Fayette County man appeals conviction in 2006 murder of Greensboro girl
The Fayette County man sentenced to death for raping and murdering a 12-year-old Greensboro girl in June 2006 is asking a judge for a new trial or to be resentenced.
Jeffrey Robert Martin appeared Thursday morning at the Greene County Courthouse for a hearing on his appeal nearly 17 years after he strangled Gabrielle Miranda Beche and buried her body on a horse farm in Dunkard Township where he worked.
Jeffrey Robert Martin as shown in his state Department of Corrections booking photo
Martin, who is originally from New Geneva and now 65 years old, has been on death row since being convicted in May 2008 on all charges, including first-degree murder, rape, aggravated indecent assault and numerous other counts, following a six-day jury trial. The Greene County jury sentenced him to death the following day.
In his appeal through the state’s Post Conviction Relief Act, court-appointed attorney Thomas Farrell argued that Martin had ineffective counsel during the trial, penalty phase and subsequent appeals. The appeal also claims new DNA evidence techniques could prove Martin’s innocence, while also arguing that the death penalty is unconstitutional according to both federal and state laws.
The two-hour hearing was held before Senior Judge Thomas Ling, who will decide later whether Martin should receive a new trial or sentence. It was not known when he would issue an order.
Both Farrell and Deputy Attorney General Gregory Simatic, who represented the commonwealth during the hearing, declined to comment about the case.
Gabrielle Miranda Bechen, 12, was murdered by Jeffrey Robert Martin in June 2006.
Martin strangled Gabrielle on June 13, 2006, after she left her home on an all-terrain vehicle to visit the nearby Dunkard Township horse farm where Martin worked as a farmhand. Five days after Gabrielle went missing, volunteers looking for her during a coordinated search discovered her ATV buried under manure on the farm. They found her body buried nearby, and Martin confessed to killing her and using a backhoe to dig the grave, but he later recanted and blamed another man for the killing.
Martin is listed as a death row inmate at SCI-Phoenix state prison in Montgomery County, but he was being held at SCI-Greene near Waynesburg this week while appearing in court for his appeal Thursday.
The state Department of Corrections took the administrative step in 2016 of issuing a notice of execution for Martin, although then governor Tom Wolf declined to sign the death warrant as part of his moratorium on the death penalty. Gov. Josh Shapiro, who took office last month, has also announced that he plans to continue a moratorium on executions.
No inmate has been executed in Pennsylvania since July 6, 1999, when Gary Heidnik was put to death for murdering two women in his home. Just three people have been executed since the death penalty was reinstated in 1976.