Today, Judge Joe Goodwin’s son Booth was on the Hoppy Kercheval show. I called into the show personally, but as you would expect, the Hoppy show declined my request that I be allowed to immediately respond to Goodwin’s lies.
Among the interesting things that Booth said was that the Court (a court where his Dad is one of the senior federal Judges) will rule against my motions to invalidate my conviction. Booth said on the program that he is “certain” that his Dad’s court will rule against me. Booth is talking about motions he has not seen and that have not even been written, let alone filed.
How can Booth be so confident? Perhaps it’s because his Dad has told Booth that he will make certain “his court” rules for his son and against me. After all, his Dad ran around Charleston when I was indicted telling his friends that convicting me would be worth a million dollars of free advertising to Booth’s campaign for Governor. Or perhaps Booth is confident that his Dad’s court will rule against me because it ruled against every motion and nearly every objection my attorneys have made in his Dad’s court.
Booth also said that the Office of Responsibility (OPR) investigation of his behavior was done only because of the pressure my attorneys and I put on OPR to do an investigation. If I had that type of power and influence, I would not have been sent to prison for a misdemeanor. In fact, if I had any influence at all, my trial would have been moved out of Booth’s dad’s court in the beginning. But our motions to move it were all denied by Booth’s dad’s court.
By the way, many people would likely agree that being put on trial in a court where the prosecutor’s dad is a senior Judge is not fair. People might even agree that facing trial for three false felonies, that if convicted meant life in prison, is enough of a penalty for having committed a misdemeanor. Yet, you can take it to the bank that I did not even commit the misdemeanor.
Booth Goodwin also failed to mention that it is not me but his Dad and Joe Manchin that have the political and Judicial power. My case had been in the Southern West Virginia Federal Prosecution office for 8 years and just when it appeared that DOJ’s West Virginia office would agree to reversing my conviction the case was moved overnight to Kentucky. After that, I made it public that “Cocaine Mitch” might be a little biased against me and that he controlled the Kentucky DOJ office. As a result of public pressure, it was then moved nearly the next night to Ohio. These movements of my case after eight years of being in Obama’s West Virginia controlled DOJ office had nothing to do with any power I have. The moves likely had everything to do with the power of U.S Federal Judge Joseph Goodwin, Cocaine Mitch, and a U.S. Senator named Joe Manchin.
Booth Goodwin also said that the OPR report found no violation of my rights. That is not exactly right, but regardless it is irrelevant. I have a right, as all Americans do, to be provided information the government discovers that might prove my innocence. The information I was not provided definitely “might” have proven my innocence. But even so, the OPR said that some of the information they reviewed should have been provided to my defense but they did not believe it was not enough to prove my innocence. Goodwin knows that OPR did not review all the “exculpatory” information that I was denied. In fact, we have just recently discovered even more “exculpatory” documents that MSHA did not provide us which I am not sure even Goodwin has seen.
All of this may seem confusing, but it’s really quite simple. If the government, Judge Joe Bob Goodwin, Booth Goodwin, and Steve Ruby do not fear the truth, then they should let me release the details of the OPR report: they should tell all of us what the shredded MSHA documents said and why they were shredded at the MSHA investigation team “shredding party”; they should tell us what the lead MSHA UBB investigator meant when he said “they did not like what they were hearing”; and they should tell us why that same lead investigator quit rather than sign the MSHA UBB investigation report.
One thing is certain—It’s hard to beat an incestuous court like the one Booth and Booth’s Dad were running. But it’s even more difficult when the government is determined to hide that they killed twenty-nine coal miners.
The government Upper Big Branch cover up is obvious. One of the pieces of “exculpatory” evidence I was not provided was an email that says the MSHA investigation report “still appears to say that MSHA is responsible for a faulty ventilation plan.” This email is responded to by another email saying —do not talk about this; it is not your job to do so—“send me the report, I can fix it”. Obviously they did fix it, since the final MSHA investigation report makes no mention whatsoever of their “faulty ventilation plan.”
Mr. Booth Goodwin and Mr. Joe Bob Goodwin both know these emails are “exculpatory information on steroids.” Someone needs to tell Booth that his Dad’s court may be likely to rule against me, but in any fair court he would be called a “convict.” His Dad would be called an “accessory”. I would be called a “victim of judicial corruption.” The perished miners would be called victims of the “Mine Safety and Health Administration and the agency’s ignorance.”