By James Halpin
The Citizens’ Voice
WILKES-BARRE, Pa. — The arson trial against the son of the Wilkes-Barre Township fire chief ended in a mistrial Friday evening after the jury reported it was hopelessly deadlocked on a verdict.
After about five hours of deliberations, the jury of 10 women and two men could not agree on whether 19-year-old Richard Hart was guilty on charges of arson, reckless burning and burglary. Luzerne County Judge David W. Lupas declared a mistrial.
A smiling Hart declined to comment as he left the courthouse surrounded by family. Assistant District Attorney Thomas Hogans said he intends to re-prosecute the case.
The charges stemmed from a fire that broke out early the morning of Dec. 21, destroying a vacant home at 115 Casey Ave. Police quickly identified Hart, a member of the township fire company and son of fire Chief Richard Hart, as a suspect based on his behavior after responding to fight the fire, including a comment he made about its origin point.
Hart initially denied responsibility for the blaze, but in a subsequent interview he claimed he set it after following a cat into the vacant house, accidentally kicking over a can of gasoline and then dropping a lit cigar.
On the stand Friday, Hart testified that he falsely confessed because he was “scared and nervous” after repeated police interrogations.
“I was 18 years old. I never had to deal with anything like this before. I was nervous,” Hart said. “I thought if I’d tell them a story they would leave me alone.”
Hart testified that he was with a friend at his home the night of the fire and that they ordered a pizza at 1:18 a.m. Hart then decided to walk down to McDonald’s on Wilkes-Barre Township Boulevard to get an iced coffee but returned after learning it was closed, he said on direct questioning.
By the time he got back home five or 10 minutes later, the pizza had been delivered and he ate a slice before falling asleep on the couch, Hart said. About 3:15 a.m., he awoke to pagers for the fire and responded to the blaze along with his father, he said.
Hogans, however, sought to cast doubt on Hart’s changing story, noting that when he showed up for a fourth interview with police he denied setting the fire and instead claimed to have seen a suspicious man following him and a friend the night of the fire. But the friend — who claimed to have been with Hart almost the entire night — testified he didn’t see any such character, and Hogans noted that despite allegedly seeing a suspicious character loitering in the neighborhood, Hart still decided to leave the house minutes later for a McDonald’s run by himself.
“If you were that scared why would you chance it?” Hogans asked.
“Because I wanted a coffee,” Hart said.
During cross-examination, Hart maintained he never made it to McDonald’s because the man pulled a gun on him and told him to get out of the area. Yet Hogans noted that he failed to mention it to anyone — including to his best friend when he got back home — until after he recanted his confession.
The defense rested its case with Hart’s departure from the stand. During closing arguments, defense attorney John Pike told the jury that Hart, a high-school dropout who worked at Wal-Mart, was manipulated into giving a confession by police with decades of experience and training in eliciting admissions from suspects.
“He broke,” Pike said. “He’s an 18-year-old dropout in a room alone with lions.”
Hogans urged the jury to use common sense during their deliberations and to consider whether Hart would logically have left his house to get coffee right before bedtime, only minutes after seeing a suspicious man lurking behind cars on the street. Hart’s story falls apart because of numerous inconsistencies, including that he failed to tell anyone about the suspicious man until a month after the fire, he said.
“It doesn’t make any sense at all,” Hogans said.
After the case was declared a mistrial, Pike said he was happy with the outcome of the case, which allowed Hart to remain free on bail. The case, he said, came down to Hart’s statements.
“The issue as I saw it was obviously the alibi and reconciling that with his statement,” Pike said. “That’s what they apparently, I think, were struggling with.”
One name that did not come up during the final day of the trial was former township fire Chief John Yuknavich. A day earlier, Pike noted that Hart at one point alleged Yuknavich, a rival of his father’s, was trying to set him up.
Yuknavich, who served six months in federal prison for stealing about $45,000 from the department, is currently facing harassment charges alleging he was “verbally harassing” the new chief during the Giant’s Despair Hill Climb in July.
Yuknavich denies any involvement in the case and threatened legal action against his accusers when asked about the allegations Thursday evening.
He arrived at the courthouse Friday morning, offering to testify for the prosecution as a rebuttal witness but was not called.
After the case ended, Pike said he didn’t know whether Yuknavich was involved in the case.
“That was something that we were looking at. The testimony was out there,” Pike said. “There was evidence to support that there was somebody else behind what was going on with my client.”
Copyright 2016 The Citizens’ Voice