The Register-Herald, Beckley, West Virginia

Local News

September 8, 2009

Judge denies Halloween assailant’s motion

By Tina Alvey

LEWISBURG — Greenbrier Circuit Judge Joseph C. Pomponio Jr. rejected a motion to reconsider a prison term levied against a White Sulphur Springs man.

In August of 2007, John Albert Marshall, 21, pleaded guilty to stabbing John Barry multiple times in a Halloween incident the previous year. Pomponio sentenced Marshall to an indeterminate three- to 15-year penitentiary term for attempted murder, but suspended the prison time in favor of a six- to 24-month stint in the Anthony Correctional Center.

ACC officials ejected Marshall after a series of rules infractions, however, and the judge reinstated the prison term.

On Tuesday, Marshall’s attorney, Mason Preston, appealed to the court to reconsider the prison sentence, saying his client was “written up for every little tiny thing” while at ACC. “He was pretty well targeted at Anthony,” Preston maintained.

Now lodged at the Tygart Valley Regional Jail, Marshall has obtained a GED and taken numerous college and vocational courses, according to his lawyer. He is “a young man worth taking a chance on,” Preston said, adding, “That one single incident (the stabbing) should not be the one thing that defines his life.”

Greenbrier County Prosecuting Attorney Pat Via opposed the motion for sentence reconsideration, noting, “The defendant was given an opportunity to radically mitigate the sentence imposed upon him (through the ACC program).”

Via said Marshall’s future is now a matter for the parole board to handle.

Pomponio found “no compelling justification” for reconsideration and denied the motion, wishing Marshall good luck with the parole board.

— E-mail: talvey@register-herald.com

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