The Morning Journal (Lorain, OH)
Drug dealer sentenced to 7 years in death
Michael D. Boyer said he was scared of being locked up for a crime he claims he did not commit, shortly before being sentenced to seven years in prison on March 12.
Boyer, 34, of Sheffield Lake, pleaded guilty Jan. 22 to an amended indictment, including charges of corrupting another with drugs, possessing criminal tools, trafficking in drugs and possessing drug abuse instruments after police say he sold the drugs which killed 23-year-old Shawn Radeff on June 12.
Boyer was visibly shaking and speaking in a barely audible voice as he asked Lorain County Common Pleas Judge Mark A. Betleski to withdraw the guilty plea.
He claimed that his attorney, Emmett R. Moran, had a conflict of interest in the case because he has been called on in the past to act as a judge in Avon Lake Municipal Court, where this case was originally introduced before being bound Kelly Radeff holds up a photo of herself with her son, Shawn Patrick Radeff, after his 2011 graduation from Avon Lake High School. Radeff died of an opioid overdose June 12, 2017, after purchasing narcotics from 34-year-old Michael D. Boyer of Sheffield Lake.
over to a Lorain County grand jury.
According to Boyer, Moran pushed him to plead guilty to the charges without doing any investigation on the case.
“Please allow me a chance for a fair trial,” Boyer said to Betleski.
Moran disagreed with
these claims, as did Lorain County Assistant Prosecutor Alan Rigas, and Betleski did not allow the plea to be vacated saying that it appeared Boyer was suffering from “buyer’s remorse” with the plea.
Before the sentence was handed down, Radeff’s parents addressed the court.
Kelly Radeff, the victim’s mother, highlighted the things her son won’t experience and the need to get the drug peddlers off the streets.
“My heart was forever broken,” she said. “He is loved and missed by so many. I have eight grandchildren and it is because Michael D. Boyer, 34, of Sheffield Lake, appears alongside his attorney, Emmett R. Moran, in front of Lorain County Common Pleas Court Judge Mark A. Betleski for sentencing on March 12. Boyer pleaded guilty to an amended indictment and was sentenced to seven in prison.
of them today.
“I know Shawn suffered from a disease and you are the drug dealer that gave him that fatal dose,” Kelly Radeff continued. “We need to battle this drug epidemic even if it means one at a time getting the drug dealers off the streets to protect the kids of our future and my grandchildren.”
Gregory Radeff, the victim’s father, only addressed Betleski, saying he wouldn’t speak to “that worthless
that I’m here
waste of skin.”
He said that he understood Betleski would not be sentencing Boyer to the maximum sentence because of a plea agreement, but he wasn’t happy about it.
“I never get to see my son, his nieces and nephews never get to see him, he has a great-niece that was born that never did get to see him,” Gregory Radeff said.
“As for that waste of human skin over there, I hope he pays in his mind for the rest of his life.”