David Reasby faces West Virginia Three Strikes You're Out law - Bluefield Daily Telegraph
PRINCETON — A man who has been convicted on multiple felonies is facing a habitual offender statute that could lead to being sentenced to life in prison.
David Reasby, 44, of Bluefield appeared by video Tuesday before Circuit Court Judge Mark Wills for a motions hearing. On Feb.1, a jury convicted Reasby of possession with intent to deliver a Schedule II controlled substance; to wit, fentanyl.
Reasby was arrested in January 2020 after an investigation by the Bluefield Police Department and the Southern Regional Drug and Violent Crimes Task Force. The fentanyl consisted of 62 pills which were compressed to look like oxycodone, Prosecuting Attorney Brian Cochran said after the trial.
Fentanyl is “like 80 to 100 times more potent than morphine,” Cochran said then.
Reasby is facing one to 15 years in prison for the fentanyl charge. After the trial, the West Virginia Parole Board took Reasby into custody for violation of parole, Cochran said. Because Reasby has “a very significant criminal history with multiple felony offenses,” the prosecution planned to utilize the state’s recidivism statue.
The prosecution filed a habitual offender information, Cochran said Tuesday. In West Virginia law, if a person is convicted of three certain types of felonies over a 20-year period, he or she can be sentenced to a term of 15 years to life in prison.
An habitual offender information was filed Feb. 9. According to the court document, Reasby has “at least twice before been convicted of a felony crime within the last twenty (20) years.”
Reasby was convicted with “the qualifying felony offense of voluntary manslaughter in Mercer County Circuit Court” on Aug. 29, 2013, according to the court document.
In a second case, Reasby was “convicted of one count of the qualifying defense of wanton endangerment and one count of conspiracy to commit a felony in Mercer County Circuit Court” on March 7, 2007, according to the court document. Those two convictions count as one because they were on the same date, Cochran said.
Reasby was also convicted on Jan. 6, 2006, in circuit court of conspiracy to commit a felony against the state, according to the court document.
“Therefore, the State respectfully requests that the court declares defendant David Vashawn Reasby a habitual offender,” according to court records.
Attorney Raeann Osborne, who represented Reasby, made a motion to set aside the jury verdict in the fentanyl case and set a new trial. Osborne told Judge Wills that the prosecution had made “prejudicial statements” to the jury regarding her client and shifted the burden of proof, which is the prosecution’s responsibility, to the defendant. Osborne said that in his closing argument to the jury, Cochran repeatedly stated taht the Reasby lied.
Osborne said that Cochran had told the jury that “you know what drug dealers look like” and implied that the jury had to decide if Reasby looked like an addict.
Cochran told the court that in his closing argument, he reminded the jury about what they were told in the instructions that the court had given them. Jurors could consider a defendant’s appearance and demeanor during the trial. Cochran also said that Reasby had testified during the trial that he had lied under oath during a hearing before a magistrate.
Osborne also said that according to state law, Reasby should have been served with the habitual offender information before the court term during which he was convicted ended. Cochran said that the law had changed in 2020. Now, the information could be served before the expiration of the court term following a conviction. Wills dismissed the motion for a new trial and the motion to dismiss the information.
Reasby had not yet received the habitual offender information document. Wills set a new hearing date so Reasby could attend court in person.
The state code requires that Reasby be brought before the court so he can be asked if he is the same person who had committed all of the previous felonies mentioned in the information document, Cochran said later. If Reasby admits that he is the same person named in that document, Wills can proceed with sentencing at a later date.
“If he doesn’t admit it or if he just remains silent, then we have to have another jury trial and I have to prove to the jury that David Reasby is the same David Reasby who committed all these prior felonies that I mentioned in this information,” Cochran said.
Reasby is being held at the Southern Regional Jail.
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source: https://www.bdtonline.com/news/david-reasby-faces-west-virginia-three-strikes-you-re-out-law/article_98f47e24-9f24-11ec-b3f5-af543e686c5e.html
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