When are these trials for the main 4 gonna get underway?
WAVERLY – Justice is slow.
Prosecution of Wagners in Rhoden murders to take 'years,' cost thousands
Excerpts from article:
Answers to countless questions about the methodical murders of eight members of a Pike County family in April 2016 are years away. Much like the investigation took years, so will the prosecution.
Even without the death penalty specification adding time to the process, the investigation involved following up on about 1,100 tips, conducting 550 interviews, serving more than 200 subpoenas, search warrants, and court orders, and testing over 700 items.
"It's not uncommon for a typical capital case to involve over 500 hours of work, and that's without all the stuff to go through in the Rhoden case," Bogen said.
Among those first motions from the defense will likely be a request to move the trials out of Pike County due to the extensive pre-trial publicity of the case and concerns about the Wagners receiving a fair trial.
“This case has received more publicity than anything we’ve ever had,” Junk said.
In Ohio, co-defendants in death penalty cases are required to have their own trials, so it’s possible the four cases could be tried in four different counties as each trial will likely generate local media attention.
Those decisions will be up to Deering who also will be sifting through and deciding on what could be at least 200 motions combined. Once a trial date is set, that process too will be quite the undertaking with each case likely taking more than a month to complete.
While typical jury selection involves a single round of questions looking for potential conflicts and prejudices, those in death penalty cases also have a second round focused on their views on capital punishment.
“We all have a lot of hard work ahead of us,” Junk said.