Fitzpatrick takes plea bargain, names two others in mining related theft at ICG mines.

With a panel of 20 jurors ready to sit judgment on his case, a Boone County man decided instead to plead guilty to the felony crime of Conspiracy related to his involvement in the theft of mine equipment from the International Coal Group (“ICG”) mines located near Erbacon.

Martin Dale Fitzpatrick, age 48, of Seth in Boone County, was scheduled for a jury trial on September 18, 2007, and he was facing three felony charges, including Conspiracy, Grand Larceny, and Breaking and Entering. After 20 jurors had been selected to try his case, Judge Jack Alsop excused the jury from the courtroom as Fitzpatrick announced through his attorney, Dennis Willet, of Buckhannon, that he would plead guilty to one of the charges rather than face the possibility that the jury would convict him of all three charges.

While the jury waited outside the courtroom, Fitzpatrick entered his guilty plea to the felony Conspiracy charge. The charges related to the July 22, 2005 theft of approximately $8,000.00 in mine equipment from ICG.

During the plea proceeding, Assistant Prosecutor Jeffrey Hall summarized the State’s evidence against Fitzpatrick. Hall told Judge Alsop that a concerned citizen observed a white Mazda Sport Utility Vehicle (“SUV”) traveling back and forth in a suspicious manner around the ICG mine site, and the citizen followed the vehicle and recorded the vehicle’s license plate number.

That concerned citizen reported his suspicions and the license plate number to an employee of ICG, who in turn confirmed that ICG had in fact been the victim of a breaking and entering of a storage building and that certain mine equipment was missing. The ICG employee then reported the theft and license plate number to State Police Trooper Bryan Garretson.

Trooper Garretson ran the plate number through the State Police dispatch in Elkins, and was informed that the plate was registered to a Martin Dale Fitzpatrick of Seth, West Virginia. Although Garreston could not initially track down Fitzpatrick, the Trooper did locate him about a year later, and in April of 2006 took a verbal statement from Fitzpatrick. According to that statement, Fitzpatrick confessed that he was the driver of the white SUV and had two other male subjects with him that did the actual breaking and entering and theft of the equipment.

As part of the plea agreement, Fitzpatrick is required to name the other individuals who were with him on July 22, 2005 when the theft occurred. After the plea hearing ended, Assistant Prosecutor Hall stated that Fitzpatrick gave a statement to Trooper Garretson that included the names of those other individuals involved. Those two individuals are now being sought for questioning as persons of interest in the crimes.

Fitzpatrick will be sentenced by Judge Alsop on November 5, 2007. He faces a prison sentence of not less than one year but not more than five years. Fitzpatrick is also currently serving time on parole related to his 2005 felony convictions from Pocahontas County for Breaking and Entering and Grand Larceny.