SMETHPORT – Hearings on perjury charges against two women who
testified they heard Becky Lucrezi Olson say that she, and not
Timothy Williams, shot Kane Police Officer Steve Jerman were held
in two McKean County courts Monday.

Charges against Michele Nelson of Austin were bound over to the
Court of Common Pleas by Magisterial District Judge William Todd,
and she was released on her own recognizance.

Later Monday, defense attorney Sam Stretton and District
Attorney John Pavlock and Assistant District Attorney Christa
Schott argued Stretton’s motion that charges against Marian Kay
Nersinger, the first person to come forward saying Lucrezi Olson
had bragged about killing Jerman, should be dismissed.

Judge John Yoder did not immediately rule on that motion, but
took the matter under advisement; Nersinger’s trial is scheduled
for May 1.

Trooper Gary Stuckey, criminal investigator for the Pennsylvania
State Police at Lantz Corners, testified that he had spoken with
Nelson on the telephone May 8, 2004, after another witness had said
she might have some information, but that Nelson said then all she
knew were rumors.

The trooper testified that Nelson had said she had not heard
Lucrezi Olson say she had shot the cop, and that if she had “I’d
have knocked her on her ass.”

But, Stuckey testified, Nelson had apparently told an
investigator working for Stretton some different things in a later
interview.

When he talked to her that time, she said that her sister had
told her Lucrezi Olson said that “basically” Williams was taking
the blame for something Lucrezi Olson had done.

She also talked of a “brawl” near the BP station in Coudersport
during which Lucrezi Olson had said some incriminating things. When
the trooper asked her specifically if she had heard Lucrezi Olson
say she shot Jerman, Nelson answered “yes,” that it happened during
the “ruckus.”

Stuckey said that when he left that day, he asked Nelson if she
thought Williams was guilty, and she talked about the death of her
son, for which she was apparently under suspicion for a time, and
how that felt.

Under repeated questioning from Stretton, which at times drew
objections from Schott, Stuckey stated that he had never heard
Nelson say “I heard Becky say ‘I shot the cop.'”

Stuckey also pointed out that Stretton’s arguments seemed to be
a matter of semantics, but agreed with the defense attorney that
the “essence” of the criminal charge was that Nelson said on the
witness stand during an Oct. 22, 2004, hearing that Lucrezi Olson
had stated that she shot Jerman, but had never said that in his
presence before the hearing.

Stretton told the court the only evidence the prosecution had
was to use Nelson’s statement against her, and that there was no
corroborating evidence or testimony. He noted how much time had
passed between when things were supposed to have been said and the
interviews and then the hearing; “Let’s put it into perspective –
four years later she’s being asked her recollections …”

He also noted that for the offense of perjury, the accused must
have made a false statement and known it to be false.

He also noted that some of Stuckey’s testimony of what Nelson
had said in the first phone call came from things she may have said
“in a brief phone call,” during which she “was caught by surprise”
… and had “no frame of reference.”

Lucrezi Olson herself took the stand to say that she barely knew
Nelson and had never talked to her about the Williams case. She
also said that she had not hung out with any groups at Sheetz or
the BP station, where some of the statements were supposed to have
been made, and that she had not been involved in any brawl such as
had been mentioned.

“I never told anyone Tim was getting or taking the blame,” she
averred.

In her summation, Schott pointed out that Nelson had
“essentially told two stories,” saying first that she had not been
in the vicinity at Sheetz when Lucrezi Olson supposedly told
Nersinger she shot Jerman and that the story of the BP brawl came
late in the second story.

She also pointed out that Nelson apparently had close ties with
the Williams family, naming her son after Tim Williams and calling
the family “awesome,” and that she had apparent animosity for
Lucrezi Olson.

Nersinger was in the Court of Common Pleas later in the
afternoon for a combined pre-trial conference and hearing on
Stretton’s motion to dismiss perjury charges against her.

At that hearing, Stretton expressed concern about the publicity
the matter has received and over whether an impartial jury can be
found.

There was apparent agreement among Stretton, Pavlock and Yoder
that close questioning of prospective jurors might avoid having to
bring in an outside jury.

Stretton requested that Nelson and Nersinger be tried together,
but Pavlock objected to a combined trial, saying that there would
be massive confusion among the jury.

The two cases are not based on the same issues, he said, and the
jury would be confused by hearing differing statements of who said
what and when.

One big issue in the Nersinger case is that Senior Judge Charles
Alexander had said in an earlier opinion that he believed Lucrezi
Olson said that she shot Jerman; the defense contends that is
reason enough to dismiss charges against Nersinger.

Pavlock and Schott argue that even if Lucrezi Olson did say that
to some person at some time, Alexander gave no clue to who that
might have been.

The issue, they contend, is whether Lucrezi Olson said that to
Nersinger at Sheetz in Coudersport, as Nersinger testified in
court.

Yoder will have to decide whether the case should go on trial as
scheduled May 1, and whether Nelson should be tried separately or
at the same time.

Jerman, 46, was killed by a single gunshot wound to the chest on
Feb. 20, 1999. Williams was found guilty of third-degree murder,
recklessly endangering another person and carrying a firearm
without a license later that year by a Mifflin County jury.

Williams, 26, is currently serving a 22-40-year sentence in
state prison.