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Saturday, July 27, 2002 || Contact Us
D.A.files motion to remove her office from hearings
Saturday, July 27, 2002 UNIONTOWN - Fayette County District Attorney Nancy Vernon Thursday filed a motion to remove her office from upcoming post-conviction hearings for David Munchinski, who was convicted of first degree murders in the 1977 deaths of two men in Bear Rocks. Earlier this month, Vernon verbally indicated that she would recuse her office from the prosecution of Munchinski, and hand the case over the state attorney general to prosecute. Munchinski, through attorney Noah Geary of Washington, has filed a post-conviction relief motion asking the district attorney's office to step aside. Geary has indicated that he intends to call assistant district attorneys, including John Kopas III, to testify about the failure to supply Munchinski with vital information. This information includes results of blood tests that Munchinski did not participate in the rapes of James P. Alford and Raymond P. Gierke in 1977 in Gierke's chalet in Bear Rocks, Bullskin Township. Geary also intends to call members of the Fayette County bench, some of whom are former prosecutors, to testify about their knowledge of the case. The Fayette County bench has already recused itself, according to an order signed in March by President Judge William J. Franks. Wrote Vernon in her motion, "Since the commonwealth would be placed in a position of questioning one of its attorneys and three present judges who were past attorneys or district attorneys representing the commonwealth, the office of the District Attorney of Fayette County will likewise recuse itself as did the Court from the case." "In so offering to recuse, the Office of the District Attorney of Fayette County avoids any appearance of, or actual conflict of interest," wrote Vernon. Munchinski, 49, was convicted of the murders in 1986. He is serving two consecutive life sentences. His accomplice, Leon Scaglione, died in prison on 1996. Police said the men, before shooting Gierke and Alford, committed rape and robbery. New information has come to light that the principal witness to the Dec. 2, 1977, shootings, Richard Bowen, was not at the crime scene and might have been out of state. A hearing on additional motions from Geary will be held in October before Pa. Senior Judge Barry Feudale of Northumberland County.
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