Convicted murderer wants court review
A New Geneva man sentenced to death for the rape and murder of a 12-year-old Greensboro girl on a Dunkard Township horse farm nearly a decade ago filed a petition asking the federal court to review his conviction.
Jeffrey Robert Martin, 58, was convicted of raping and strangling Gabrielle Bechen on June 13, 2006, after she left her home on an all-terrain vehicle to visit the nearby farm where Martin worked as a farmhand.
Martin, who is being held in SCI-Graterford, filed a writ of habeas corpus Tuesday with the U.S. District Court for Western District in Pittsburgh. He asked the court to review his conviction and sentence on “any and all federal constitutional claims.” However, on the petition form he failed to state, as instructed, any grounds for his challenge.
Martin also filed a motion with the court asking to be declared indigent and for an attorney to be appointed to represent him. He indicated he received $14.20 to $21 a month in prison wages and currently has less than $20 in his prison account.
Martin used a backhoe to dig a grave, where he placed her body, and hid her all-terrain vehicle and belongings elsewhere on the farm. Searchers looked for Gabrielle for five days before finding the girl’s ATV buried in manure. That discovery led to Martin’s arrest and his eventual confession.
A Greene County jury found Martin guilty on all counts, including first-degree murder, rape and aggravated indecent assault, following a six-day trial in May 2008. During his trial, Martin took the stand to recant his confession and claimed another man was responsible for the girl’s death.
The day after his conviction, jurors took less than an hour to decide Martin should be put to death for the crime.
The state Supreme Court affirmed Martin’s conviction and sentence in September 2014.
On appeal, Martin had claimed there was insufficient evidence to support the jury’s guilty verdict on the charges of rape and sexual assault, which the jury then considered as aggravating circumstances in imposing the death sentence.
The state appellate court denied his application for re-argument in a two-sentence order issued last December.