On
May 9th, 1988, there was an armed robbery and rape at the Sparks,
Nevada, Payless Shoe Store.
Nolan Klein was
misidentified weeks later as the perpetrator by one of the store's
clerks.
Nolan was not advised of his rights as required by the Miranda
decision. At one point shortly after May 9, the said clerk had
an opportunity to identify Nolan at the Sparks police station. She
did not do this.
Nolan Klein
was convicted of crimes he did not commit
and was sentenced to many
years in prison. He has maintained his innocence from the beginning.
When offered parole in 2008 -- if he would admit guilt and agree to not
sue the state -- he refused to do so.
It was made
clear to Nolan that he would never again be a free man unless he
swore to not sue regarding travesties committed against him by
public officials who were/are incompetent or far worse.
Nolan is now
dying in prison from a number of health issues
-- and is not being given proper medical care. If he were released
from prison, he would be admitted to the Veterans Administration
hospital in Reno where he would receive much better care.
At the time
of the Payless crimes, Nolan Klein was present at Jack's Bar in
Carson City.
The Payless store at 543 E. Prater Way in Sparks is 34.6 miles away from
Jack's Bar (now closed) at 418 S. Carson Street in Carson City.
Google Maps rates travel time between these two addresses at 44
minutes by car. On
May 9, 1988, Nolan's car was having problems with its carburetor and
would have required more time to get from Jack's to the Payless
store.
Witnesses,
including bartender Barbara Hillman, have testified that Nolan did
not leave Jack's Bar until AFTER the time of the Payless incident!
On the day of
the Payless incident, Nolan had a beard of 2-3 inches. The
perpetrator had only beard stubble.
A witness
outside the shoe store, Mr. Don Lutzenberg, spotted the perpetrator's car and wrote down
that vehicle's license plate number.
Nolan's car had plates with a
different number.
Nolan was
assigned an incompetent public defender by the name of Shelly
O'Neill.
She did not initially comprehend the importance of Nolan's
beard. She did not immediately check out the license number of the
perpetrator. She did not track down Mr. Lutzenberg to find out all
he had observed at the time of the Payless crimes. She did not
clarify and stress to the jury the time Nolan had left the bar in
Carson -- this being AFTER the Payless crimes were committed.
As presented
in Tonja Brown's statement: "Nolan told Shelly that he had
heard of DNA testing and he wanted her to get it done, so he could
clear himself. O'Neill told Nolan that she was
going to let the District Attorney do it." When
a so-called defense attorney relies on the prosecution to run tests
and provide evidence, we have proof of that attorney's stupidity and
incompetence. Or
worse! Shelly
should be polygraphed and asked, "Were you willfully working as
an agent of the prosecution with full intent to ensure Nolan's
conviction?"
The rape victim was NOT PENETRATED according to the examining doctor's report.
This doctor testified that the report was
accurate. However, Shelly O'Neill completely missed this point. This
could possibly be because she was handed the report by Ron Rachow as the doctor was testifying. Did sexual intercourse actually take place at the shoe store on May 9, 1988?
Cigarette
butts with the perpetrator's DNA were not put in fail-safe custody
by law enforcement officials.
Persons not identified had access to
these butts over a period of years and tampered with them, seemingly
replacing them at one or more times.
On September
22, 2008, District Attorney Dick Gammick publicly stated that they
had opened up the DNA evidence and tested the filter cigarette butts.
If
so, no results were reported to Nolan.
If Gammick
had found DNA evidence against Nolan, he would have told the world.
He did not do this.
It is
relevant that law enforcement in Washoe County can not be trusted to
guard evidence from tampering and/or loss. Tampering and loss are
not uncommon in Washoe County.
When John Paiva
Junior was shot dead in his home by Reno police officers, all
evidence that might have proved wrongdoing on the parts of those
officers was lost, stolen, or destroyed while in police custody.
When Mr. Mike Weston, of Mogul, was victimized in the court of Judge
Fidel Salcedo by judicial fraud, perjury by an NHP officer, and
evidence tampering, the
official transcript was edited to work against Weston.
This writer has personal knowledge of
both scenarios.
Public
Defender O'Neill, some time after the Payless incident, indicated
confusion over whether one or two store clerks had been raped.
More than
once, O'Neill committed perjury.
One related complaint was submitted
by Nolan's sister, Tonja Brown.
This complaint was ignored by
authorities, thereby putting O'Neill above the law, and destroying
due process.
Without due process, justice can not
and does not exist.
Another Payless suspect in the view of Sparks police officers, Ricky Lee Zarsky, apparently left northern Nevada and was never tracked down.
Tonja would attempt to locate Mr. Zarsky. She would learn that Zarsky left the day after the crime and went to Texas. He never picked up or sent for his last paycheck that was still there at
Carls' Silver Club.
Nolan and
Zarsky reportedly look similar.
Nolan was the victim of mistaken
identity.
Nolan raised 33 grounds of ineffectiveness of counsel, judicial error,
prosecutorial misconduct, and jury misconduct.
Nolan's case was assigned to Judge Charles McGee. A pattern of wrongful and/or adversarial judicial calls on McGee's part invite the perception that he
was never impartial toward Nolan and was not committed to justice. Years
after the involved crimes of 1988, McGee was arrested for DUI. A
fair question is raised whether McGee had a drinking problem in
1988, sufficient to impair his judgment during Nolan's trial.
http://judicial.state.nv.us/decisiononmcgee3new.htm
Nolan's case
is now (August 2009) in the hands of Judge Brent Adams.
It is also of
profound concern that McGee, as an elected official, was not elected
in an open and transparent process where concerned citizens were
free to monitor integrity of process. Washoe's
computerized voting machines count votes in secret where numbers can
be "juggled" by persons such as registrars of voters.
Computer security experts, representing Harvard, MIT, Princeton,
Johns Hopkins, and the University of California studied machines
just like those used in Nevada -- and found that they are easy to
rig to throw elections. A
major Federal lawsuit is now in process having the goal of outlawing
the use of voting machines in all states.
The "National Clean Elections Lawsuit" goes to trial next
year in Albany, New York, and is expected to require 14 days of
court time. Nevada
officials, from Governor Gibbons on down, refuse to discuss the fact
that Nevada's voting machines can not be trusted to report honest
numbers.
California has decertified machines it was using that are exactly
like those machines still being used in Nevada. This because they
can not be trusted to report the will of the people. Nevada
is now being run by persons holding elective positions who can not
prove they were honestly elected!
During Nolan's Payless trial, McGee refused to permit jurists to rehear testimony of
a key defense witness which they felt needed clarification.
The jury wanted to rehear the testimonies of two witnesses, but McGee informed the jury it would take too long to have them transcribed.
So he ordered jurists to pick one of the two witnesses.
If McGee had
permitted what the jury requested - rehearing both testimonies - this could well have resulted in the jury finding Nolan not guilty.
Any judge who works against clear understanding of facts by a jury should not be a judge. Any state that turns its back on incompetent judges who condescend juries and the jury process should not be permitted to fly the American flag and should not receive federal funding for any reason. This was raised as one of
Nolan's 33 grounds. McGee never addressed this issue, nor any of the following courts
of appeal.
Of extreme
relevance, Nevada's general approach toward justice is distorted and
fraudulent.
As a despicable result, innocent persons wind up wasting years of
their lives in penal facilities at taxpayer expense. TAXPAYERS ARE
RIPPED OFF BY GOVERNMENT FOR MILLIONS OF DOLLARS IN ORDER TO
INCARCERATE INNOCENT PERSONS!
A former Nevada
Supreme Court clerk reports that the Court commonly makes
politically-sensitive decisions BEFORE preparing fraudulent
arguments for those decisions. Our
state denies jury trials to persons accused of misdemeanors
even though the 6th Amendment clearly guarantees trial by jury to
persons accused of any and all crimes:
In
ALL criminal
prosecutions, the accused shall enjoy the right to a speedy and
public trial, by an impartial jury of the State and district where
in the crime shall have been committed, which district shall have
been previously ascertained by law, and to be informed of the
nature and cause of the accusation; to be confronted with the
witnesses against him; to have compulsory process for obtaining
witnesses in his favor, and to have the Assistance of Counsel for
his defense.
By
contrast, the State of California extends trial by jury to ALL
accused persons requesting this. Nevada officials have some tough
explaining to do.
A class-action
lawsuit is needed to compensate thousands of victims of Nevada's
arrogant and stupid (if not treasonous) disregard of the supreme
law of the land.
Note also
that the guarantee of "Assistance of Counsel" clearly
means "competent
and spirited assistance"
by "capable
counsel".
It is unthinkable that the Founding Fathers meant "token and
fraudulent assistance" by "incompetent and lackadaisical
counsel". Shelly O'Neill did not provide competent and
spirited assistance to Nolan. Nolan's
6th Amendment right to being assisted by a competent and spirited
lawyer was clearly violated, thereby making his conviction null
and void.
Returning to
Nolan's Payless situation:
A tape
recording of the perpetrator's voice is distinctly different from
Nolan's voice!
Nolan's Public Defender, O'Neill, admitted to this at the post conviction hearing. Yet, she never said a word at trial that she had listened to the tape herself, nor did she demand to have Nolan's taped voice brought into court to compare with the 911 tape and his. Ron Rachow only played the 911 tape to the jury.
O'Neill did not present this hard fact to Nolan's jury.
Washoe County's District
Attorneys (plural) have been covering up the WRONGDOINGS OF PROSECUTOR RON
RACHOW for the last 21 years.
The
legal system in Nevada is anything but a justice system. It makes horrendous jest
of the concept of government under just laws, justly applied by
just officials.
The legal
system in Nevada commonly violates any notion of due process.
Without due process, justice can not and does not exist.
Innocent
persons, with Nolan Klein as a key example, are languishing in
prisons, with taxpayers being made to pay the related
multimillion-dollar costs. This could not be if more
Nevadans were willing to speak out and demand working
checks and balances in our court system -- and a complete
house cleaning of lawyers and judges who lack integrity and a
commitment to justice as their chief priority.
The state has not yet had the chance to respond to
Nolan's most-recent petition.
On June 9, 2008,
Tonja presented this to The Advisory Commission on the Administration of Justice.
She commented on Agenda Item VI B and VI D. She submitted testimony for the Commission. (Exhibit P). She submitted a proposed bill dealing with DNA evidence and wrongful convictions. She requested the Commission recommend the bill to the 2009 Legislature. She said the bill entitled an inmate to have DNA testing at his own expense. She said her other item of discussion, Agenda Item VI-D, was eyewitness identification. She provided a large packet of exhibit material for the Commission. She
asked the Commissioners to look at the photo lineup included in her materials.
She read further statements from her exhibits.
Chair Hardesty said the Commission had Ms. Brown’s material and he asked her to make a policy issue. Ms. Brown recommended the Commission needed to study misidentification and recommend to the Legislature they do a case study.
http://www.leg.state.nv.us/74th/Interim_Agendas_
Minutes_Exhibits/Exhibits/AdminJustice/E060908P.pdf
In 2008 Nolan appeared before the State of Nevada Pardons Board. He asked to have his life sentences changed to a number of years because the Parole Board has made it perfectly clear that, unless an inmate admits guilt, they will never be released to the streets.
There is a
case to be made that Nevada is run by and for a power elite.
Elections and courts are controlled to serve and defend this
relatively small group of persons. Justice and other American
ideals are mere pretenses within Nevada realities that are
ominous, sinister, heinous, despicable, un-Constitutional, and
treasonous.
~ Guy P. Felton III
Publisher of this website
###
RETURN
TO MAIN PAGE
RETURN
TO PAGE 2
DONATE FOR NOLAN’S LEGAL FIGHT