Akron Jury Convicts Richard Beasley of Murdering Three Men Lured by a Fake Craigslist Farm-Job Ad
The jury deliberated about 12 hours. A week later it recommended death for the self-styled street preacher, whose teenage accomplice got life without parole.
Published
Three men who answered a fake Craigslist farm-job ad in 2011 were killed, and a fourth was shot. On March 12, 2013, an Akron jury convicted Richard Beasley of the murders and the attempted murder.
After about 12 hours of deliberation, the Summit County jury found Beasley, 53, a self-styled street preacher, guilty of the aggravated murders of David Pauley, 51, of Norfolk, Virginia; Ralph Geiger, 56, of Akron; and Timothy Kern, 47, of Massillon, Ohio, and of the attempted murder of Scott Davis, a South Carolina man who was shot in the arm and escaped. The jury convicted him on all remaining counts of a 27-count indictment, including kidnapping, aggravated robbery and identity fraud; in Kern's killing it found that he acted with prior calculation and design but was not the principal offender. Beasley, who used a wheelchair because of back problems, slumped as the verdicts were read.
Prosecutors called Beasley the triggerman in the plot, which he carried out with Brogan Rafferty, a high school student he mentored. Rafferty, 16 at the time of the crimes, had been tried as an adult and sentenced in November 2012 to life in prison without parole. On March 20 the same jury recommended death for Beasley; the trial court imposed three death sentences, and the Supreme Court of Ohio affirmed the convictions and sentences in 2018.
Reuters reported that Beasley was found guilty on all counts, while the Supreme Court of Ohio recorded that the judge had acquitted him of one grand-theft count before the case went to the jury.
Sources
- State v. Beasley, 153 Ohio St.3d 497, 2018-Ohio-493, Supreme Court of Ohio
- Former preacher found guilty in Ohio Craigslist murder case, NBC News (Reuters)
- Craigslist trial nets conviction, The Spokesman-Review (Associated Press)
- Jury Recommends Death For 'Craigslist Killer', WOSU