This is a diary about the extraordinary and seemingly endless fight one man, who in all likelihood was the victim of tragedy himself in the sudden loss of his wife, has had to endure thanks to the environment created by the witch hunt mindset of unchallenged Republican domination at the county government level.
The fact that this is taking place one county removed from where I live literally has made me question whether to take the chance of driving into the county on the occasions when it might be necessary or convenient.
The plight is that of Ryan Widmer in Warren County, Ohio, who has twice now been put on trial for the drowning death of his wife, Sarah, in 2008. He could still yet face a third trial. The county prosecutor's office has zealously pursued these charges despite the fact that all they have to present is a loosely concocted theory which has no physical evidence to support it.
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Working backwards, the latest outrage today (which has kind of pushed me over the top and produced this diary) comes in the form of newly unsealed records that strongly suggest the lead detective in the case blatantly falsified his credentials in the pastwhen he was a job applicant for fire and police positions. This information was discovered before the second Widmer trial, but the trial judge for reasons unknown sealed the information and kept it from being presented at trial.
This is just the latest in an almost impossible-to-believe litany of developments that scream that any conviction in this case would be a one-sided Kafka-esque nightmare that most of us would think (or at least hope) would no longer be possible in the modern-day justice system.
To wit:
-- This development comes less than a week after another newly unsealed record indicated that the drowning victim, Sarah Widmer, had a heart murmur indicated in her medical history, contradicting sworn testimony from her mother who said she had no prior history of heart issues. The defense has contended from the outset that her drowning was caused by a medical condition, likely related to either her heart or a sleeping disorder that would cause Sarah to fall asleep unexpectedly in inappropriate places.
-- The second Ryan Widmer trial ended in a mistrial at the end of May, which was also the result after the first trial. Shockingly, the second jury favored by a 7-4 count (with one undecided) a verdict of guilty. Perhaps the most troubling aspect of all with the case is reflected in the following snippet:
"The prosecution's 'shot-gun,' 'see-what-sticks,' 'lack-of-a-theory-of-the-case' presentation places the burden of figuring out what happened to Sarah on the jury," the defense motion says.
The Hamilton Township juror agreed. So does a Mason juror who spoke to the Enquirer previously. The Mason juror said it bothered her that the prosecution never presented a clear scenario for what happened to Sarah Widmer, the lack of defensive injuries to her hands, elbows, knees or feet and no injuries at all on Ryan Widmer.
"They gave us a bunch of crap evidence and expected us to build our own scenario and our own story," the Mason juror said.
That's a rather plain-spoken assessment, but accurate. The prosecution didn't even try and hide the fact that they couldn't specifically tell the jury how or why Ryan Widmer would have killed his wife, inviting their speculation by saying, "Accept the reasonable, object the unreasonable." Does that sound like the same standard as "beyond a reasonable doubt" to you?
-- The case as presented at trial both times had numerous issues and significant expert testimony that stated that what the prosecution suggests could have happened could not have taken place. But it seems that the locals in the jury want to put more faith in their local "experts," such as the county coroner who was not a medical examiner but a funeral director and the cowboy law enforcement figures from the county. (You can get an idea of the many problems in the case from this biased but basically factually correct Web page put up by Ryan Widmer supporters).
I do think the problems with this case boil down to the political, and in particular, the Republican mindset that they know what is right beyond question because they're good Uhmericans and if their leadership says it's so, than it must be so.
Quite frankly, Warren County is the kind of place where you get looked at funny -- or worse -- if you're not toeing the Republican line. It's the kind of place that has a school district that performs at the "excellent" level in state rankings, yet has suffered six straight levy defeats and is about to be taken over in fiscal emergency by the state because all the owners of the McMansions that have been built out there in the last decade would be damned if they are going to vote for a tax increase.
Warren County is a place where Democrats haven't even found anyone to put on the ballot for a countywide position since 1996.
It's the kind of place that, in 2004 when Ohio was the pivotal state in the presidential election equation, discovered a homeland security threat that ranked "10 on a scale of 10" for their Board of Elections on election night, thus throwing all observers out of the building and then reporting outrageous margins of support for George W. Bush.
Some may choose to view it as just politics, but it's more than that in the corners of America where strong-armed Republicanism runs amok. We all have to be vigilant against it every day, because it has consequences in everyday life. Just ask Ryan Widmer.