VOSBERG, Doris Jane

WAVERLY — Former Pike County Sheriff C harles Reader — who stood tall and proud while in the glare of an international spotlight five years ago after a family of eight was murdered in his county — stood slumped over before a judge and sobbed as he begged for mercy.

Appointed visiting Judge Patricia Cosgrove, after a soliloquy about how much Reader had failed his profession, community and family, sentenced him to six years in prison on felony charges and six months in the county jail on a misdemeanor. As some of the sentences will run concurrently, Reader will serve a total of three years.

Reader had pleaded guilty to stealing money seized from arrests and then covering it up.

Cosgrove, who retired from the Summit County Court of Common Pleas in Akron, capped a remarkable and swift fall from grace for Reader, who wore the highest-ranking badge in county law enforcement.

Reader, sobbing and leaning on the podium, said he wanted to see his son graduate from high school, attend his daughter’s wedding, and be the husband he has never been to his wife, Ramona. And he apologized for shaming the badge, hurting his family and abusing the trust of his community.

“Your honor, please don’t send me to prison,” he said through sniffles and tears, his face haggard and fire red. “I have wronged, but I am not ruined. I still have a lot of good left in me. Cosgrove was unswayed. When she asked him why he took the money, he said it wasn’t for gambling, as prosecutors contend. Reader said he took the money from drug dealers (he pleaded guilty to taking money from evidence seized in arrests) and used it for charity — to plant memorial trees, to pay for his cruisers to be washed at school car washes and the like.

Reader, 47, said he always replaced the cash in due time.

“There are no words for the regret I have,” he said through sobs.

But the judge, who noted for him that she has a long record of sentencing public officials to prison, also pointed out that he pleaded guilty in September to two counts of theft in office (fourth-degree felonies), two counts of tampering with evidence (third-degree felonies), and one count of conflict of interest (first-degree misdemeanor).

Security at the courthouse Wednesday was like no one in Waverly had ever seen. Most of the block around the courthouse was cordoned off with police tape, and bomb-sniffing dogs were checking bags. Dozens of law enforcement officials blocked surrounding streets, prowled the courthouse hallways, staged on the sidewalks and stood at post in nearby parking lots.

Officials said the extra security — 60 officers in total, including from the U.S. Marshals Service — was the call of current Sheriff Tracy Evans to ensure nothing went wrong.

‘Lengthy’ sentence

Before the hearing, prosecutors filed paperwork with the court asking for a “lengthy” prison sentence.

“His sworn duty was to enforce the law and, instead, he repeatedly broke the law,” wrote Robert Smith, the assistant chief legal counsel for Ohio Auditor Keith Faber’s office, which prosecuted the case.”The defendant has, through his criminal conduct, done everything in his power to undermine public support for law enforcement.”

Again, though, Cosgrove didn’t hold back as she unloaded on the former sheriff and his excuses.

“You choose to be in this profession, “she told Reader.

“Your honor, please don’t send me to prison,” former Pike County Sheriff Charles Reader said through sniffles and tears to Judge Patricia Cosgrove. “I have wronged, but I am not ruined. I still have a lot of good left in me.” Cosgrove told Reader, “it cannot be underestimated, the damage you have caused to the citizens of Pike County.”

Despite Pike County Sheriff deputies denying his request, Charles Reader Jr. embraces his father, Charles Reader, moments after he is sentenced to prison Wednesday in Waverly.

“We see horrible things. Horrible things ... We all choose our profession, and we have to conduct ourselves with integrity. You did your job but you neglected your family. You didn’t reach out for help when you should have.”

And she told him he has disgraced the badge.

“It cannot be underestimated, the damage you have caused to the citizens of Pike County .... And to law enforcement. The sacrifices these men and women make, I think you’ve made a mockery of them.”

“His work consumed him and left him in a precarious mental state,” defense attorney James Boulger said by way of explanation. “The wheels came off.”

Various accounts in pre-sentencing paperwork Boulger filed suggest Reader suffers from paranoia and flashbacks and night terrors from investigating the gruesome and brutal Rhoden case.

Originally indicted in June 2019, Reader had faced 18 counts in all, including a first-degree felony charge of engaging in a pattern of corrupt activity. The remaining 15 counts were dismissed with his guilty plea.

Anonymous complaint

The case against Reader all started with an anonymous complaint filed with the state in November 2018. The allegations originally included taking loans from employees and at least one man who was a vendor with the county; tampering with evidence envelopes that contained cash seized from drug arrests and then not being forthcoming to investigators about doing so when they raided his office in December 2018; and that he improperly facilitated transfers and auction sales of vehicles impounded by his office.

Reader’s downfall was swift and public, with much of the previous paperwork filed by the state outlining a gambling addiction and marital troubles.

Reader is accused of taking money from the office to fund a growing gambling habit. Records filed by the state show his losses at Eldorado Scioto Downs in Columbus at $595.37 in 2016; $5,526.96 in 2017; and $11,033.54 in 2018. The state also says Reader withdrew more than $2,800 from machines on the floor of the Atlantis Casino in Reno,

Nevada, while attending a national sheriff ’s conference in June 2017.

He does not owe that much money in restitution, however, as the state says Reader took $14,475 from evidence bags but eventually replaced most of it. His total restitution owed is $4,850, which includes $1,000 for cash taken and then money made on improper vehicle transfers he facilitated.

After the sentencing, Faber, the state auditor, said in a statement that Reader was entrusted to enforce the law and instead “literally gambled it away.”

“His choices do not diminish the dedication of the thousands of law enforcement across Ohio that willingly sacrifice, serve, and protect us every day — these men and women deserve our utmost respect,” he wrote.

Four people spoke in court Wednesday on Reader’s behalf, and more than two dozen letters of support from community members, former coaches and people he mentored that were filed with the court cast him in a far different light.

The letters describe a man with a big heart who was tortured by what he had seen, who let the pressures of his job and the constant fear that his family was in danger because of his office’s high-profile cases consume him.

“We could see that we were losing Charlie the way he always was,” his mother, Brenda Erb, wrote to the court. “He was so stressed out you couldn’t even talk to him … He was determined that he would find the murderers who massacred that family if it took everything he had.”

Some of the letters of support for the man known as “the People’s sheriff ” did address Reader’s crimes.

“Charlie has made mistakes. Who hasn’t?” the Rev. George M. Whitley wrote. “But I believe the good he has done in Pike Co. should be considered.”

He said he has counseled Reader the past couple of years.

“I know things have taken a toll on his life and health,” he said. “In my opinion it would not serve justice for him to go to prison.”

And the Rev. Kathryn Elliott, Reader’s former highschool choir teacher, called

Reader a man of integrity and faith. Of the gambling problem, she wrote, “Punishing an addict for their addition can often make matters worse.”

Reader was appointed as sheriff in Pike County, in southern Ohio, in May 2015 and began serving his first full-term in 2016.

Rhoden family killings

It was April 22, 2016, when eight members of the Rhoden family were found shot to death — most while sleeping — in four locations on three properties in rural Pike County. It wasn’t until November 2018 that another local family was arrested and charged with the killings. Four members of the Wagner family have been in jail since and await trial. They are eligible for the death penalty if convicted.

Although the Ohio attorney general’s Bureau of Investigation led the investigation, Reader never stopped being a public face of the case until his office was raided a few weeks after the Wagner arrests.

When first indicted on these charges, Reader vowed to fight them and not give up his post but then agreed to a voluntary suspension in July 2019.

Even as the case dragged on, however, he tried to run for a second term in office. He failed, though, to gather enough proper signatures to get on the ballot.

Now, with a felony conviction, he can never be a law enforcement officer or hold public office in Ohio again.

Reader still has an ethics charge pending filed by the state in Franklin County Municipal Court related to this case.

At the end of Wednesday’s hearing, Reader turned to his devastated family in the gallery. He asked a deputy if he could hug his kids. The deputy said no. But Reader’s teenage son, his hands covering his tear-streaked face, leaned in and got one anyway.

Then deputies led Reader from the courtroom. A few seconds later, a cadre of law enforcement officers led him through the courthouse’s back door, and to a waiting SUV. The shackles that held the former sheriff ’s legs and hands clanked with every step he took down the concrete walk.

Doris Jane Vosberg, age 87 of

Fairfield, passed away on

Sunday, March 21, 2021. Doris was born in Seven Mile, Ohio, on January 30, 1934, to Rufus

Mann and Hilda Samonds

Mann. Doris was a lifelong member of Immanuel Lutheran

Church, Hamilton Ohio. Doris is survived by her children,

Richard J. (Joyce) Vosberg, Carl

E. (Tami) Vosberg, Thomas C.

(Lori) Vosberg and Gloria J. (Joel) Shaw; grandchildren, Ashley N. (Josh) Perry, Brittany A. (Shawn) Turner, Brandon M. Bishop, Christopher A. Vosberg, Carly M. Vosberg and Aurora A. Shaw; great grandchildren, Alexis M. and Weslee T. Turner Peyton G., Channing A. and Braxton W. Perry; brother, Donald (Glenna) Mann; daughter-in-law, Reathal Vosberg. Doris was preceded in death by her parents, Rufus and Hilda Mann; husband, James Virgil Vosberg, Sr.; son, James Virgil Vosberg, Jr.; sisters and best friends, Laura Mann and Mildred Mann. Visitation will be held on Saturday, March 27, 2021, from 10:00 AM to 11:00 AM at Brown Dawson Flick Funeral Home, 1350 Millville Ave., Hamilton, Ohio. Funeral service will be held at Brown Dawson Flick Funeral Home, on Saturday, March 27, 2021, at 11:00 AM with Pastor Kevin Jud officiating. Burial will follow at Rose Hill Burial Park. The family would like to thank nurse Lisa at Majestic Care, Fairfield for being such a bright light at the end of Doris’s life. Memorial contributions can be made to Hospice of Cincinnati. Condolences may be made at browndawsonflick.com.