral argument will not address Jeff’s claim of innocence; but it does raise the possibility of a new trial for Jeff in Indiana, where he would be able to present the evidence that his Ohioan prosecutors suppressed.

We trust that the Court will agree with Jeff’s argument on Tuesday. Whether in Ohio, or in Indiana, Jeff deserves a new trial.

Posted in capital punishment, criminal justice, death penalty, death row, Jeffrey Wogenstahl, jurisdiction, Ohio, USA | Tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , | Leave a comment

The Dilemma of the Ohio Supreme Court

Posted on March 22, 2017 by Justice for Willie

The Ohio Supreme Court has denied* Jeff’s motion to remand his case to the trial court. This motion had asked the court to allow all Jeff’s legal challenges to be combined into one. 

The court has also declined to accept jurisdiction for Jeff’s appeal regarding newly discovered evidence from the US Department of Justice (forensic hair evidence at Jeff’s trial was flawed). 

In the case announcement** about its decision last week, one of the court’s judges, Justice O’Neill, explains that he wishes courts to consider all the evidence relating to Jeff’s case. O’Neill notes that, less than two months after Jeff filed his appeal based on the flawed hair evidence, the Harrison Police Department released to him its full investigatory file on his case (mentioned in Jeff’s motion to remand his case to the trial court). The judge continues:
{¶ 5} These circumstances present a dilemma. Accepting the present appeal would be premature in the sense that we are limited to an incomplete picture of the evidence Wogenstahl has recently discovered. And whatever decision we might come to would be inconsequential if Wogenstahl were eventually granted a new trial based on the evidence in the investigatory file.
{¶ 6} Presuming that this court’s decision not to exercise jurisdiction over this appeal will immediately end this litigation and allow Wogenstahl to start over with a new motion in the trial court, I respectfully concur. __

It is good to know that O’Neill, at least, is considering the possibility of a new trial for Jeff. We trust that the other judges take the same view.  

*State of Ohio v. Jeffrey A. Wogenstahl, Case No. 2016-0423, Entry, The Supreme Court of Ohio. March 15, 2017.
**03/15/2017 Case Announcements #2, 2017-Ohio-906, pp. 3-4: Appeals not Accepted for Review, 2016-0423. State v. Wogenstahl. Hamilton App. No. C-140683, 2015-Ohio-5346, O’Neill, J., concurring.
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Snitch Testimony: Lies and Misrepresentation

Posted on March 9, 2017 by Justice for Willie

At Jeffrey Wogenstahl’s trial, jailhouse snitch testimony was used by the prosecution even though it contradicted the coroner’s evidence.* The snitch, Bruce Wheeler, stated that he received no incentives for testifying against Jeff:
“The prosecutor promised me nothing.”

The prosecution then emphasized this point:
“I will tell you again you should believe him… Bruce Wheeler got nothing for his appearance in this courtroom. He got nothing… Nothing reduced, nothing dismissed.”**

We now know, however, that this was not true: Wheeler did receive benefits for giving false testimony against Jeff. Moreover, the prosecution was aware that Wheeler received benefits and knew that he was lying about them.

In a sworn affidavit given in 2014, Wheeler mentions three benefits for testifying against Jeff.

  1. “It was implied that I would do less time in prison if I testified.”
  2. “I asked the prosecutors to get me to Ross Correctional as opposed to one of the institutions that was considered more dangerous, if I helped them in Wogenstahl’s case. I ended up at Ross Correctional, and I believe it was because of my testimony.”
  3. “The prosecutors promised if I testified they would write a letter to the Parole Board on my behalf.”*** [The prosecution did subsequently write a letter to the Parole Board on Wheeler’s behalf.****]

As well as falsely denying that the snitch was incentivized by the state, the prosecutor played down Wheeler’s conviction for assaulting a two-year-old child, dismissing the crime as “something stupid” and “a thoughtless, unthinking act”. The prosecutor also omitted Wheeler’s initial failure to tell the truth about the assault.

Yet the same prosecutor, at Wheeler’s trial, had referred to his crime in a very different way:

“I don’t understand how he [Wheeler] can back hand this child with this kind of force and not know how it happened. It stretches the bounds of credibility. Quite frankly, I just don’t believe it.”†

The state’s lies and misrepresentation at Jeff’s trial are likely to have had a significant impression on the jury. As Clive Zimmerman notes,

”Triers of fact tend to believe confession evidence, even when offered by a jailhouse snitch.”‡

The prosecution’s suppression of impeaching evidence about Wheeler is but one more piece of ‘wholly improper’ prosecutorial misconduct at Jeff’s trial to add to the already ‘plain and plentiful’ list made in 2012 by Judge Karen Moore.§

Jeff should have a new trial.

*See State v. Wogenstahl. B-926287. Jeffrey Wogenstahl’s Motion for leave to file a Motion for New Trial, based on newly discovered evidence from the U.S. Department of Justice, filed in the Court of Common Pleas, Hamilton County, Criminal Division. Filed January 2014. Page 19. (Office of the Ohio Assistant Public Defender). Print.
** See Appellant Jeffrey Wogenstahl’s Motion to Remand Case to the Trial Court, filed in the Supreme Court of Ohio, October 7, 2016 – Case No. 2016-0423; pp 31 -32. 
*** See Volume 1 of Appendix to Appellant Jeffrey Wogenstahl’s Motion to Remand Case to the Trial Court, filed in the Supreme Court of Ohio, October 7, 2016 – Case No. 2016-0423; pp. 169 – 170, Exhibit 35, points 5 – 7.
**** See Volume 1 of Appendix to Appellant Jeffrey Wogenstahl’s Motion to Remand Case to the Trial Court, filed in the Supreme Court of Ohio, October 7, 2016 – Case No. 2016-0423; Page 173, Exhibit 36.
†See Appellant Jeffrey Wogenstahl’s Motion to Remand Case to the Trial Court, filed in the Supreme Court of Ohio, October 7, 2016 – Case No. 2016-0423; pp 33 – 34. 
‡See Clifford S. Zimmerman, “From the Jailhouse to the Courthouse, The Role of Informants in Wrongful Convictions”, P. 68 of Chapter 3 in “Wrongly Convicted, Perspectives on Failed Justice”, ed. Saundra D. Westerfelt and John A. Humphrey, 2001.
§See State v. Wogenstahl. 07-4285. United States Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit. February 2012. Pages 48-49 (Moore, J., concurring). uscourts. Web. August 24 2014.
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