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Message from Tyrone to people everywhere who care about justice:
HELP! Spread the word! Sound the alarm! Pull out all the stops!
My case is at a crisis point. The federal judge in my case, Judge Donald Nugent, has denied me discovery of evidence withheld by the prosecutors. Worst of all, Judge Nugent has denied me an evidentiary hearing!!!
Why is this so significant?
Because all the state court judges refused to give me an evidentiary hearing on all the massive amount of evidence my attorneys raised in my postconviction petition that showed that I was railroaded by the prosecutor and poorly represented by my trial attorneys. Because without an evidentiary hearing at which I could present the testimony of my three alleged accomplices there is no real way that judges could understand how my three alleged accomplices were bullied and programmed into testifying against me. Because you need to hear the three alleged accomplices -- Butch Wolcott, Joey Dalesandro, and Gary St. Clair -- in person to believe how they could have presented testimony against me but later provided affidavits spelling out in detail how the prosecutors coerced and coached them into giving false testimony and why they recanted their false testimony.
All the state court judges simply rubber-stamped my convictions and death sentence without a full and fair evidentiary hearing. That's not unusual.
But federal courts in habeas corpus are the final remedy, the last line of defense, the ultimate safety net. If federal courts don't do their job and give serious scrutiny to petitions filed by wrongly convicted state prisoners, who will? Federal judges have lifetime appointments. Federal judges are not supposed to be afraid of setting aside a sentence of death, especially a sentence won by corrupt prosecutors and lackadaisical defense attorneys. Federal judges are not supposed to be burdened by preconceived notions and assumptions about how our state criminal justice system works. Federal judges are not supposed to presume that state court trials and appeals have reliably found a defendant guilty and sentenced him to death when that defendant has presented substantial evidence of innocence and when he was never given a full and fair evidentiary hearing by the state court judges.
What do you do when a federal district judge seems to be operating with the preconceived idea that the state courts always function properly, that innocent people are not convicted and sentenced to death, that a habeas petitioner who requests discovery and an evidentiary hearing merely wants to "retry his case" to delay the inevitable?
What do you do when a federal district judge does not give a death penalty habeas petition the scrutiny that it is due?
What do you do when it appears that a federal district judge very well may be on the verge of once again rubber-stamping an innocent habeas petitioner's (my) death sentence?
We need to spread the word that Judge Nugent is about to rubber-stamp the death sentence of an innocent man!
We need to sound the alarm that a federal judge would be so unwilling to scrutinize a death sentence that he would not grant an evidentiary hearing when the state courts totally failed to give an innocent inmate's (my) massive evidence of prosecutorial misconduct and ineffective assistance of counsel a full and fair hearing!
We need to pull out all the stops before it is too late and an innocent man is sent to the gas chamber!
1st: Please read the story about my wrongful conviction published in Cleveland Scene magazine on this website. Judge for yourself, from the Cleveland Scene's objective story, whether this case deserves careful scrutiny and a full and fair evidentiary hearing.
2nd: Please write a letter to the editor of your newspaper and let everyone know what is going on in Judge Nugent's courtroom.
3rd: Please urge your local newspaper to investigate this travesty and to inquire why Judge Nugent doesn't seem to want to expose the state courts' becoming rubber stamps in death penalty cases.
And please consider making a small online donation to help to maintain this website and to publicize my wrongful conviction. It's easy; it's quick. Just click here to make a donation through PayPal to support me, Tyrone Noling.
(Our Pay Pal link will be functional in a few days.)
Stay tuned for future messages and updates!
/s/Tyrone Noling
Prisoner Number 222-599
Ohio State Penitentiary
Webmaster: Vikki Shaw
© Tyrone Noling
All Rights Reserved
Webmaster: Vikki Shaw
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Creative Commons Attribution 2.5 License.
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