Case dropped in hiding of OD victim’s body
Franklin County prosecutors have dismissed charges against a woman accused of helping to hide the body of an overdose victim, based on a judge’s ruling that sheriff ’s detectives failed to advise her of her Miranda rights before she confessed to them.
Angela Nichols, 40, was indicted on felony charges of abuse of a corpse and tampering with evidence on April 27, 2018 — 11 days after she was questioned by two detectives at the Franklin County Sheriff ’s office.
She and her husband, Andrew J. Nichols, were brought in separately for questioning after the body of 20-yearold Hanna Geiger was found wrapped in trash bags and duct tape in the basement of a rental home where the couple had lived in the village of Harrisburg in southwestern Franklin County.
Andrew J. Nichols was convicted by a Franklin County Common Pleas Court jury of involuntary manslaughter, trafficking in cocaine, corrupting another with drugs, tampering with evidence and abuse of a corpse in February 2019. Judge David Young sentenced him to six years in prison.
Angela Nichols’ case had been in limbo since the time of her husband’s trial, when her legal counsel filed a motion to suppress the incriminating statements she made to detectives. The motion argued that the detectives failed to advise her of her Miranda rights — which include the right against self-incrimination and the right to a lawyer — before asking about her knowledge of or involvement in the crime.
Judge Young granted her motion in September 2019, ruling that everything after the 7:48 mark of her videotaped interview must be suppressed because, at that point, detectives began “a custodial interrogation of the defendant without first advising the defendant of her constitutional Miranda rights.”
Prosecutors appealed the decision to the 10th District (Franklin County) Court of Appeals, which found in November 2020 that the judge had failed to properly explain the factual basis for his ruling and ordered him to revisit the case and “adequately set forth findings of fact.”
Young complied with the appeals court last month, issuing a more detailed ruling that again suppressed the videotaped confession.
On Monday, the case against Angela Nichols was dismissed in a filing signed by Assistant Prosecutor David Zeyen, who wrote that the charges were being dropped because “the court suppressed necessary evidence.”
An autopsy determined that Geiger died of a drug overdose. Testimony during Andrew Nichols’ trial indicated that he supplied cocaine that Geiger self-injected before she had a seizure and stopped breathing. Rather than call 911, he hid the body in the basement of his rental home.
According to court filings, Angela Nichols told deputies that she returned home from a trip to California and learned from her husband about the overdose victim’s body in the basement. She said she helped him wrap up the body and cleaned the area around it.
Geiger, who had been reported missing from her Fayette County home in early March 2018, was in the basement for nearly six weeks before her body was discovered by the property’s landlord, investigators said. jfutty@dispatch.com @johnfutty