Adult in Ohio Craigslist case charged with murder

In this Decem­ber 2011 file photo, Richard Beasley, 52, appears in Sum­mit County Com­mon Pleas Court in Akron on drug charges. Con­fu­sion over rules gov­ern­ing pris­oner trans­fers and lack of com­mu­ni­ca­tion helps explain why Beasley, now sus­pected in a deadly Craigslist rob­bery scheme, was mis­tak­enly released from Ohio cus­tody twice, accord­ing to a state pris­ons report. (AP Photo/Tony Dejak, File)

ANDREW WELSH-HUGGINS, THOMAS J. SHEERAN

Asso­ci­ated Press

AKRON, Ohio (AP) — A self-styled chap­lain sus­pected in a deadly scheme to rob peo­ple who replied to a Craigslist job ad has been charged with mul­ti­ple counts of aggra­vated mur­der, kid­nap­ping and rob­bery and could face the death penalty if con­victed, accord­ing to an indict­ment announced Friday.

The charges against Richard Beasley accuse him of killing three men and wound­ing a fourth in August, Octo­ber and November.

Beasley, 52, of Akron, who has been jailed in Akron on unre­lated pros­ti­tu­tion and drug charges, has denied involve­ment in the Craigslist slay­ings. He was arrested in Novem­ber after author­i­ties linked him to the alleged plot.

Pros­e­cu­tors would not spec­u­late on a motive but Attor­ney Gen­eral Mike DeWine, who joined in announc­ing the charges, said inves­ti­ga­tors are look­ing at “ser­ial killings.”

“Are there more bod­ies? We frankly do not know,” DeWine said, appeal­ing to peo­ple with any infor­ma­tion about miss­ing per­sons to come forward.

Also Fri­day, a judge deter­mined that the case of a juve­nile sus­pect men­tored by Beasley will be moved out of the county where two slay­ing vic­tims were found and another was shot but survived.

The deci­sion to trans­fer the case of Bro­gan Raf­ferty to Sum­mit County came after a hear­ing Fri­day after­noon, said Tonda Brown, Noble County Court Assign­ment Com­mis­sioner. She said the gag order in the case has also been lifted.

Mes­sages were left with the Noble County pros­e­cu­tor and Rafferty’s attor­ney in Noble County. The Sum­mit County Prosecutor’s Office could not imme­di­ately com­ment, said spokes­woman April Wiesner.

Sum­mit County Pros­e­cu­tor Sherri Bevan Walsh said the case of Beasley, with the nature of the crimes and the mul­ti­tude of charges, was made for the death penalty.

“This case we view as to be one of the worst of the worst when it comes to hor­ri­ble mur­der cases,” Walsh said.

The 28-count indict­ment against Beasley also included theft, weapons and iden­tity theft charges. Beasley received the indict­ment Fri­day, and a deci­sion will be made next week about his rep­re­sen­ta­tion, said Rhonda Kot­nik, an attor­ney who has been rep­re­sent­ing Beasley on the non-Craigslist charges.

An acquain­tance of Beasley, 16-year-old Bro­gan Raf­ferty, of nearby of Stow, could face sim­i­lar charges after being trans­ferred to adult court late last year. His case is pend­ing in Noble County where two of the slay­ings happened.

Author­i­ties say the scheme tar­geted older and sin­gle out-of-work men with back­grounds that made it unlikely their dis­ap­pear­ances would be noted right away.

The first vic­tim, Ralph Geiger, 55, of Akron, was killed Aug. 9, the day after he left a home­less shel­ter say­ing he was tak­ing a farm job. His body wasn’t found until Nov. 25.

Geiger’s brother, Mark Geiger, said Fri­day he’s happy with the way pros­e­cu­tors are han­dling the case. He said he’s long won­dered about other vic­tims. He said he’s not a death penalty advo­cate but wouldn’t oppose it, although life in prison for Beasley would also sat­isfy him.

“As long as Beasley never has the oppor­tu­nity to inter­act with the out­side world again, that’s what I feel would be appro­pri­ate,” said Geiger, a telecom­mu­ni­ca­tions exec­u­tive in Atlanta.

The plot’s sec­ond vic­tim, David Pauley, 51, of Nor­folk, Va., came to Ohio in mid-October after answer­ing the Craigslist ad. A friend has said Pauley was des­per­ate for work and eager to return to Ohio.

Police say he was killed Oct. 23, and his body was found Nov. 15. Fam­ily mem­bers had con­tacted police con­cerned they hadn’t heard from him.

The third vic­tim, Tim­o­thy Kern, 47, of Mas­sil­lon, whose body was buried near an Akron shop­ping mall, answered the ad and was last seen Nov. 13, author­i­ties said. His body was also found Nov. 25. Kern told his fam­ily he was tak­ing the job to help sup­port his three sons.

A sur­viv­ing vic­tim, Scott Davis, 48, of South Car­olina, also answered the ad and was shot Nov. 6 before escap­ing, police say.

Beasley was a Texas parolee when he returned to Ohio in 2004 after serv­ing sev­eral years in prison on a bur­glary con­vic­tion. He was released from an Akron jail July 12 after a judge mis­tak­enly allowed him to post bond on a drug-trafficking charge.

He was arrested two days later fol­low­ing a traf­fic stop but again mis­tak­enly released. An inves­ti­ga­tion by Ohio’s pris­ons sys­tem found that Beasley should not have been released on bond but said con­fu­sion over inter­state prisoner-transfer rules and “ambi­gu­ity” in mes­sages from Texas to Akron jail offi­cials con­tributed to the error.

In a four-page hand­writ­ten let­ter to the Akron Bea­con Jour­nal, Beasley has said he has been mis­cast as a con man when he really helped feed, house and coun­sel scores of needy fam­i­lies, alco­holics, drug addicts, the men­tally ill and crime sus­pects for years.

“To call me a con man when I sac­ri­ficed for oth­ers is wrong,” wrote Beasley, who didn’t men­tion the Craigslist inves­ti­ga­tion or Raf­ferty. “To turn their back on me is not fol­low­ing Christ’s exam­ple. I gave three full years of my life to that min­istry and what I got out of it was the sat­is­fac­tion of doing the right thing. There was no ‘con’ to it.”

Posted by AP News on Jan 20 2012. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS Feed. Comments can be made below.