AG argues to dismiss appeal in Fayette murder case
The state Attorney General’s office wants a judge to dismiss an appeal for a Scottdale man’s life sentence for murder in the early 1980s.
On Oct. 13, Deputy Attorney General Gregory J. Simatic filed an answer to the post-conviction relief petition for Joseph Frankenberry, 74.
Frankenberry’s petition argued that prosecutors committed violations that prevented him from receiving a fair trial.
Frankenberry was sentenced to life in prison without parole in 1982 following the murder of John Tomasek of Uniontown. Tomasek’s wife, Phoebe Tomasek, was having an extramarital affair with Elmer Younkin, and police said the two hired Frankenberry and another man to kill John Tomasek.
Frankenberry claims he was never provided with tape recordings made by Elmer Younkin in which he and Phoebe Tomasek discussed hiring Charles Ralph Huey, an FBI informant, to kill John Tomasek.
Huey was granted immunity to testify and claimed that Frankenberry shot John Tomasek in the head four times while he sat in the cab of a tractor trailer.
Simatic stated in the filing that the claim is “demonstrably false”, contending the transcript of the telephone conversation was reviewed by Frankenberry’s trial council for two hours, adding that even if there were merit to the claim, it wasn’t raised in a timely manner as he knew about the tapes for a lengthy period of time.
Frankenberry also claimed prosecutors failed to turn over evidence that demonstrated that Huey was an FBI informant prior to early February 1981, which would have established that law enforcement officials committed perjury.
Simatic stated that Frankenberry has no proof of the existence of the information he received by third-hand sources.
“Frankenberry never specified who purportedly relayed this information to him or when this revelation allegedly occurred,” Simatic wrote. “This is an awfully weak basis on which to accuse federal agents of outright perjury as opposed to an innocent misstatement or an honest error of recollection.”
An evidentiary hearing has been scheduled for Frankenberry at 1:30 p.m. Tuesday in the Fayette County Courthouse.
Senior Judge David C. Klementik of State College will be brought in to preside over the case as all the Fayette County judges have recused themselves because many were prosecutors in the original case.
Frankenberry is lodged at the State Correctional Institution at Benner Township, Centre County.