I also can sadly attest to the court system being more interested in convictions than justice.
I’d like to thank William Baker and Brice Brenneman for bringing these issues to light. I was part of the wheel of the court’s mercy.
I was also wrongfully convicted by the same judge that sentenced Dr. Wine, based on one hearsay statement repeated several times, with no other evidence to support the conviction. It’s sad to have served about 14 years of my life as an innocent man, based on hearsay alone, because Judge Frederick Pepple said so.
In all criminal prosecutions, the accused shall enjoy the right to be confronted by their accuser, as guaranteed by our constitution. Our constitutional guarantee appears to be no guarantee at all. Allowing hearsay into court as an open-ended exception touched on what Mr. Baker talked about when he wrote of the judges using improved policies, misuse of the rules of law and misinterpretation of the law, causing the innocent to be sent to prison.
I was convicted of a crime that I did not convict, and once I was sentenced Pepple looked at me and stated, “I don’t think 25 years to life is quite enough.” Really? But the 15 years flat that he offered as a plea deal was? This is what Mr. Baker was talking about with these judges having too much power.
Gordon W. Diggle III
Lima
Diggle is an inmate at Allen Oakwood Correctional Institution convicted in a 2010 murder case in St. Marys.
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