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Home > Blogs > Greene County News > Archives > 2009 > March > 31 > Entry
Ohio Supreme Court denies new trial for man who tried to have sex with teen
XENIA — The Ohio Supreme Court has rejected the request for a new trial for a man who allegedly traveled from Cincinnati to Xenia to have sex with a 14-year-old girl.
Jose Rivas, of Cincinnati, was convicted of importuning and unlawful sexual conduct with a minor in 2005 after he arranged in an online chat room to meet a 14-year-old girl named “Molly” at a Xenia hotel for sex. The teen was actually a Xenia police officer and Rivas was arrested when he sent a pager message directing “Molly” to his hotel room, according to the Ohio Supreme Court.
At trial, Rivas claimed the transcript the state providde during the evidentiary discovery process was inaccurate and requested a copy of the police department computer hard drive, the court said. Rivas’ request was denied because police said the hard drive contained evidence for other cases that had not been prosecuted.
After his conviction Rivas appealed to the Second District Court of Appeals in Dayton. He won that case and his conviction in Greene County Common Pleas Court was thrown out and a new trial ordered. The Ohio Supreme Court’s 4-3 ruling overturns the appellate court’s decision to give Rivas a new trial.
In the majority opinion Justice Terrence O’Donnell wrote that Rivas did not sufficiently prove to the court that the transcript of the online chat provided by police was inaccurate. “The defendant bears the burden of showing that the state acted in bad faith by destroying potentially useful evidence,” O’Donnell wrote. “Mere speculation does not meet the accused’s burden to show that the withheld evidence is material.”
Two justices, Robert R. Cupp, Paul E. Pfeifer and Chief Justice Thomas J. Moyer, dissented from the opinion writing that the police computer hard drive was material to the Rivas’ defense.
Rivas’ attorney Marc. D. Mezibov, of Cincinnati, called the decision “troubling and unsettling” because he believes it could jeopardize future defendants’ rights to challenge evidence supplied by the prosecution. Mezibov said he could ask the court to reconsider its split decision in the next 10 days or appeal the case to the United States Supreme Court.
Elizabeth Ellis, appellate counsel for the Greene County Prosecutor’s office, said police had to protect investigative methods that would have been compromised had they given the defense a copy of their hard drive. She also noted Rivas destroyed his own hard drive which would have held a copy of the online chat. “In these particular cases, there is always going to be two copies of the information,” Ellis said. “If this was your key to freedom if you were wrongfully accused why would you destroy your own hard drive?”
Rivas, who was sentenced in 2005 to six months in jail and required to register for 10 years as a sex offender had the execution of his sentence postponed until the appeal was complete.
Permalink | Comments (3) | Post your comment | Categories: Xenia
Comments
By Arlington, VA
March 31, 2009 12:25 PM | Link to this
Doesn’t DDN Online have a copy editor?? Headline on the front page for this story says “Court denies new trial for man who seeked sex with teen.” SEEKED? Oh, please! Get a dictionary!By don
March 31, 2009 12:40 PM | Link to this
“SEEKED”?…abominable grammar or a brilliant way to see if we pay attention to the headlines? I’m guessing abominable grammar.By fedup
March 31, 2009 1:01 PM | Link to this
Have you noticed that all the DDN puts in its papers now is this kind of sensational BS. Clearly, this is one paper that deserves to fold. It has no integrity whatsoever and gladly will destroy a person’s reputation just to sell another paper. If you have a subscription, do yourself a favor and cancel it.