Twice-convicted killer shouldn’t get third chance

We’d be amazed if the Ohio Adult Parole Authority receives a more impassioned appeal to keep a dangerous criminal behind bars than the one received last week from Trumbull County Prosecutor Dennis Watkins in the case of Pompie Junior Wade.

Watkins’ website describes a prosecuting attorney’s duties succinctly. He “represents the State of Ohio by inquiring into and prosecuting felony crimes committed by adults and all offenses committed by juveniles. The Trumbull County prosecuting attorney is also legal counsel for county officials, county agencies, townships and assorted boards, representing them in various civil matters.”

But Watkins, who joined the prosecutor’s office as an intern 44 years ago and has been the prosecutor since 1984, has traditionally gone far beyond any bare-bones definition of his office’s duty to prosecute criminals.

He has taken personal responsibility in trying murder cases in Trumbull County and was a pioneer in the state in hiring an advocate for victims and witnesses in the prosecutor’s office.

He brought Miriam Fife on board shortly after her son, Raymond, was brutally murdered at age 12 in 1985 by Danny Lee Hill, then 18, and Timothy Combs, then 17. Hill remains on death row at the Ohio State Penitentiary in Youngstown, and Watkins’ office continues to fight appeals that have delayed his execution. Combs is in Allen Correctional Institution in Lima and won’t be eligible for parole until 2049.

Miriam Fife counseled thousands of victims of violent crime, their families and witnesses as a volunteer and as Trumbull County’s first witness/victim advocate in Watkins’ office. When she retired this past May, Watkins described her hiring as possibly the best of his long career in public service.

WATKINS’ LATEST EFFORT

That background adds context to the latest effort Watkins is making to assure that justice is done for Dominic Chiarella and Fred Piersol. Chiarella was murdered at age 51 shortly before Christmas in 1975 during a robbery at the Austin Beverage Center on Warren’s West Side. Piersol, then 23, was severely wounded.

Pompie Junior Wade, then 21, was convicted of aggravated murder with specifications and sentenced to the death penalty. His accomplice, Moses Hurd, was convicted on lesser charges and paroled after 14 years in prison. But Ohio’s death sentence protocol in effect at the time of Wade’s conviction was subsequently ruled unconstitutional, and Wade avoided execution. Now he is up for parole.

And Watkins is once again taking point in opposing that parole. He brings to the battle a unique perspective. We often hear complaints about elected officials who have been in office for too long. But Watkins demonstrates that a public official who brings an institutional memory to his work can be invaluable.

When Watkins describes Wade as a “psychopath’s psychopath” he can back up that description with facts pulled from memory. Watkins sat second chair to Prosecutor Walter Dragelevich when Wade was convicted in Trumbull County Common Pleas Court. He can recount the details of the robbery at the beverage store – how Chiarella and Piersol were ordered into a cooler at the back of the store and how Wade, who could have left with the loot, decided to walk into the cooler and shoot both men in the chest with a .32-caliber revolver.

Watkins also knows that Wade had been charged with murder in the 1972 barroom shooting of William A. Jackson. He pleaded guilty to manslaughter in that death and had been released on parole shortly before the robbery in which Chiarella was murdered in cold blood.

In a letter to Andre Imbrogno, acting chairman of the Parole Board, Watkins was able to write, with authority: “I know the victims’ families and the survivor of that night and their suffering. I also know the criminal history that Pompie Wade has. Because I know him … I am writing the Board again to re-emphasize the importance and, as I see it, moral mandate, in keeping Wade incarcerated for the rest of his life.”

Some criminals who are sentenced to “life” in prison may earn consideration for parole under the laws of the state. And some have proved by the choices they have made that parole is not an option.

Wade, who killed Chiarella and tried to kill Piersol while on parole for killing Jackson, is clearly one of those prisoners who should die behind bars. Justice for Wade’s victims and the need to protect society from a man with a history of killing without remorse demands no less.

We trust that when the Parole Board meets later this month, it will agree.