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Home > Blogs > Dayton Courts: Legal and crime news > Archives > 2010 > February > 19
Friday, February 19, 2010
Convicted robber loses bid to get his pleas vacated
DAYTON — The suspect in a series of major crimes during the summer of 2007, who pleaded guilty to all indicted charges, failed in his bid to get those pleas vacated.
Retired Judge William H. Wolff, Jr. found that Montgomery County Common Pleas Judge Gregory Singer did not make any promises about sentencing to Anthony Seals.
Seals, 38, has been in prison since November 2008, when Singer gave him a 25-year sentence.
Last year, the county Public Defender’s Office filed a petition for post-conviction relief, arguing that Seals was unable to make a “knowing intelligent and voluntary plea,” because Singer’s off-record statements led Seals to believe he would get a 15-year sentence.
But during a Jan. 28 hearing on the issue, Seals acknowleged that he understood Singer had made no promises, and “he conceded, in a response to a question by the state, that in pleading guilty he took a calculated risk as to his sentence,” Wolff wrote in his decision, which was handed down Tuesday, Feb. 16.
Seals asked that his guilty pleas and sentence be set aside, which would take the case back to right after the indictment phase, allowing him to negotiate another plea or to go to trial.
Seals was a suspect in several robberies when a Riverside police officer spotted him driving on Woodman Drive on July 20, 2007. Seals then led police on a chase, sometimes at speeds higher than 100 mph.
Seals fled into the city of Dayton. He crashed into a building at 28 Burkhardt Road. He jumped out of the vehicle and ran. Dayton and Riverside officers caught him behind 136 Martz Ave., using a Taser on him as he tried to climb a fence.
Ten days later, a grand jury indicted Seals on 15 felony charges, including eight first-degree felonies: three counts of kidnapping, four counts of aggravated robbery and one count of aggravated burglary.
On Sept. 18, 2007, the grand jury added another charge: a first-degree count of failure to comply with the order or signal of a police officer.
Seals was facing a potential aggregate sentence of more than 100 years, according to Wolff’s decision.
The case was set for trial on Nov. 4, 2008. That day, the two sides were unable to reach an agreement during off-record discussions in Singer’s chambers. Seals was represented by Ronald Keller.
“The judge did, however, twice state to defense counsel, Mr. Keller, that the sentence would be somewhere between 14 and 21 years, but closer to 14,” according to the petition. “Mr. Keller told Mr. Seals what the judge had said. Based on the belief that he would receive no more than 15 years in prison, Mr. Seals pleaded guilty to all charges.”
Dewar included affidavits from Keller and Richard Skelton, another defense attorney whom Keller asked to sit in during the discussions in Singer’s chambers. Keller’s statement reflects the version of events in Dewar’s petition. Skelton’s differs in one respect: he remembers Singer indicating a range of 13 to either 18 or 20 years, but the number would be closer to 13.
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Charlie Myers pleads guilty, gets life sentence
DAYTON — Charlie Myers, the Columbus man accused of shooting a Harrison Twp. woman and kidnapping her 4-year-old son, avoided the death penalty by pleading guilty Friday, Feb. 19, to all indicted charges, including eight counts of aggravated murder.
Under the plea agreement reached with prosecutors, Myers, 23, will spend his life in prison without the possibility of parole, plus a 49-year sentence to be served consecutively to the life sentence. Montgomery County Common Pleas Judge Dennis J. Langer sentenced Myers immediately.
“You understand that you will never be on parole?” Langer asked Myers. “Do you understand that?”
In addition to the aggravated murder counts, Myers was indicted on four counts of kidnapping, two counts of aggravated burglary, two counts of aggravated robbery, one count of gross sexual imposition of a child under the age of 13, one count of receiving stolen property, one count of grand theft of a motor vehicle and one count of being a felon in possession of a weapon. All charges include firearms specifications.
Eddie Nelson, whose wife Jenny was murdered, told Myers he was there to represent his son, now six.
“The fact that you grew up in a broken home gave you no right to break his,” Eddie Nelson said, his voice building in anger. “You are the monster in his nightmares. You are hated.”
On Jan. 2, 2009, the son of Jenny Nelson approached travelers from Maryland at an Interstate 70 rest stop between Dayton and Columbus. He told them that somebody had shot his mom.
Detectives believe Myers stole the Nelsons’ car in December 2008, then drove to the family’s Harrison Twp. home on Jan. 2. Myers kicked open the front door of the Redder Avenue house, where Nelson was cooking dinner. Her husband was at work at the time.
Myers took Nelson and her son down into the basement, where he tied Nelson to a chair. He then took the boy upstairs and sexually assaulted him, prosecutors said.
Nelson broke free from her restraints, grabbed a knife and stabbed Myers in the side, Heck said. Myers then shot Nelson twice with his shotgun, prosecutors said.
Myers fled in a car, owned by a Nelson relative, with the boy, two computers and Nelson’s cell phone, investigators said.
Myers left the boy that night at a highway rest stop near the Madison and Clark County county line. The boy had no shoes and wasn’t wearing a coat, according to prosecutors.
The Oldsmobile Alero, Myers stole after the shooting, was found Jan. 4 in Columbus, the same day Myers was arrested.
FBI agents tracked Nelson’s cell phone number and determined her cell phone was used twice in Columbus after her death, according to an affidavit for a search warrant filed in Franklin County Municipal Court. One of those calls, made the morning of Jan. 4, was made to Myers’ cell phone.
FBI agents and Franklin County sheriff’s detectives went to Myers’ apartment at 70 McMillen Ave. to determine who called him with the dead woman’s cell phone.
Once inside Myers’ home, investigator’s found a cell phone, a blue Dell laptop computer, and a Playstation 2 video game system consistent with items stolen from the Nelson’s home the night of the slaying, the affidavit said.
Detectives also found four shotgun shells and printed directions to the Nelson’s home on a table the apartment, according to the affidavit. Detectives also found the keys from the Nelsons’ Honda.
Myers, charged with aggravated murder and other felonies, could have faced the death penalty should he have been convicted in a jury trial.
During court proceedings throughout 2009, Langer ordered that Myers, who is hearing impaired, be fitted for hearing aids and found that Myers is competent to stand trial.
In September, Langer held a motion-to-suppress hearing, during which various law enforcement members testified about Myers’ statements. Defense attorneys argued that those statements should be suppressed.
Langer ruled in November that all statements from interviews with detectives and to the media were admissible.
On Jan. 7, 2009, as he was being walked into the Montgomery County Jail, Myers told reporters that “it’s my fault” and “I apologize for the victim.”
Langer did rule to suppress one of Myers’ statements, this time to a correction officer, who asked where he got the cut on his back. Myers responded “that woman cut me, then I killed her.”
Langer found that Myers should have been given a warning that he had a right to remain silent before he was asked that question.
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Charlie Myers pleads guilty to all charges
DAYTON — Charlie Myers, the Columbus man accused of shooting a Harrison Twp. woman and kidnapping her 4-year-old son last year, just pleaded guilty to all charges, including eight counts of aggravated murder.
Myers is before Montgomery County Common Pleas Judge Dennis J. Langer right now, who was proceeding to sentencing at 11:17 a.m. Friday, Feb. 19.
Prosecutors and Myers’ defense team have reached a plea agreement that would spare Myers’ life. Under the agreement, Myers would plead guilty to all indicted counts and be sentenced to life in prison without the possibility of parole, plus a 49-year sentence to be served consecutively to the life sentence.
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