Special counsel for DA asks for delay in responding to Supreme Court petition
Walsh facing challenge to his ability to pursue the death penalty
Mike Jones/Observer-Reporter
The special counsel for Washington County District Attorney Jason Walsh has asked for a delay in submitting a response to a Philadelphia group’s petition asking the state Supreme Court to restrict his ability to pursue the death penalty against defendants facing homicide charges.
Lancaster County attorney Joshua Voss – who along with Chester County-based attorney Shohin Vance were hired last week to serve as special counsel for Walsh – filed the application for delay Tuesday and will now have until Aug. 22 to respond.
Voss wrote in the application that they were “only recently retained and would benefit from additional time to fully understand the facts and circumstances undergirding” the petition. He added that due to “the unprecedented nature of the relief that is sought, this action may garner interest” from other parties filing as friends of the court.
“A modest extension will allow potential amici (friends of the court) additional time to develop arguments that may assist this Court in disposing of this matter,” Voss wrote in the application.
The delay comes four days after the Washington County commissioners held an emergency meeting Friday afternoon to hire the special counsel at a rate of $480 per hour, although most of it is expected to be covered by the county’s insurance. The special meeting, which was not publicly advertised, was hastily called about 24 hours before it was held in order to give the special counsel the entire weekend to formulate a response.
However, the delay now raises questions about the necessity for holding an emergency meeting rather than properly advertising it and scheduling it for earlier this week, given the delay. Only two residents attended Friday afternoon’s meeting, both of whom spoke out against hiring a special counselor. The meeting lasted less than five minutes and ended when Commissioners Nick Sherman, Electra Janis and Larry Maggi voted unanimously to hire the special counsel to represent Walsh.
Sherman, who is chairman of the board of commissioners, said they had to take action at the emergency meeting ahead of Tuesday’s deadline since they did not know how the attorneys would handle the situation.
“It’s something we couldn’t have predicted,” Sherman said of the delay. “There was an issue we had at the time, but they changed it on us (with the delay). At the end of the day, no harm, no foul.”
In an interview before Friday’s meeting, Walsh said he had already written the response to the petition, but thought it would be better to have an independent attorney represent him in the case. He also said at the time he thought the special counsel would ask for a delay.
The special counsel was hired to represent Walsh after the Atlantic Center for Capital Representation in Philadelphia filed the petition July 22 asking the high court to put restrictions on the district attorney’s ability to pursue the death penalty over claims he’s used it for political purposes and leverage over defendants. Walsh has indicated his intent to seek the death penalty against nearly a dozen defendants since he was elevated to the top prosecutor position following the death of former district attorney Gene Vittone in August 2021. Walsh won election to a full term two years later in November 2023.
The Atlantic Center is representing defendants Jordan Clarke of Peters Township and Joshua George of Smith Township, both of whom are facing the death penalty if convicted of first-degree murder in the separate cases involving the deaths of their infant sons.
Three days after the petition was filed on July 22, Washington County Coroner Timothy Warco signed a sworn-affidavit claiming he was coerced by Walsh into ruling that Clarke’s son, Sawyer, died by homicide in May 2022, prompting him to file a fraudulent death certificate with the state. That affidavit was included in the petition on July 29 in order to add to the Atlantic Center’s record.
In response, attorney Steve Toprani, who served as the coroner’s solicitor from 2013 until resigning in October 2023 after the two disagreed over the use of inquests, authored his own sworn affidavit Saturday disputing Warco’s claims. Toprani’s affidavit is expected to be included in the special counsel’s response, which is now due by Aug. 22.
It’s not known when the state Supreme Court will rule on the matter. George is set to go to trial later this fall, while the defense attorneys for Clarke indicated last week they plan to file a motion to dismiss due to the extraordinary circumstances surrounding Sawyer’s death certificate.