Ohio Prosecutor Fired for Misconduct

"Cuyahoga County prosecutor fired after posing as an accused killer's girlfriend on Facebook to try to get alibi witnesses to change their testimony," is James F. McCarty's report in the Cleveland Plain Dealer.

A Cuyahoga County prosecutor was fired this week after he admitted posing as a woman in a Facebook chat with an accused killer’s alibi witnesses in an attempt to persuade them to change their testimony.

Former Assistant County Prosecutor Aaron Brockler insisted in an interview at his Lakewood home Thursday that he had done nothing wrong and shouldn’t have been fired.

"Law enforcement, including prosecutors, have long engaged in the practice of using a ruse to obtain the truth," said Brockler, 35, a county prosecutor since 2006. "I think the public is better off for what I did."

County Prosecutor Timothy J. McGinty said he fired Brockler for good cause.

"This office does not condone and will not tolerate such unethical behavior," McGinty said. "He disgraced this office and everyone who works here."

McGinty continued: "By creating false evidence, lying to witnesses as well as another prosecutor, Aaron Brockler has damaged the prosecution’s chances in a murder case where a totally innocent man was killed at his work."

Brockler was the lead prosecutor in the aggravated murder case of Damon Dunn, 29, of Cleveland, who was scheduled to stand trial for the shooting death of Kenneth "Blue" Adams on May 18, 2012, at an East Side car wash.

Related posts are in the prosecutorial misconduct category index.