By Jennifer Feehan
The Blade
TOLEDO, Ohio — As prosecutors and defense attorneys continue to argue over the destruction of an investigator’s report on the Magnolia Street fire that killed two firefighters, at least one legal tangle for accused arsonist Ray Abou-Arab was eliminated Thursday.
At the request of prosecutors, Lucas County Common Pleas Judge Stacy Cook dismissed unrelated charges alleging Mr. Abou-Arab, 62, of Oregon sold synthetic marijuana last year.
In the far more serious case, Mr. Abou-Arab is charged with two counts of aggravated murder, each with death-penalty specifications; two counts of murder, eight counts of aggravated arson, and one count of tampering with evidence for the Jan. 26, 2014, fire that killed Toledo Fire Pvts. Stephen Machcinski, 42, and James Dickman, 31.
His attorneys contend they have been unable to see a report that purportedly stated the fire began in the kitchen area of one of the apartments, a theory that would tend to point toward their client’s innocence, because that report was destroyed by investigators.
Fire Investigator Dale Pelz and police Detective Deb Hahn testified at an earlier hearing that they had seen the report by then-Fire Investigator Glenn Frames but they had dismissed the theory of the fire starting in a kitchen because it was contrary to evidence at the scene.
Mr. Frames testified that he never wrote that in his initial report.
On Thursday, George Oliver, an intelligence research specialist with the U.S. Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms, and Explosives, testified that an audit trail retrieved from the Bomb Arson Tracking System showed that Mr. Frames created the initial report on the Magnolia Street fire on the day it occurred and never altered the report or logged into the system again.
Mr. Frames testified in June that he removed himself from the case because he had worked alongside Private Machcinski and was too distraught to continue.
Mr. Oliver further testified that no one but the author of the report -- in this case, Mr. Frames -- would have been able to modify the original narrative. Testimony on the issue is to resume Oct. 21.
Just before the hearing ended, Jeff Lingo, chief of the criminal division for the Lucas County Prosecutor’s Office, said he had consulted with the agents who filed two counts of trafficking in a controlled substance against Mr. Abou-Arab last year and asked the court to dismiss those.
A month after Mr. Abou-Arab was indicted by a Lucas County grand jury on the capital murder charges, both he and his son, Omar Abou-Arab, were indicted on the drug charges. Police alleged that Omar Abou-Arab directed customers at the Fassett Mini Mart to his father’s nearby cellular-phone store, where Ray Abou-Arab is alleged to have sold the illegal substance on two occasions in May, 2014.
Complicity charges against Omar Abou-Arab were dropped in January.
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