OH- Search warrant of ex-cop’s home staying sealed

Typical, misconstrue what the RSO has said, what other way can a prosecutor make this case?

5-7-2009 Ohio:

A Lake County judge has refused to unseal the affidavit that allowed law enforcement to search the Wickliffe home of a former Lorain police officer last year.

Joseph Montelon’s attorney had asked Lake County Common Pleas Judge Vincent Culotta to open the affidavit, saying his client has not been charged and police didn’t have a legitimate reason for the Aug. 28 raid on his home.

Montelon is suspected of being the writer of anonymous letters sent to public officials and media for years that were highly critical of Lorain police Chief Cel Rivera and other Lorain police officers.

Lorain County Prosecutor Dennis Will said the investigation, which involves Lorain police, the FBI and other law enforcement agencies, is still ongoing and the affidavit should remain sealed until the investigation is complete.

Culotta agreed in his decision that “unsealing the search warrant affidavit at this point could hamper and harm the ongoing investigation.”

Montelon, a convicted sex offender who resigned from the Lorain Police Department in 1992, has not admitted to writing the letters, which police and prosecutors have called “threatening.”


Terry Gilbert, Montelon’s attorney, said he wasn’t surprised by Culotta’s decision, but he may try again later if his client is never charged. It’s been nearly a year since the raid and no charges have been filed, he said.

Montelon and Lorain City Councilwoman Anne Molnar have both said the raid in which police seized computers, documents, guns and Montelon’s cell phone, appears to have been designed to silence a critic and uncover Montelon’s source of internal police documents.

Montelon has admitted that he has been sending documents to Molnar and others over the years but said he did so to help stop police corruption.

Some of those documents were part of a package that Molnar, Councilman Mitch Fallis and others sent to the U.S. Department of Justice last year requesting an investigation into the Lorain Police Department.

The Justice Department launched an investigation into allegations of police brutality by Lorain police officers in November, and that investigation is ongoing.

Gilbert has said the letters aren’t threatening.

“Whoever wrote those letters didn’t commit any crime, but was being critical of the government,” he said. ..News Source.. by Brad Dicken The Chronicle-Telegram