Category Archives: Witness stand

Jury finds man not guilty of food stamp fraud

Oct. 11, 20114:24 p.m.

The first defendant to stand trial in a federal food stamp fraud case has been found not guilty.

Mpeka Magari was one of 13 people charged last March with selling his government-issued food assistance card to grocers, who illegally converted them to cash.

All but two defendants in two cases have pleaded guilty, or have plans to accept plea bargains, giving up their rights to jury trials. Last week, after five hours of deliberations, a jury found Magari not guilty on two counts of food stamp fraud and two counts of wire fraud in a trial before U.S. District Judge J. Thomas Marten.

No witness testifying at the trial could positively identify Magari as having sold his card, said defense lawyer Michael Shultz.

Wally Gaggo has pleaded guilty to buying cards from several people receiving federal food assistance and turning them into cash. Owners of two Wichita grocery stories also have pleaded guilty and are awaiting sentencing. At least four others have been sentenced to time served, two years’ probation and ordered to pay restitution between $700 and $1,700.

The government claims Kansas Food Market and the Alnoor Grocery and Biryani House defrauded the government out of more than $580,000 by handing out half of the benefits in cash and pocketing the rest during some 2,600 transactions.

Another defendant, Sobhi O. Dana, is scheduled for trial next month.

Verdict in food stamp fraud trial

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BB gun robbers meet victim with real bullets

July 20, 20112:42 p.m.

Two would-be robbers brought BB guns to a proposed drug deal, but the man whose money they tried to steal had a real gun.

John Delgado, 24, died from a gunshot to the head in a west Wichita parking lot. His friend, and another man who they apparently intended to rob, are now facing murder trials.

Patrick Unrein II

Patrick Unrein II

Patrick Unrein II also was shot the night of May 31, too in the parking lot of Villa West apartments at 13th and West streets. But based on the testimony of Delgado’s ex-girlfriend at a preliminary hearing, Sedgwick County District Judge David Kaufman ordered Unrein to stand trial, charged with first-degree felony murder.

Under Kansas law, people who participate in dangerous crimes can be guilty of murder if someone dies during the commission of the felony.

Rachel Kelley, 34, testified she was sitting in the front of Delgado’s black Ford Taurus when he was shot. She said Delgado, 24, and Unrein, 34, had come to Wichita from Emporia to sell methamphetamine.

But the men told her that while their customer was expecting to buy a pound of meth for $6,000, they only had a gram.

“They were going to take his money instead of sell him meth,” she testified.

The men took BB guns out of the trunk of the car, Kelley said, “to scare him.”

Before Delgado or Unrein could pull their BB guns, Kelley said she heard a real gunshot. The man they were trying to rob had pulled out a revolver during an argument and fired the shot which would hit Unrein and kill Delgado.

Shannon Hutchinson, 37, who prosecutors say fired the gun, waived his right to a preliminary hearing this morning.

Amy Newell, 33, waived her preliminary hearing last week and pleaded guilty to aiding a felon, after the couple led law enforcement on a statewide hunt, which ended three days later in northwest Kansas.

Delgado and Unrein were both on state parole at the time. Delgado had previous convictions for various drug crimes. Unrein had prior convictions for aggravated assault, aggravated battery and aggravated robbery.

Both Hutchinson and Unrein are tentatively scheduled for trial Sept. 12.

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Head-shaving incident nets serious charges

Dec. 22, 20102:50 p.m.

If you’re considering shaving someone’s head to get back at them, you might want think again.

Such an attack has at least four people awaiting trial next month in Sedgwick County District Court, facing some serious charges that could land them in prison for more than a decade.

Michelle Glendening, 27, testified this week at a preliminary hearing for two of the defendants. Glendening has very short hair, although it used to flow almost to her waist, she told a judge Tuesday.

Last Aug. 22, Glendening had just picked up her children for visitation, when she said she saw a group of people she knew standing in a driveway in the 5100 block of West St. Louis.

“They yelled at me to get out of the car,” Glendening testified. “But I didn’t get out.”

Glendening said one of the women approached the car, grabbed her by the hair and dragged her into the garage. Several people held her down, Glendening said, and shaved her head.

One of the men bound her with duct tape, Glendening said, and scrawled a profane remark on her shirt. They also took her jewelry, she testified. She said she eventually was able to escape.

All this reportedly happened because of a laptop. Glendening said a friend gave her the computer, and she sold it for a piece of diamond jewelry. Upon taking the necklace to a pawn shop, it turned out to be a fake. Others in the group disputed that the laptop was hers to sell.

There was also some talk in court that drugs may be been involved.

Awaiting trial are Denise Galleher, 48; her daughter Crystal Galleher, 28; Earl Cooney, 33; and Joshua Freimark, 31.

They are charged with aggravated kidnapping — one of the most serious felonies under state law. It carries sentences between 12 and 55 years in prison.

They also face charges of aggravated battery and aggravated robbery.

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Efforts target wrongful convictions in Missouri, Florida

Nov. 23, 20105:25 p.m.

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Dale Helmig spent 17 years proclaiming his innocence from a Missouri prison. This month, a judge agreed with him and overturned his conviction in the murder of his mother.

This week, a panel appointed by the Florida Supreme Court began studying cases of men in that state who have been proven innocent through DNA testing.

The Florida Innocence Commission, consisting of judges, lawyers and police, seek to learn lessons from old cases that will prevent wrongful convictions in the future.

There have been 261 convicts exonerated in the U.S. after DNA testing of evidence showed someone else committed the crimes.

But not all cases involve DNA.

Helmig’s court victory resulted from evidence uncovered by students studying law and journalism at the University of Missouri-Kansas City and the University of Missouri, law professor Sean O’Brien and the Midwest Innocence Project.

Despite the judge’s ruling, Helmig remains in prison, because prosecutors are appealing the judge’s ruling.

Kansas does not have an innocence project or an innocence commission dedicated to reviewing old cases.

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The defense lawyer

Sept. 29, 20102:31 p.m.

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Kiehl Rathbun remembers 30 years later the shock of hearing a jury pronounce Ronald Rhodes guilty of murder.

“I think they could see it on everyone’s face in the courtroom,” Rathbun said this week. “No one could believe it. The jury wouldn’t even talk to us afterwards.”

It was Rathbun’s first murder trial. He said the state had no physical evidence linking Rhodes to the 1981 killing of Cleother Burrell.

“They had a knife that was kind of the same,” Rathbun said.

Police recovered a knife a month after the killing on the roof of a tavern a block away. They said that was the murder weapon.

Rathbun said he sent an investigator to find a man who claimed to have witnessed the killing. But when he got on the stand, the man said Rhodes wasn’t the one who he saw stab Burrell.

“But he had picked him out of a photo earlier,” said Nick Klein, the judge who presided over the trial.

“I think the jury might have thought he was just scared of (Rhodes),” the retired Klein said, when reached as his home in Colorado this week.

Rathbun said there was a dispute over wehther the photo lineup used by police to identify Rhodes was legal.

Meanwhile, a new class at Washburn Law School has signed up to study the Rhodes’ case, and others.

I visited the class recently to familiarize the students with reporting I’ve done, including filing open records’ requests. Instructor Rebecca Woodman has assigned students to look over trial transcripts and evidence logs in the case.

Rathbun said he was eager to help provide information about the case. Although he lost his law license in 2007, Rathbun said he has overcome some personal issues that destroyed his legal career and is trying to rebuild his professional life. He said he’s currently working on a master’s degree in education and hopes to teach English some day.

And there’s still a matter of what happened to evidence that could be tested for DNA, which might answer some questions.

Woodman and I are planning to visit Rhodes next month at the Lansing Correctional Facility, where he is serving a life prison sentence.

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Convicted in Christmas video store assault

June 9, 20108:03 p.m.

Previously on “Common Law”, we heard preliminary hearing testimony from women who said they were threatened by Leonard Charles on Christmas Day at a west Wichita video store. When Charles went to trial, a jury found him guilty, though of a less serious crime than he was facing. His public defender Lacy Gilmour explains:

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Common Law: Christmas crime story

April 20, 201011:42 a.m.

A woman is stranded. A man offers to help. Then he follows her home. It happened to Autumn McDowell at the Family Video store near 29th and Tyler. It was Christmas Day. She and the video store manager described their frightening experiences recently for Judge Jeff Goering at a preliminary hearing.

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Common Law: Witness to a murder, cross-examination

April 7, 20108:36 a.m.

When police arrived to find Gonzolo Gomez dying on his front steps, Kathleen Buendia originally denied being outside the house during the shooting. She later changed her story, and that was enough for defense attorney Mark Sevart to call into question the 19-year-old’s testimony against his client, Maria Reyes.

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The District Attorney brings up abortion in Roeder trial

Jan. 26, 20108:30 a.m.

On Friday, prosecutors objected to the defense trying to inject the subject of abortion in the first-degree murder trial of Scott Roeder. On Monday, District Attorney Nola Foulston asked witness Keith Martin about his church’s view on abortion. Martin went to Reformation Lutheran Church in Wichita, where abortion provider George Tiller was shot last May while serving as an usher.

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A discussion about “the a-word” in Roeder trial

Jan. 25, 20108:47 a.m.

Count how many times lawyers and the judge use the word “abortion” in trying not to talk about what public defender Mark Rudy called ‘the a-word” in the first day of Scott Roeder’s trial. For the record, witness Paul Ryding, who attended church with George Tiller, said he’d seen Roeder at the church before. Ryding said Roeder seemed to have an agenda and “it wasn’t one of worship.” Even when the court reporter read the testimony back, it sounded a little like “abortion.” (Video via CNN’s InSession Sidebar)

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