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Supreme Court Won't Hear Indiana Death Sentence Appeal

The U.S. Supreme Court won’t take the case of an Indiana man convicted of murder who says his lawyers weren’t good enough.

Jeffrey Weisheit was sentenced to death in 2013 for murdering two children in a fire he set. Weisheit appealed – he argued his lawyers did not provide him adequate counsel. For example, he says his attorneys didn’t work hard enough to get mental health records or call certain expert witnesses to help mitigate his sentence.

And the Indiana Supreme Court ruled in 2017 that while Weisheit’s attorneys could have done a better job defending him, their issues were not egregious enough that the conviction or sentence should be overturned.

Weisheit took his appeal as high as he could – to the U.S. Supreme Court. But the nation’s high court won’t hear his case. That means the Evansville man’s conviction – and death sentence – are now final.

Brandon Smith is excited to be working for public radio in Indiana. He has previously worked in public radio as a reporter and anchor in mid-Missouri for KBIA Radio out of Columbia. Prior to that, he worked for WSPY Radio in Plano, Illinois as a show host, reporter, producer and anchor. His first job in radio was in another state capitol, in Jefferson City, Missouri, as a reporter for three radio stations around Missouri. Brandon graduated from the University of Missouri-Columbia with a Bachelor of Journalism in 2010, with minors in political science and history. He was born and raised in Chicago.