FreeZeke.org

Zeke's Statement from 1996: Applications For Commutation

I applied for commutation of my sentences to the Board of Pardons several times. After I publicly admitted that I had committed the arson Judge Ziegler, who presided over my trial wrote a strong letter in support of my application. He has supported me strongly in each subsequent application. In my last application Judge Ziegler also wrote to the Governor. Judge Ziegler has serious doubts about my guilt. It is not often that a trial judge writes such a letter. According to Judge Ziegler, this is the only time that he has done this.

When I applied for commutation the fourth time, in 1994, the Board of Pardons sat on my case for several months which they had never done before. Shortly before the election in October, a prisoner whose life sentence had been commuted moved to New York and was arrested for murder and rape. Soon after the story broke, all pending applications before the Board of Pardons were turned down, including mine.

"Clarence . . . Clarence Miller did this to me." George Wilhelm's dying declaration to police, February 9, 1976 (T.T. 1528).

". . . Goldblum was not the individual who inflicted the fatal stab wounds on Mr. George Wilhelm." Dr. Cyril Wecht, Coroner of Allegheny County in letter to Board of Pardons, September 1, 1994; Henry Lee, Ph.D., report dated February 25, 1997.

"This is the one case in 21 years [as a judge] which seriously troubles my conscience about the result." The Honorable Donald Ziegler as quoted in Michael Bucsko, Judge Haunted by Dying Man's Last Sentences, Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, February 5, 1995.