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Friday, April 20, 2007

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Intimidated witnesses and bad news coverage

Posted by Pete Kotz on Fri, Apr 20, 2007 at 4:59 PM

Ever since 18-year-old Shawrica Lester was tragically gunned down outside an Akron nightclub, Summit County prosecutors have struggled to bring her killers to justice, thanks to being out maneuvered by a bunch of shitheads better known as the V-not street gang. Several members, including 17-year-old Tyree Feaster, were charged with Lester's murder immediately after the January shooting. Since then, V-not has been busy terrorizing anyone willing to testify. They've launched death threats against state witnesses and even made stops at the homes of Lester's friends and relatives, claiming they were raising money for a defense fund. This week, V-not's antics proved effective when two witnesses failed to show up at a hearing to have Feaster tried as an adult. Instead, he got off with a cool four years in juvenile detention, even after he admitted to firing his gun into the crowd. But The Akron Beacon Journal wrote that "prosecutors insist that gang members whose threats kept two witnesses from testifying Wednesday did not win a softer sentence for [Feaster]." Was the prosecutor's office that embarrassed by being outdone by a bunch of illiterate thugs? C-Notes had to find out, so we called prosecutor Paula Sawyers, who handled the case. Based on our little talk, it turns out that it was the Beacon that fucked up. "I didn't say that," Sawyers says. "On the contrary, I said [the gang's threats] certainly did affect the outcome of this case. [Four years] was not the ideal outcome — I would have loved to see him bound over, but [four years] was better than watching him just walk out of the courtroom, which was the situation we faced without our key witnesses." Sawyers doesn't know where the witnesses vanished to. That's a big problem, seeing as she has three more V-not members to try. "We reminded their family members of our witness protection program," she says. "We just hope they take us up on using it." — Denise Grollmus
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GONNA kill the clubs,etc.etc. GONNA get SOoo (($@*&! THAT finally. THEN wunder WHY folks headin for burbia, elsewhere, securitysystems,etc. Sad. VERY sad. EVENTUALLy the 9($@ will get killed, etc.etc.

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Posted by bob on 04/23/2007 at 6:44 PM

Witness protection program! If the city can't afford to hire enough Police Officers to carry out the normal daily task, what is to lead you to believe they have enough protection to accomodate a witness protection program? It is easy to understand the fear that is generated by these gangs. Does Law Enforcement have what they really need from our public official in order to complete the task. First and foremost when they took the paddle out of the schools and out of the hands of the parents it created a major problem. Now it has spiraled down hill to the point where our youth think its ok to act in such behaviors because the price to be paid is so minimal. Look at the baby boomers who had firm discipline thru out there child hoods, never did you even remotely consider the stuff these kids are doing and getting away with because point blank you didn't want that ass whippin.

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Posted by Sy on 04/24/2007 at 3:08 AM

Smh . *sigh* . . . . and to think im related to this dick . >.<

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Posted by Alexis Ja'nelle on 02/09/2012 at 9:13 AM
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