Free Tyrone Noling

An investigation halted without explanation
Insurance agent questioned, but case wasn't pursued

Sunday, August 13, 2006

Andrea Simakis
Plain Dealer Reporter

Days before Bearnhardt and Cora Hartig were found dead in their kitchen, their physician phoned them to chat.

Dr. Daniel Cannone had been friends with the retired meat cutter and his wife for years. Cannone told police that on April 4, 1990, he spoke with Cora about their plans to eat Easter dinner together and asked to talk with Bearnhardt. The old man got on the phone and said he had been expecting a call from someone else. The Hartigs had lent their insurance agent $10,000; Bearnhardt was upset because the man hadn't paid them back.

According to Cannone's account, Bearnhardt said, "This whole thing is starting to smell" and that he was going to call the agent when they hung up "to meet him for the final payoff."

Three days later, deputies found the couple's bullet-riddled bodies. There was no sign of a break-in, and no obvious indication that anything had been stolen. Papers covered the living room, as though someone had been searching for something. Police found a cigarette butt in the driveway but never determined who had dropped it.

Investigators went looking for the Hartigs' insurance agent. The couple had two, but one of them, Lewis Lehman, owned a .25-caliber handgun - the same type of weapon used to kill the Hartigs. He had bought the gun in 1975 from a store in Alliance. A state ballistics expert determined that out of the dozens of brands of .25-caliber handguns, only four could have been the murder weapon - including Titan, the make owned by Lehman.

Lehman told deputies he had sold the .25, but he couldn't remember when or to whom. He agreed to be photographed and fingerprinted but refused to take a polygraph test, saying he worried about its accuracy and wanted to "consult with someone" first. Lehman denied getting a loan from the Hartigs.

According to police records, that was the last time anyone asked Lehman about the shootings. The focus of the investigation soon turned to Tyrone Noling, who was convicted of the murders in 1996, though his gun was not the murder weapon.

Today, Portage County Sheriff Duane Kaley said he couldn't remember why the investigation of Lehman stopped. Prosecutor Victor Vigluicci, who was not in office at the time, also could not explain why Lehman wasn't questioned further. But during a post-conviction hearing, an assistant prosecutor told a judge that Lehman's gun had been recovered and tested and was not the murder weapon, a misstatement corrected by Noling's attorney. In fact, Lehman's gun was never found.

Lehman, a longtime smoker, died of complications from cancer of the esophagus in 1994.

To reach this Plain Dealer reporter: asimakis@plaind.com, 216-999-4565

© 2006 The Plain Dealer.

Used with permission.

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