Judge orders trial in hunting homicide case
A Fayette County judge ruled that a there was enough circumstantial evidence to hold for trial a Uniontown hunter who allegedly killed a rival over deer meat. Judge Steve P. Leskinen, in an opinion handed down last week, indicated “the collective weight of (the) evidence” against Lawrence Cseripko “is overwhelming.”
State police allege that Cseripko, 59, of 60 Fairview St. fatally shot Paul Horvat Jr. on Dec. 16, 1997, in a wooded area of Menallen Township frequented by hunters. The case went unsolved for several years, but police believe they were able to crack it by comparing DNA from deer entrails found near Horvat’s body to deer steaks taken from Cseripko’s freezer shortly after Horvat’s body was discovered.
Police have theorized that Cseripko, who faces a single count of criminal homicide, killed Horvat and took the deer near his body.
Once the technology to compare animal DNA became available, police built a database of deer DNA by taking samples from the animal. A lab compared the DNA of the guts to the DNA of the steaks and allegedly matched the two.
Police included both the DNA match and statements from a man who saw Cseripko in the area just before Horvat’s death. Dewey Stewart reportedly told police that Cseripko said he would shoot Horvat if he saw him again. Stewart told police a short time later, he heard what he believed was a gunshot.
The gun used to kill Horvat, a .243-caliber rifle, never was found.
“It may be possible to concoct an innocent explanation for all of the above, but until that explanation is presented and tested at trial, the Commonwealth’s evidence makes Cseripko’s innocence appear to be only a lonely, forlorn and unreasonable hope,” Leskinen wrote.
During a May court appearance, an associate of Cseripko’s attorney, John Thompson Jr., argued that police did not exclude other potential suspects in Horvat’s death before arresting is client. Thompson also claimed that the case against Cseripko was weak.
In July, Cseripko’s attorney withdrew a request for bail in the case while waiting for Leskinen’s ruling in the case.