http://www.charlestoncitypaper.com/gyrobase/Content?oid=oid%3A8749

 [ send green star]

I decided to google Paul's case and found this document:  Titled:  United States Court of Appeals, #95-6996.

http://pacer.ca4.uscourts.gov/opinion.pdf/956996.P.pdf

It is a rather long document but I think it should be reviewed.

BJ

 [ send green star]

that was interesting reading.  I'm sorry to say, probably because of Paul's activities..he is not going to see accountability from the justice system.  They more than likely wanted him in jail anyways...but right is right..wrong is wrong.

I wish him luck.

Phyllis

 [ send green star]

I got the net message from you today.  First off I want you to know that I was never implying that you were dishonest.

I know you have the one article posted, but maybe if you posted more than one article, gathering facts for people to review the facts, it might help your cause.

Just a suggestion.

BJ 

 [ send green star]

Paul someone suggested that you post a rebuttle for the accusations the prosecution raised during your trial and appeal. I think that would be a great idea!!

BJ thank you for posting that information! It gives Paul an opportunity to explain himself and get the truth out.

 [ send green star]

Thanks JoJo,

I am glad to have read this.  Had not seen it on the homepage, so thank you so much for printing it here.

WHY DID HE DENY THE LETTER?  THIS GETS MORE INTERESTING THE MORE I LEARN. 

THE JUSTICE SYSTEM IS NOT GOING TO ADMIT WRONG DOING, UNTIL THEY ARE FORCED TO.

PHYLLIS

 [ send green star]

Jo

I really feel like if anyone would read everything that is out here, they would relies that sometime is rotten here. You know about paul, he has been a thief, ran girly clubs and is really in most peoples eyes a piece of crap. and the truth is they are right. But what Paul Mazzell is not, is a killer and that is what he was convicted of. Like him or Hate him. he killed no one and a person sworned to uphole the law conspired to take his life, knowing he was innocent of the charge of murder. People are just people, some smart and then some like me, not so smart. I understand and its their right to believe and think what they want, you will never change them. and that's their right as an American. Someday they will know the truth and will still feel the same. Paul Mazzell

 [ send green star]

Hi, Paul!

     First of all, I want you to know that my husband and I are behind you 100% and will fight tirelessly, in whatever way we are able, to see that the wrong that was done to you is finally righted.  Make no mistake about that--ever--because we are committed to that, OK?

     Secondly, I am concerned that you keep putting yourself down for things you have done in the past.  Everybody has a past...and out of curiosity, who is Paul today?  Could you tell us, in your own words, who is that man that we're fighting for--the man that his children and grandchildren look up to--who is he now?

     I think that if these people that are coming after you knew who you were today and what you went through all those years in jail, wrongly convicted, just to get where you are today, that they might have a better understanding and maybe they'd change their minds and side with you!  Help them to understand you, Paul.

     In your own words, who is Paul today? 

 [ send green star]

Please sign my petition:

http://www.thepetitionsite.com/takeaction/485311112

If you believe, this person is incorrect.

 [ send green star]

Paul...

I understand how discouarging you must get at times... but you have come a very long way from those days and should not give up hope...

Cynde had a great idea about you telling people who you are now instead of focussing on who you were back then.  We all have pasts and some of us have made many mistakes in our lives. That does not mean we are the same people now as we were back then.... we all grow and most of us try to learn as from our mistakes... As I tuly believe you have!

Also as far as people posting the articles that only show the state's case, not in your favor. I encourage that and  encourage you to write a rebuttle for people to look at both sides in their entirety so that they make informed decision and you would receive much more support from people.

It is not that people do not care, nor wish to help, but most will not put themselves and reputations on the line without viable facts. 

Though I believe in you and your innocense on the murder charge, there is very little I can do to help, if you can not supply us with a complete rebuttle to the state's case and any other types of documentation, like from your lawyers that would help us to inform others that just need more than what you are putting out there now..

I would really like to be able to help Paul... I hope you will give that some consideration.

Love, Light & Hope

~Barb~

 [ send green star]

Barb,

I am not sure of what I can do, if the letters from the murder victims brother, a former law enforcement officer, the statement from L.G. Faircloth a retired SLED agent, and other law enforcement officers who have spent years trying to get a simple investigation, along with the news paper articals and the mear fact I have been begging the police to looking into this. why would I want the police to get involved if I had anything to hide? Why would these other people get involved if they did not believe I was innocent of murder? Why would I openly state in the A.P. and local news papers the Charlie Condon conspired to put an innocent man to death?. "Innocent of Murder" and then have no one deny this, why? If this doesn't show there is something rotten going in South Carolina, then I just don't know how to convince you.

You want to know about the Paul Mazzell of today. I am 78 years old, bad health and live with my sister, who is 80 years old. I live on S.S. and I pay the state $50.00 a month for my parole officer or who ever. I don't have a car and have to depend on someone to carry me to the doctors or the store. This is Paul Mazzell today. I am free and I am still trying to prove my innocences. that it.

 [ send green star]

I believe you and the evidence that I have read certainly has merit.  However, plenty of people say they are innocent...when they are NOT.  Some do it as a ploy to grind the wheels to a halt...slow down punishment...convictions, etc. 

Perhaps in your case it's a little different, but the bottom line is this...you have to keep pushing buttons.  Just because you ask for this, does not mean that everyone in S.C. is going to drop what they are doing.  Because you are not the only one in SC asking for the same things in others cases.  You are not the only one to write the Lt. Gov and not get a response.  It happens all the time.  Also, it takes time for them to respond.

I guess what I am trying to say is..perservere...don't give up, but don't expect immediate response.  It is going to take time my friend.

 [ send green star]

BY BRETT BURSEY

Two years ago, POINT sent Condon's office a request for an interview. The response: "This office always cooperates with members of the legitimate media. The attorney general is declining your request... We know that the tiresomely liberal staff of POINT disagrees with him on many issues, such as maintaining the noble tradition of The Citadel and ensuring the rights of infants not to be born addicted to crack cocaine. POINT's monthly yowling notwithstanding, the attorney general is doing the job the people of South Carolina elected him to do. And he believes that while he represents the majority of South Carolinians, your publication does not."

Condon is not just inaccessible to POINT, he is notoriously unavailable to the "legitimate" media other than through staged events. His colleagues say he is generally aloof, and is seldom in his Columbia office. He works either out of his million-dollar home on Sullivan's Island or in an office rented from the city of Charleston that isn't listed in the state directory.

The most the author got from Condon directly was a brief handshake (no smile, fleeting eye contact) as the candidate emerged from filming a campaign commercial.

While Condon's voice, regrettably, is absent from this profile, his record speaks for itself. And the stories family members, colleagues and former political opponents tell about Condon reveal a man driven to make it to the top, at all cost.

On a brilliant fall morning recently, Attorney General Charlie Condon rose to the podium on the south side of the State House and provided the perfect picture of the man and his politics. Supported by a choir, a band, the governor and an audience inflated by members of his staff -- who were sent a memo encouraging them to attend -- Condon pronounced October "Domestic Violence Awareness Month" and testified to his commitment to supporting the victims by standing tough on criminals.

What makes this picture of Condon so revealing is its other side. Like a surreal mirror image, another rally against domestic violence was taking place on the other side of the State House.

The event had no choir, no band, no governor. It was sponsored by a coalition of some 30 South Carolina groups that work with battered women. They had been invited to be props in Condon's show but were not offered a meaningful role, according to Susan Higginbotham, director of the South Carolina Coalition Against Domestic Violence And Sexual Assault (SCCADVASA).

"In other states, the attorney general doesn't have his own event; he joins the advocacy groups in theirs," Higginbotham said. "We wanted to have a solemn event, not participate in someone's political campaign."

Condon doesn't have a working relationship with the members of the coalition, and often even works against them in the legislature. During the last legislative session, for instance, he called for chemical castration of repeat sexual offenders. SCCADVASA and other victims' advocates oppose chemical castration, saying it is a political gimmick.

"The issue is violence, not sex," Higginbotham said. "Chemical castration is not a cure, and may make offenders more violent."

Although Condon placed Higginbotham on a review committee to satisfy a federal grant requirement, she said he has never sought her advice on policy matters and has never acknowledged her letters offering to help shape productive legislation.

"His true interest," Higginbotham said, "is in getting a good clip for the evening news."

Bill Runyon,
Charleston lawyer

Condon grew up in Charleston the third of nine children. His father, Joe Condon, was the youngest of three brothers who ran Condon's Department Store. Condon's Catholic-Irish great-grandfather started the family business as a dry goods store in 1896.

Charlie Condon's younger brother Danny said that working in the store is a rite of passage for the Condon kids. "Charlie worked here in high school and summers in college," he said. He described his brother as having always been "driven."

Condon attended Catholic schools from kindergarten through college. A contemporary at Bishop England High School remembered him as cut-throat, even then. "Charlie was the kind of kid that would take his brothers' friends in a second."

Condon graduated magna cum laude from Notre Dame in 1975, and received a law degree from Duke in 1978. He met Emily Yarborough at Duke, where she was in medical school. The two married and have four children.

Condon worked for a year with a Columbia law firm before being hired as assista  [ send green star]

Condon worked for a year with a Columbia law firm before being hired as assistant solicitor for the Ninth Circuit in 1980.

A few months later, Condon was running for solicitor. Capers Barr, who had been the solicitor for four years, was retiring, and Robert Rosen, an influential Broad Street lawyer and Democratic Party power broker, chose Condon to be Barr's successor.

Condon was a Democrat with a good Charleston family background and a fine education. He was an attractive candidate, but there was one problem: Condon was against the death penalty. Prevailing wisdom said that you couldn't get elected solicitor if you wouldn't execute people.

Attorney General Charlie Condon and Gov. David Beasley appear at a rally commemorating Domestic Violence Month, where they vow to stand tough on crime.

Attorney Bill Regan remembers that Rosen was selected to talk to Condon about the political necessity of changing his stance.

"Robert called and said, `I've been talking to this damned Charlie Condon for six hours about the death penalty, and the nuns have him so scared of going to hell he's crazy."

Condon agreed to change his position on the death penalty, won the Democratic primary, and became the youngest solicitor in South Carolina history.

At times, there are more lawyers than tourists in the Holy City. There are 38 pages of lawyers listed in the Charleston phone book, and it's still hard to find one that has much good to say about Attorney General Condon.

Comments ranged from "He's a son of a bitch" to "I'd rather not comment." Many were wary of speaking on the record. As one lawyer put it, "If I make unkind remarks about Charlie, the files of the lawyers I represent before him would go to the top of the stack."

Condon, apparently, has never been popular with his colleagues. When he ran for attorney general in 1994, only a handful of his former employees supported him.

The scene of the last day in office is revealing. "Normally, all the office doors were open," said an attorney who worked for Condon. "On the day Charlie left, all the doors were closed. No one offered to help [him move]. People were relieved he was leaving."

Bill Runyon was Condon's Democratic opposition in the 1980 solicitor's race. "Charlie had no practical experience," Runyon said, "and rather than want competent people who could make him look good, he saw them as a threat."

Condon has stepped on a few toes and a good number of necks in his rise to the top. The following stories offer a glimpse of how he plays in his own hometown.

Condon hadn't been solicitor long when, in a move that earned him the enmity of much of the Charleston legal community, he fired Assistant Solicitor Andy Savage.

"Andy was twice as good as Charlie," remembered Charleston lawyer Edward Pritchard. "Charlie was the pretend solicitor, and the police would insist on dealing with Andy. Charlie didn't like being upstaged."

Condon fired Savage a few weeks before Savage's wife died of leukemia. Nearly 20 years later, the incident still angers Pritchard. "Andy had come back to Charleston so his wife could die at home," he said. "When Charlie fired him, Andy lost his income and medical benefits for his wife. Condon's got as much business talking about family values as Jack the Ripper."

Runyon said, "Charlie wouldn't even let people off to go to Andy's wife's funeral."

In 1981, Condon further alienated the very people who put him in office when he started a pattern of staging press conferences that appeared self-promotional.

He used a series of them to attack district court Judge Klyde Robinson.

Runyon said, "The feds had busted Sheriff [James] Rogers of Berkeley County for bribery, and had a wire tap where the sheriff was bragging about his connections. Rogers bragged about giving the judge a slot machine. There were never any concerns that Judge Robinson was involved in anything improper other than having a slot machine in his beach house as a conversation piece."

Although the judge gave the slot machine to the FBI and was not being investigated by the feds, Condon held a press conference to announce he was investigating the judge.

"Charlie milked it for months of publicity," said Rob Wendt, a Charleston attorney and Robinson's law clerk at the time. "One day Judge Robinson stormed into Charlie's office and demanded, `Indict me or tell the public you're not going to.' And Condon let the issue die."

Wendt said, "Judge Robinson was a Harvard law grad, former U.S. attorney and one of our better judges, and Charlie drove him off the bench to get some publicity."

Judge Robinson did not seek reappointment after the incident.

Condon scored another big media hit in 1988 at the expense of longtime colleague Allen Badger, the deputy solicitor in charge of drug prosecutions. She had worked for Condon for more than six years.

The story involved "Big Head" Reynolds, who had a prior conviction for cocaine and was facing new charges. Badger said the police offered Reynolds a deal if he would turn in some people. Reynolds then told the police he had given someone a bag of cocaine in front of Badger on a stre  [ send green star]

The story involved "Big Head" Reynolds, who had a prior conviction for cocaine and was facing new charges. Badger said the police offered Reynolds a deal if he would turn in some people. Reynolds then told the police he had given someone a bag of cocaine in front of Badger on a street in downtown Charleston.

"This guy had no credibility," Badger said. "He's out on probation for multiple ounces of coke and facing additional charges. I didn't think anything would come from his ridiculous allegation." She was wrong.

"I got a call from a friend who told me that this thing looks like it's getting serious, and Condon is giving credence to the allegation." Badger said. "I started getting nervous because in my six-and-a-half years I had seen so many people get screwed by him. He never stood by his employees.

"Several days later, Charlie called me to his Ivory Tower -- that's what we called his office, it was a separate, locked space with his secretary, Garden Frampton, for a guard -- and there were two SLED agents there. Charlie never spoke to me about having any concerns over the allegations. He apparently called SLED -- knew they were coming -- and never mentioned it to me."

Faced with being fired or arrested, Badger resigned that afternoon.

 [ send green star]

Hogg, it is well known he is the killer of Ricky Seagraves, he was given imunity for this and back to the age of 13.

Hine was given imunity in the shooting death of a black man. and just start a 35 years sentence and got his partner 70 years. this partner was a law man in oklahoma.

Behren was given imunity for his part in the shooting of two police officers.

if you are going to tell the story, please tell it all.

 [ send green star]

L. G. Faircloth, who appeared personally before me, and after being duly sworn, deposes and says:

1. I am a retired agent of the South Carolina Law Enforcement Division with over twenty years experience in the investigation of criminal cases.

3. In the course of my investigation, the following information has come to my attention:

* In December, 1996, M.C. Bellew and I interviewed Bobby Pooser, the resident of the house to which Ricky Seagraves was brought following his abduction from the Majic Market by Edward Merriman and Danny Hogg. Pooser told us that Hogg washed Seagraves' blood out of the truck that Hogg and Merriman were driving when they came to his house, and that Hogg's bloody pants were burned in the fireplace and Pooser gave Hogg a pair of his own pants to wear. Pooser also stated that he told a police officer what he knew about the Seagraves murder, but that no action was taken until years later when Hogg was sent to prison. The information we received from Pooser is detailed in a letter by M.C. Bellew to John Blume, Paul Mazzel1' s lawyer.

• I personally interviewed SLED Agent Robert Greer, who related to me a conversation between himself and two SLED polygraphers, Dennis Coggins and Lieutenant Wyndham.
• At the time of said conversation, Coggins had just administered a polygraph test to Danny Hogg, which he failed. Coggins remarked that Hogg had lied through his teeth, and Wyndham said that. Hogg was the person who killed Seagraves down in Charleston.

* I personally interviewed Edward Merriman, Paul Mazzell's co-defendant at the Ricky Seagraves murder trial. Merriman told me that Danny Hogg killed Ricky Seagraves, that he (Merriman) wittnessed the shooting and death of Seagraves, that Paul Mazzell was not involved in the killing of Ricky Seagraves, and that he (Merriman) and Paul Mazzell had requested, but were denied, the opportunity to undergo polygraph testing. Merriman later took and passed a polygraph test.

* Statements given to law enforcement by Lisa Hogg prior to Mazzell's trial strongly indicate that Danny Hogg was the person who murdered Ricky Seagraves. To my knowledge, these statements were never introduced at Mazzell's trial.

The SLED file on Mazzell's case is apparently missing from SLED's custody. In my experience, this is highly unusual, and it may indicate an effort by an unscrupulous person to make exposing the truth in this case more difficult.

I firmly believe that enough evidence exists at this time to successfully prosecute Danny Hogg for the murder of Ricky Seagraves. I base this conclusion on my many years of work as an investigator of criminal cases, during which I never lost a criminal prosecution.

4. The information I have gathered, along with the information available about this case from other sources, including what was presented by the prosecution at Mazzell's trial, have led me to the firm conclusion that Paul Mazzell is not guilty of the murder of Ricky Seagraves. I further believe that, if Paul Mazzell is granted a new trial, he will be found not guilty. Signed: L. G. Faircloth. Dated: July 18, 1997

 [ send green star]

Hi Paul, it took me awhile but I signed both of your petitions.  I hope you are able to clear your name for that which you did not do.  I always look into things before I sign for them when they are this serious.

Good luck.  I know it is and has been extremely difficult for you to come forward and fight all those years.  Once someone has an X on them people tend to think it does not matter what else happens to them but it does.  Especially when other crimes are placed on them that they did not commit and they bear the burden of a sentence they should never have had to begin with.

 [ send green star]

Paul, it would help your petitions if you put a link to things people can read immediately.  Many people will not take the time to look into the history of your case.  If you can modify your petitions with links to articles and documents it will strengthen your position when people come across your petitions.

Here is one such story I found that I think you should have as a link:

Press Room

Recent Press Releases from the Hanahan Police Department

Retrial ordered in "Dixie Mafia" murder conviction

A federal judge in Columbia ordered a retrial Wednesday for the reputed former kingpin of the "Dixie Mafia," agreeing that errors were made in Paul Mazzell's 1983 murder conviction.

The judge's ruling comes almost 13 years after Mazzell, now 66, and a co-defendant were convicted of murder and conspiracy in the fatal shooting of 29-year-old Ricky Lee Seagraves in Charleston County.

Ironically, Mazzell was helped by a couple of police officers who believed he was wrongly convicted.

Columbia attorney John Blume said Mazzell, who is serving a life sentence, was elated when he told him the news Thursday morning.

"Paul said today was the happiest day of his life, that someone finally listened to him," Blume said.

Mazzell and associate Eddie Merriman of John's Island were convicted in 1983 of killing Seagraves almost five years earlier.

Merriman died in prison last fall, but not before giving his version of the murder to State Law Enforcement Division agent L.G. Faircloth in 1987. Faircloth got SLED's case file reopened, talked to some people involved, then shared his findings and gut feelings with Hanahan Police Chief Melvin C. Bellew.

That initial spark of interest grew into the belief that the wrong men had been convicted of murder.

Bellew is married to Mazzell's niece, but said that fact never affected his effort to bring Mazzell's case up for review.

Faircloth retired last year, but continued to work on Mazzell's release.
After Mazzell exhausted his state appeals, Blume filed the case in federal court in 1990.federal magistrate referred it on to U.S. District Judge Dennis W. Shedd of Columbia earlier this year.

Shedd ruled Wednesday that Mazzell deserves a retrial because of faulty instructions to the jury from 9th Circuit Judge Richard E. Fields - now retired.

Those instructions allowed the 1983 trial jury to find Mazzell guilty even if they believed he was only an accessory after the fact. The jury should have based its decision on whether jurors believed he actually committed the murder, Blume said. There is no record of how the jury reached its decision.

In a recent interview at Lieber Correctional Institution, Mazzell told The Post and Courier that in 1978 he "ran some clubs, some gambling and a little prostitution." Some called Mazzell the kingpin of the "Dixie Mafia," a Lowcountry organized crime group, at the time when Seagraves disappeared.

Witnesses reported seeing two men attack Seagraves at a U.S. Highway 78 convenience store near Seagraves' home in Ladson on Oct. 30, 1978. Shots were fired, and Seagraves was pistol-whipped, dragged out of the store and forced into a waiting pickup truck, they said.

Police, acting on information from a man who was in jail on unrelated charges, unearthed Seagraves' skeletal remains from a shallow grave in woods off S.C. Highway 61 on July 31, 1981.

The information came from Daniel Hogg, an admitted strongman for organized crime who eventually became the state's star witness under a grant of immunity.

Mazzell and Merriman were arrested but soon released on bond. They went about their business for the next 18 months. Above a radiator repair shop he owned, Mazzell erected a large sign that read, "We intend to uncover the cover-up of Ricky Seagraves' murder."

"That really started my problems," Mazzell said.

 [ send green star]

When the trial began in February 1983, "I walked into the courthouse thinking because I was innocent, I had nothing to worry about," he said.
He didn't count on the testimony of his one-time crony, Hogg. Another setback was that the jury never heard that a polygraph test Hogg was required to take in return for immunity showed deception when he was asked if he killed Seagraves.

Hogg testified that Mazzell wanted Seagraves killed because Seagraves supposedly had robbed one of Mazzell's drug dealers. He said he and Merriman abducted Seagraves and turned him over to Mazzell for the killing.

"I didn't kill Ricky Seagraves, I didn't send anyone to kill Ricky Seagraves - I buried Ricky Seagraves," Mazzell said in the recent prison interview. Seagraves was already dead when he saw him that night.

"If I'd known he was dead, Jesus Christ couldn't have dragged me over there," he said. He didn't contact authorities "because I ain't no damn rat."

Shedd ruled that not only was the truth of Hogg's testimony questionable, but that Mazzell received ineffective counsel because his attorney failed to object to Fields' instructions to the jury.

Attorney Blume credited Bellew and Faircloth with "creating an atmosphere that this guy didn't get a fair shake and producing information to support it."

The ruling won't get Mazzell out of prison immediately. The state can appeal Shedd's order, ask for a new trial within 60 days, or drop the matter.

Assistant Deputy Attorney General Don Zelenka said Thursday that no decision would be made until Shedd's ruling could be reviewed.

This post was modified from its original form on 16 Jun, 16:52  [ send green star]

Charleston attorney Richard Stoney prosecuted the case as an assistant to Attorney General Charles M. Condon, who was solicitor at the time of the trial. Thursday, he would say only that he had not read the entire order.
Merriman died in prison last fall, and Mazzell says he's also willing to die behind bars if he has to, but he'll continue fighting to clear his name until his last breath.

http://www.hanahanpolice.com/pressroomi.asp?newsid=53

 [ send green star]

http://www.press.umich.edu/pdf/0472099116-ch4.pdf

A long but good read and insight to cases like Paul's.  It also includes a section about Paul and his case.

 [ send green star]

I know it is an old article but it is credible to people because it is from a police department press room.  The statements within the article are what will help you with people who are leary to sign because of your involvement in other criminal activity.

Signing your petitions is not condoning any other activity you have had involvement in.  It is to give you due justice to clear your name for that which you did not do.  For your family's sake it is important that justice is done.

 [ send green star]