Two for One: Summit Co. Prosecutor Office

• Author: Ben Keeler
• Filed under: Local
• Date: Jun 11,2008

This post is two fold. First I want to discuss the case at hand that is in the news, then I want to talk about the Summit County GOP as it relates to the Prosecutor's Office. Two for the price of one at The Point. Hence my creative title.

Fae Evans has served 15 years of a 13 to 30 year sentence and was to have been released last week, but the parole board decision was opposed by Sherri Bevan Walsh. She is the current Summit County Prosecutor and a Democrat. A hearing on the issue is scheduled for July 19 and we will keep an eye on it. This criminal (Evans) who is dying of a rare cancer wants an early release. In summary, the three year old daughter of Evans was beaten, raped, and murdered by her boyfriend or something (I am not sure of the exact relationship, but they lived together). The baby girl, Shelia Marie, had 125 bruises and internal abdominal injuries that were found by investigators to have been there at least two days before she went to a hospital. Evans was convicted of child endangering and involuntary manslaughter, because she knew what was going on and did nothing to stop it. Real nice.

Sorry, but my sympathies are with the dead child. Die in jail. So anyways, I agree with Bevan Walsh who is fighting her release, even though this is partly an election year headline grab. Do you agree with her, or should Fae Evans get to spend her last few months of life out of prison? Switching tracks, but staying with this office……

Now our prosecutor is running for reelection this fall. She won in 2000 by a very slim margin - 101,644 votes for her, 100,266 for her opponent, Republican Michael Callahan. That comes out to a 50.34% win for Bevan Walsh, a very small margin. In lets just say in what was a curious decision, according to a knowledgeable source, Callahan's reserved ad times were given back to local radio stations two weeks before the election. Bevan Walsh, who has no shortage of family money, came in and bought them and subsequently eked out a win. Strange strategy in such a close race, no? Moving forward, normally one would expect that the winner of this race would have another tightly contested race the next time around. Yet in 2004, Bevan Walsh ran without a Republican opponent. Why? David Drew wanted to run as the Republican, but was told by "party leaders" that we already had a candidate, which obviously was not the case because no Republican filed to run. Drew, who had all the signatures ready to file but was told don't bother, still ran as an Independent, but everyone knows how successful that usually is. This case was no different as he got slaughtered. So in 2008, I see that Nancy Mercurio Morrison is the Summit County GOP candidate for the slot. It is pretty sad when you have to look and A) see if your party is even fielding a candidate these days and B) wonder what the back story is about how this person ended up on the ballot. I have come to the conclusion, and dispute me if I am wrong please, that some Summit County Republican(s) don't sit around and decide who is the best candidate and put them on the ballot so they can win. Instead, they cut deals with Democrats and then proceed to lose virtually every race. Well, except races where a party chairmanship is on the line.

I don't understand how any political organization with a website that looks as good as this one ever loses.

Sherri Bevan Walsh has about the same chance of losing as John McCain does of losing Utah this fall, but the thing is with better strategery in 2000 she would never have been elected. If our party higher ups wanted her to lose that is. Like I said, in this Fae Evans case I think she is in the right, but at the end of the day I will always prefer a Republican to a Democrat in this or any office. Too bad that people that make the decisions when it comes to who is on my ballot don't agree.