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Attorneys ask for judge to ‘disqualify’ DA from prosecuting Donora homicide case

By Mike Jones newsroom@heraldstandard.Com 4 min read
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Mike Jones

Nicholas Tarpley, 28, of Donora, was shot and killed while working at Anna Lee’s Convenience Store at 501 Allen Ave. in the borough Feb. 24, 2021.

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Christian

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McLean

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Tarpley

Attorneys for three co-defendants charged in the shooting death a worker at a Donora convenience store in 2021 are asking a judge to remove the Washington County district attorney’s office from prosecuting the case.

But before they could even argue the merits of that request Thursday afternoon, the attorneys for defendant Devell Christian demanded that he be brought over from the jail and into the courtroom for the hearing with President Judge John DiSalle due to the seriousness of it being a capital murder case.

“He has a right to be here and watch the wheels of justice where the result could be a needle in his arm,” defense attorney Ryan James said as he became animated while addressing DiSalle.

“We cannot in good conscience proceed … in his absence,” co-counsel Ken Haber added.

DiSalle ultimately agreed to push the hearing back until 9 a.m. Thursday, and scheduled a second day the following morning if the arguments continue beyond that initial date.

Christian, 34, of White Oak, and Sidney McLean, 34, of Washington, are accused of walking into Anna Lee’s Convenience Store at 501 Allen Ave. in Donora on Feb. 24, 2021, and firing multiple shots at Nicholas Tarpley while he was making a sandwich for a customer. Tarpley, 28, of Donora, died inside the store after being shot six times.

A third defendant, Jah Sutton, 29, of Pittsburgh, was arrested several months later and accused of being an accessory to the killing and helping McLean, who was her boyfriend at the time, elude authorities.

All three are charged with homicide and facing the possibility of the death penalty if convicted at trial of first-degree murder. A motive for the shooting has never been revealed.

The attorneys for Christian filed paperwork in May asking for the district attorney’s office to be disqualified from prosecuting the case, arguing that it had “abused its discretion” in seeking the death penalty in what they claim are for “political purposes.”

There are currently nine separate homicide cases against 12 total defendants in which Washington County District Attorney Jason Walsh has announced his intent to seek the death penalty if there is a conviction. There are only 40 other capital cases pending elsewhere across the state.

“Effectively, on what is otherwise a case that is not ‘the worst of the worst,’ the (district attorney’s) filing of these aggravators exemplifies a stretch to death as political fodder for the District Attorney’s election campaign,” James and Haber wrote in their brief.

Walsh, a Republican who was first assistant district attorney when he assumed the role of district attorney in August 2021 following the death of Gene Vittone, is running for election in the Nov. 7 primary against Democrat Christina DeMarco-Breeden.

In their court filing, James and Haber also raised concerns about why Sutton was originally charged with conspiracy to commit homicide, but the district attorney’s office later amended the criminal complaint and upgraded the charge to homicide following her preliminary hearing, allowing prosecutors to seek the death penalty.

“By this, the (district attorney’s office) showed its hand that it’ll wield the death penalty impermissibly to achieve its ends,” the brief states. “And, here, those ends are cooperation. The (district attorney’s office) is impermissibly hanging the prospect of death over Ms. Sutton’s head – who has not been suggested as one of the shooters of Nicholas Tarpley – out of a misguided notion that it can squeeze her for information to convict Sidney McLean and Mr. Christian. That’s not speculative hyperbole – it’s reality.”

Attorneys for McLean and Sutton have since joined the brief asking for DiSalle to “disqualify” the district attorney’s office from the case and send it to the state Attorney General’s office for prosecution.

Before Thursday’s hearing was rescheduled, James touched on that argument again and accused the district attorney of “improperly wielding it as a weapon” against Sutton in order to persuade her to testify at trial against Christian and McLean in exchange for lesser charges.

“This is a capital case,” Haber said about the reason to delay the proceeding in order for the defendants to be present. “The government is seeking to execute Mr. Christian. We think he has a right to be here.”

Christian and McLean, both of whom are being held without bond at the Washington County jail, will be transported to DiSalle’s courtroom for the hearings next week. Sutton, who is being held in Butler County on federal charges in an unrelated case, will appear by video for the proceeding.

It’s not known if DiSalle will rule on the request following the hearing or if he will take time to make his decision.

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