THE CLEVELAND PLAIN DEALER
Why Did Evidence Go Unseen SoLong?
Wednesday, August 16, 2006
Regina Brett
Plain Dealer Columnist
For 14 years, Vicky Buckwalter fought for a man on death row.
She didn't realize there was more ammunition until now.
On Sunday, Plain Dealer reporter Andrea Simakis laid out information that Tyrone Noling's attorneys never saw.
Noling sits on death row for the 1990 murders of Bearnhardt and Cora Hartig, who were gunned down at their kitchen table in Atwater Township.
Noling was convicted based on confessions of three buddies who have all since recanted. No physical evidence connected him to the crime.
Buckwalter, an investigator for the Stark County public defender, didn't get access to information reporters later found in public records.
Why didn't the prosecutors turn it over in discovery requests? Why didn't the judges order them to?
Noling's attorneys never knew:
Police searched the car of Noling's buddy, Joey Dalesandro.
Noling had given investigators a gun that they realized did not match the one used to kill the Hartigs, so they went back to Dalesandro. They said he told them Noling had called from jail and told him to get rid of a gun in his glove box, and that he had sold that gun.
But no one produced phone records to verify that call. And no one could have taken a gun from the car because it had already been searched by Alliance police. No gun was found.
The brand of gun owned by another suspect, the Hartigs' insurance agent, Lewis Lehman.
The defense never got a state report listing only four possible gun makers for the .25-caliber gun used to kill the Hartigs. Titan was one brand listed.
The defense never saw a receipt showing that Lehman owned a Titan .25-caliber handgun.
Lehman was asked to take a polygraph.
The defense never knew that Lehman refused to take one.
Witness statements made to investigators before the trial.
A woman who testified at the trial never mentioned murder in her early statement to investigators. It was only after investigator Ron Craig talked to her that she talked of murder.
The psychologist's report:
The doctor - the prosecutor's own expert - had warned prosecutors not to rely on the memories of Noling's buddy Butch Wolcott, in part because he might make things up. But Wolcott's testimony was used to help convict Noling.
There are other holes:
All three pals' statements were consistent about what happened until the investigator threw murder into the mix, then none of the stories matched.
There is no record that police checked the finances of the insurance agent for recent large purchases or debts.
The Hartig home was ransacked. For what? The pals were robbers. The Hartigs were found with money on them and $160 visible under the sink.
Lehman's gun was never found; a prosecutor said it was and that it didn't match.
The DNA on a cigarette butt found in the driveway didn't match the guys. No one tested it against the insurance agent, a longtime smoker who died of throat cancer.
A doctor who befriended the Hartigs said that just days before the murders, Bearnhardt Hartig said he had lent his insurance agent $10,000 and the money was due.
The last words Hartig said to the doc were, "This whole thing is starting to smell."
It still does.
To reach Regina Brett:
rbrett@plaind.com, 216-999-6328
Used With Permission.
Email: Tyrone Noling
Webmaster: Vikki Shaw
© Tyrone Noling
This work is licensed under a
Creative Commons Attribution 2.5 License.
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