Here's How DA Jim Martin Fixes DUI Homicide Cases for Connected Cronies

Through first-hand experience and investigation, we know of three (3) ways how Lehigh County District Attorney Jim Martin fixes DUI and DUI homicide cases for crony connected drunk drivers and their families while callously screwing the grief-stricken victim's family. Certainly there could be more ways. But (as a heads up) these are the three ways we know of, just in case you need to outmaneuver DA Jim Martin and The Morning Call "newspaper" to get justice in Lehigh County like we did. Good luck ...

#1. DA Martin bargains for a sentence of "house arrest" (wink wink) and then adds a handy clause that allows the criminal defendant drunk driver perpetrator to leave his or her house any time they want. See page 7, Commonwealth of PA vs Judith V. Fulmer. Readers, from what we've been told by insiders, "house arrest" was DA Jim Martin's original plan for my daughter Sheena's crony connected homicidal drunk driver killer, Robert LaBarre. But instead, thanks to many hundreds of letters mailed to DA Jim Martin and Judge Robert Steinberg from Sheena supporters in an election year, we arranged "big house arrest" for Bobby LaBarre-- 5.5 to 12 years in a Pennsylvania State Penitentiary, which pissed off the local powers that be (and wanna-be) major big time. For more jaw-dropping and verifiable facts on the colluding crony blow-back regarding the Villa family's unbroken streak of victories against Jim Martin's power cabal, read DA Jim Martin's shameful vendetta against assertive grieving father Bill Villa.

BTW, VIP Judy Fulmer was granted house arrest a 2nd time for her 2nd DUI ...  would you or I get two free passes?  

Editor's Note: In one of the most blatant and shameful abuses of power for political gain that LVS has exposed to date, DA Jim Martin charged Veronica Rohrer with attempted homicide, while the TV cameras were rolling, and for purely political reasons, which he soon secretly withdrew and eventually couldn't get even one greatly reduced charge to stick with a jury. So why wasn't longtime Jim Martin pal Judy (hiccup) Fulmer charged with attempted homicide for nearly killing Jane Baker with her car and fleeing the scene? Food for thought.

#2. DA Jim Martin secretly, and let me repeat that, secretly arranges a guilty plea hearing with the homicidal drunk driver and his or her family but does not inform the grieving victim's family. Then, with no one there in court to protest it, DA Martin drops the major charges and lies to the judge that the (curiously absent) victim's family is in agreement with his bargain plea deal. This is exactly what DA Jim Martin tried to do to my family on February 2, 2007.

DA Martin secretly moved Robert LaBarre's guilty plea hearing up 10 days and purposefully did not inform Sheena's family.

Thankfully, a "Good Samaritan" anonymous phone caller (likely from Lehigh County Courthouse) tipped us off and we crashed the "private" guilty plea hearing in Judge Steinberg's courtroom on Feb 2, 2007 and out-fixed DA Jim Martin. With us there, watching, crooked and incompetent DA Jim Martin couldn't drop any of the charges. Read the full and verifiably factual account of DA Jim Martin's shameful attempted case-fix here, "Martin's Tricky Secret Switcheroos."

#3. DA Martin lies to the grief-stricken victim's family about the homicidal drunk driver's BAC (Blood Alcohol Content) evidence. Martin tells them this, and typically the night before trial: "Bad news. The judge tossed the blood evidence because Lehigh Valley Hospital screwed up the paperwork on the chain of custody on the blood evidence, and without the blood evidence, we have to drop most of the charges."

DA Jim Martin used this case-fix strategy in Commonwealth of Pennsylvania vs. Christopher Stephen Squires, dropping 9 of the 14 charges the night before a trial was scheduled to start. DA Jim Martin, not coincidentally, is longtime friends with the grandfather of Christopher Stephen Squires. We learned this from the grandfather himself, who happens to be a longtime friend of the Villa family as well. He revealed his longtime friendship with DA Jim Martin to Sheena's paternal grandparents in the parking lot of the Cathedral of St. Catharine of Siena church and we swear on Sheena's ashes to this. He also told my parents he was a guest at DA Jim Martin's invitation-only, swearing-in ceremony in January, 2008. So there's your motive.

The grieving father in the Squires case, Chris Mohney, posted his 11th hour frustration over what he had been told by Chief Deputy DA Renee Smith, the night before trial, in an online comment at The Morning Call's article, and it's still out there (for now) on the internet, see comment #22.

"The Homicide while DUI was "dropped" because the hospital lost or never had the proper paperwork to maintain a chain of custody on the drivers blood. Once that charge was gone there was no plea bargain, Squires simply pled guilty to the balance of the charges. I told the reporter that yesterday when we spoke but she omitted it from the article. I obviously wish the whole truth had been printed. Thanks LVHC" -Chris Mohney, Allentown

Readers, for helpfully not printing the "whole truth" about Lehigh Valley Hospital screwing up the paperwork (and years of similarly helpful service to DA Jim Martin), Morning Call "reporter" Debbie Garlicki was rewarded with a fast-tracked and cushy job as an Executive Aide in DA Jim Martin's office.

Q. Did Lehigh Valley Hospital really screw up the Squires blood evidence?

Shortly after the Chris Mohney comment appeared online, LVS contacted Chris Mohney to confirm that it was indeed he who posted the comment. It was. And over the course of the next year plus, Chris Mohney told us two more shockers.

1. A Lehigh Valley Hospital spokesperson told Chris Mohney there was "nothing inadmissible" about the Squires blood evidence and paperwork the Hospital had turned over to DA Jim Martin's office. Obviously, Renee Smith had lied to Chris Mohney the night before trial and Renee's soon-to-be-new-co-worker (officially) Debbie Garlicki made sure Renee Smith's lie was never printed in the "newspaper" thus covering DA Jim Martin's fat, boozy, and lying ass.

Editor's Note: A local blogger who reported he had spoken with presiding Judge Robert Steinberg about this case appears to corroborate what Chris Mohney told us about Lehigh Valley Hospital, see "Ethics, Morning Call style." [Since deleted, we have hard copy]

2. Around the same time that Morning Call investigations editor Tim Darragh told me in a lengthy phone conversation that I was raising "excellent questions that deserved to be answered" on the Squires case, and then Morning Call Editorial Board Czar Glenn Kranzley was denying me a "Welcome Mat" meeting for the 229th time ... according to Chris Mohney:

Some Morning Call advertising sales people who had worked w/ Chris Mohney at another company called Chris and told him they were doing really well in ad sales at The Morning Call and encouraged, i.e., recruited Chris to apply for a position that was open.

Guess what, Chris Mohney got the job.

Not surprisingly, after Chris Mohney got a sales job at The Morning Call "newspaper" he stopped returning my phone calls and speaking w/ me. But I didn't connect the dots on this until I happened to stumble across Chris Mohney's name one day among The Morning Call Staff Listings. Talk about your jaw-dropping double-take. Now I understood his radio silence. So I called The Morning Call's Chris Mohney pretending to be a prospective advertiser w/ some excellent questions that deserved to be answered about advertising w/ The Morning Call. I got Chris immediately and he proceeded to tell me this ...

* The Morning Call was not buying his silence (and BTW, Chris immediately volunteered this; I didn't ask him anything along these lines).

* Shortly after he started at "the Call," he was called into the office of one of the "Big Wigs" (he wouldn't specify who it was). Chris was asked (and I'm paraphrasing here), "Would you like us to speak w/ the DA's office about the confusion surrounding the outcome of your perpetrator's guilty plea hearing?" Chris said yes. So now gone "reporter" Matt Birkbeck was dispatched to speak w/ the Deputy DA who had called Chris Mohney the night before trial telling him the "bad news" about Judge Steinberg "tossing" the blood evidence because Lehigh Valley Hospital had fucked up.

* "Reporter" Matt Birkbeck reported back to "Mr. Big" at the "newspaper" and Chris Mohney that Renee Smith was on record as saying that Mr. Mohney had "misunderstood" what she had told him on DA Jim Martin's behalf the night before trial, and that if he wanted to get an attorney and fight it, it would be "her word against his." According to Chris Mohney, "Mr. Big" at The Morning Call sort of shrugged at him as if to say, "Well, we tried, but that's that. Oh well."

Last I heard Chris Mohney had moved back to the Pittsburgh area where he grew up.

Over the course of the year-plus we had been communicating, and always by phone or email, Chris Mohney had scheduled about a half-dozen in-person meetings w/ me. He always canceled them. Re-scheduled them. And canceled them again.

I believe Chris Mohney has "found peace" and is "moving on w/ his life" and I'm positive The Morning Call "newspaper" and DA Jim Martin are thrilled about this. Works out better this way for everyone, right "guys?"

Editor's Note: While we do get a steady spew stream (daily) of cyber stalking taunts and threats here at LVS, and sadly, not all of them are from (wink wink) "anonymous" ...

tellingly, no one ever factually disputes our dirty facts on DA Jim Martin.

And The Morning Call "newspaper."

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