The man charged with killing Barbara Bruzda will be in court today for a status conference one month after the State Supreme Court denied an appeal in the case.
The status conference will be for 75-year-old Ronald Weiss, who is charged with first degree murder in the death of Bruzda in March of 1978. She was found dead five months after she was last seen playing pool in the bar her father owned. Weiss was found guilty in 1997, after a state law had changed and allowed spouses to testify against each other. His then-common law wife testified against him, as did two prison inmates who said Weiss admitted killing Bruzda. But in 2018, federal judge Mark Hornack struck down the conviction based on a ruling that a deputy attorney general and a state trooper had lied about promising special treatment to the two prison inmates in exchange for their testimony. Weiss was released but immediately arrested and the charges re-filed, with Indiana County President Judge Thomas Bianco subsequently ruling that the murder and the prosecutorial misconduct were separate issues.
A recent appeal by Weiss to the state supreme court was rejected without comment back in April.
A status conference is also scheduled today for Joshua Brink of Smicksburg, who is charged in connection with a fatal crash in West Mahoning Township in August of 2021. He faces charges homicide by vehicle while DUI and related crimes for a crash that took the life of 52-year-old Douglas Dalessio as he was mowing grass on a lawn tractor when Brink’s vehicle allegedly went off the road.
Also due for a status conference today is Summer Settlemeyer of Johnstown, who is charged with criminal homicide, kidnapping and other crimes related to the kidnapping and killing of 19-year-old Hayden Robert Gareffa of West Wheatfield Township. She was one of seven charged in connection with the crime, with most of the people from Johnstown, and one person from Indiana.
Comments