Mar 30, 2015 5 min read

Defense attorney Michael J. DeRiso has been practicing law for 20 years, but he said he has never witnessed such a strange chain of events surrounding the aggravated assault trial of Cameron Reihner, who was convicted by a jury in January 2014 in Washington County Court.

Questions about charges a district judge may have dismissed at Reihner’s preliminary hearing swirled around the beginning of the trial, and Reihner contends he was unaware this was an issue when he was being represented by defense attorney Peter Marcoline.

But, had Reihner known, DeRiso, who now represents Reihner, thinks the outcome of the case could have been much different.

Amid this backdrop, Judge John DiSalle sentenced Reihner, 24, of Washington, Monday to 8 ¾ to 17 ½ years in a state prison and ordered him to pay $17,103 toward the medical bills of Jonathan Irizarry, who was beaten with a baseball bat and continues to suffer from head and leg injuries.

The story begins with a late-night meal June 23, 2012, at Denny’s Restaurant on West Chestnut Street, Washington, and an argument among groups of people who did not know each other.

After the argument with brothers Jonathan and Steve Irizarry, Reihner and his friends were escorted from the restaurant. They then banged on a restaurant window and motioned for the Irizarrys to step outside. As they departed, Jonathan Irizarry’s wife tried to calm the situation. Jonathan Irizarry told the jurors after they had driven home to Houston, they discovered they were followed.

Steve Irizarry went after the car that followed them home, and all stopped in the parking lot of a West Pike Street business. Jonathan Irizarry said he joined his brother in the parking lot and was approached by Reihner, who was carrying an aluminum bat, and beaten. He said he suffered the loss of peripheral vision in his left eye, a broken nose, other facial fractures and a broken ankle, on which he wears a brace.

“I thought I was going to die,” Jonathan Irizarry testified at the trial.

A passing motorist called police. Reihner was linked to the crime through amateur sleuthing that led to identification of his photo on the social media site Facebook.

But this was no open-and-shut case, according to information that came to light months after the guilty verdict.

At a hearing in December of last year, DeRiso said Reihner learned after the fact that the defendant was tried on charges a magistrate had dismissed. District Judge David Mark Oct. 17, 2012, tossed the charges related to a confrontation alleged between Steven Irizarry and Reihner, ruling evidence was lacking.

DeRiso said Monday he did not know there was a transcript of discussion about these dismissed charges between Assistant District Attorney Michael Fagella and Marcoline. When he learned a record was made, “Mr. Reihner should have been present for that” discussion of what charges would set the stage for the jury trial, DeRiso maintains.

Reihner “did not consent, he did not assent. And no one had the authority to make that deal.”

DiSalle declined to grant Reihner a new trial based on the background information revealed at the December hearing, and sentencing proceeded Monday as scheduled.

Reihner declined to address the court at the sentencing, but his mother, Jennifer, read from a hand-written letter that her son is “being made out to be some type of monster” who has “never taken a street or illegal drug,” but is now on medication because of what took place at his trial.

The judge told Jennifer Reihner, a resident of Erie, that she was not present when the fight broke out. William Reihner, the father of the defendant, who was not present in court Monday, said in a phone conversation he did not want to see a similar situation happen to another family.

Cameron Reihner has already served 22 months in Washington County jail.

Assistant District Attorney John Friedmann said Jonathan Irizarry’s wife, Bobbie Jo, came to his office Monday to report her husband has no feeling on one side of his face, and one option remains to repair his leg injury. If that does not work, doctors may have to amputate. The victim is not able to work consistently, and he was unable to attend the trial to its conclusion because he suffered a seizure for which he had to be hospitalized.

Friedmann asked the judge to consider that “this was an escapade that took place in two different places.” He called Reihner the principal actor and said the attack on Jonathan Irizarry was unprovoked.

DiSalle told Cameron Reihner the defendant he could have avoided the confrontation at the Denny’s restaurant, but he instead drove to the Irizarrys’ home. He asked the state Department of Corrections to assess Reihner for alcohol and drug issues.

Reihner’s co-defendant, Troy L. Wilson, 23, pleaded guilty last year before DiSalle to one felony count of aggravated assault and was sentenced to 2 to 4 years in prison. At Wilson’s sentencing, the Irizarry brothers’ mother, Awilda Rivera, said Jonathan suffered terribly since the attack. She said he suffers from “post-traumatic stress disorder-related attacks,” limited vision in one eye and continued surgeries.

“I don’t think what was agreed to was enough,” Rivera said. “This has ruined a family.”

In addition to the prison sentence, DiSalle also ordered Wilson to pay $12,000 in restitution to the brothers, attend drug and alcohol counseling and undergo anger management counseling.