**Currently work in progress**

In 2006 I was railroaded into pleading guilty to a felony charge I never committed by the Charlottesville Virginia criminal "justice" system. This was accomplished through threats from the prosecution and even threats by my own defense attorney. I was even threatened by the prosecution when attempting to fire my incompetent lawyer.

The two prosecutors at the time were assistant prosecutor Joseph Platania and head prosecutor Warner Chapman. My attorney at the time was William Johnson of Mathews County Virginia.

The railroading was the result of multiple major issues along with the serious moral failings of a corrupt city and it's equally corrupt legal system.

The first among those issues was that the prosecution and the police department wanted to avoid a trial because they knew that the claimed "victim" in the case, Michelle Dickerman (Manweiler), was lying to them. Dickerman had tampered with and even outright fabricated printed email messages (printouts created by her and delivered to police with no attempt at verification) that were the sole evidence the entire case was based upon.

Law enforcement had rushed out to club me over the head without first verifying any of her claims because of her status in Charlottesville. Once they had thrown me in jail and smeared me in the media they discovered what Dickerman had done to the evidence. Charlottesville law enforcement could not risk revealing what happened. Thanks to criminal levels of neglegience, police and prosecutors had been tricked by a newly minted lawyer fresh from law school. It would result in lawsuits and scandal. So I was tossed under the bus to protect careers.

A second issue was of Michelle Dickerman's status within Charlottesville that gave her special treatment, which flagrantly violates equal protection under the law. Charlottesville is the home of the University of Virginia (UVA) - an Ivy League university. In 2006 Michelle Dickerman was a recent graduate of UVA's School of Law at the time of my arrest. Michelle Dickerman's father, Gregory Manweiler, was also an alumni of UVA and was a financial donor to the university. Gregory Manweiler at the time of my case was the CFO of a bank tied to Langley Air Force base and NASA. This is the reason why law enforcement rushed into a situation they didn't understand - the status of Michelle Dickerman in Charlottesville.

Charlottesville has a long history of favoritism and special treatment of UVA students, especially university students with rich families. Prior to my case of 2006 there was a UVA student named Andrew Alston who stabbed a man to death for mouthing off to one of Alston's friends. Alston's father was reported to be a significant and rich lawyer. Alston is reported in court documents to have put 20 stabs wounds in his victim. He received 3 and a half years for voluntary manslaughter and only had to serve two thirds of that. I received worse penalties than Alston solely for emails that I can prove were tampered with.

I had no criminal record - not even parking tickets. No history of violence. A good job in engineering. I have never laid a hand on Dickerman, not even to tap her on her shoulder to get her attention. Dickerman hadn't even been in the same room with me until the preliminary hearing that happened after my arrest. Yet I received worse penalties than a rich UVA student who brutally stabbed someone to death. I was denied bond as if I was a murderer and made to sit in jail until the conclusion of the case. Inmates and even corrections officers warned me that I needed my case moved out of Charlottesville. As one corrections officer put it - "If you punch a UVA student in the face in Charlottesville, you might as well have punched a cop".

Another issue was the clear and unprofessional attraction towards Dickerman that was displayed by assistant prosecutor Joseph Platania. Platania displayed this attraction in front of witnesses in the courthouse. He was not the only one to behave in this way however. My former attorney William Johnson also continued to make inappropriate remarks about Dickerman throughout the case.

According to Johnson, both he and Joseph Platania had a sexual conversation over the phone about Michelle Dickerman. Johnson further went on to state that Platania became so excited by this talk that he offered to setup a meeting between Michelle Dickerman and William Johnson. A prosecutor had a sexual discussion about the victim he represented with the defense attorney, and said prosecutor then attempted to setup a meeting between the victim and the defense attorney. I think that says everything you need to know about the prosecution's mindset quite frankly.

If you go into any jail you'll hear plenty of inmates claiming to be innocent. The difference is that I can prove it. I can prove it using Michelle Dickerman's own evidence she supplied to police. I can prove it using her own statements to the court. My problem has never been a lack of evidence. My problem has been getting that evidence into a courtroom or out into the public eye. These are not easy things to accomplish for a random person, especially for one who didn't have the financial means to do anything about it for many years. Our legal system doesn't revolve around evidence. It revolves around how much money you can toss into a trash can and light on fire.

I can prove that Michelle Dickerman was forwarding my emails to a fake social media account she created to resemble my account - giving her complete freedom to rewrite the contents at will. I can prove that Dickerman wrote fake dates on individual email sheets of multi-page emails to split the pages up - thus claiming them as separate emails themselves. This was done for multiple reasons.

For one, it hid how long she actually waited to actually go to the police - which would have proven that she had never believed herself to have received any death threats. Additionally, splitting single emails into multiple also made it appear as if more emails had been sent to Dickerman than what was actually sent in reality.

Upon hearing of my arrest, Michelle Dickerman immediately deleted the profile containing all of the email messages sent to her - which destroyed an original source of evidence and prevented the discovery of her criminal acts. It removed the ability to obtain exculpatory evidence. Michelle Dickerman had just graduated UVA School of Law and passed the Virginia State Bar exam not long after committing this act of obstruction. A lawyer would know better. I even have my former lawyer admitting on tape recording that "She was wrong, she shouldn't have done that".

After Dickerman's destruction of evidence, the Charlottesville police would go on to claim they magically "misplaced" the tape recording of my interview with the investigating officer Nick Rudman. This allowed them to claim that I had confessed to all charges when in reality this never took place.

The police department further claimed to have damaged my confiscated hard drive. They claimed it was so severely damaged that they wouldn't be able to obtain any evidence from it until after nine to eleven months of repair work. Which meant that I was unable to obtain exculpatory evidence. It also meant that the printouts created by Michelle Dickerman were the sole evidence against me - printouts that I can prove in a court of law were fabricated.

Thus my railroading commenced - with the help of my former attorney William Johnson. A defense attorney who appears to have worked hand-in-hand with the prosecution against his own client. To the extent that there is evidence to suggest that Johnson may have been communicating his plans and my own words back to the prosecution.

I will discuss the events of 2006 in greater detail as I add more sections to this website, as well as go step-by-step to demonstrate how Michelle Dickerman fabricated evidence.

The Guilty Parties:

Michelle Annette Dickerman (Manweiler) of Falls Church VA:

A University of Virginia School of Law student at the time of her crimes, Dickerman is now a Deputy Assistant General Counsel in the US Department of Treasury. I have evidence in my possession proving that Dickerman fabricated the emails that were the basis of the false felony charge against me.

I can prove Dickerman was forwarding emails she received to a fake account made to look like mine, enabling her to alter the contents as she saw fit. At no point did Dickerman notify Charlottesville law enforcement of this. I can also prove that Dickerman wrote false dates on individual sheets of singular emails - thus turning one email into multiple so as to appear as if she received more messages than she had in reality. This criminal act caused the Charlottesville law enforcement to react excessively to this case, resulting in a misdemeanor charge getting bumped to a felony on a guy with no criminal record at the time. Once my arrest had been made Michelle Dickerman deleted her account, thus destroying all of the original emails on her account and removing all evidence of her crimes.  

Dickerman also claimed to police and the courts that I made contact with her at her home in Charlottesville, an act that never took place. Dickerman would forget her lie months later during the conclusion of the case, and accidentally admitted in her victim impact statement that I never knew where she lived in Charlottesville the entire time (whoops). Dickerman would be facing multiple felonies if my evidence were to be presented in court. This is also not the first time Dickerman had attempted to lie to law enforcement to get false charges placed.

Michelle Dickerman also received extreme favoritism and special treatment from the Charlottesville law enforcement well in excess of anything received by the average Charlottesville citizen - indeed even in excess of what anyone else in the United States would receive. The penalties I was hammered with go so far beyond anything acceptable that it outright violates the 8th Amendment. The prosecutor even admitted in court that one of the penalties I was receiving was the most ever handed out "in the history of the Charlottesville Circuit court" - a court which handles manslaughter, rape, and child molestation cases. Meaning that Michelle Dickerman received more protection than a raped woman or a molested child - all for emails I can prove she tampered with and even fabricated. I even seem to be the first person in the history of the Commonwealth of Virginia to have received a felony for this charge without having received two prior misdemeanor convictions of the same charge first (as the charge I was given a felony for is actually a misdemeanor in Virginia). Keep in mind I had no criminal record (not even a speeding ticket at the time), had never laid a hand on Dickerman, and we were never in each others presence until the 2006 Preliminary Hearing.

I believe that there were a couple of reasons behind this extreme special treatment received by Michelle Dickerman. First and foremost, Charlottesville has a history of doing such things when it comes to UVA students. I was even told by a corrections officer at the jail that if you punch a UVA student in the face in Charlottesville "you might as well have punched a cop". A UVA student named Andrew Alston stabbed a man 18 to 20 times, killing him, and only spent two and a half years in a white collar prison. I actually got worse penalties than him and he killed someone.

The second reason is why I included the photo of Dickerman that I did - because it features Dickerman's father Gregory Manweiler. Gregory Manweiler was the CFO and Vice President of a bank when this case happened in 2006. He is also an alumni of UVA like his daughter, and donates to the university. When my uncle was attempting to find me work after my release from jail, the owner of the company that hired me made the comment "It sounds like someone had a rich daddy who knew someone important at the university who could pull strings". This was without knowing a single thing about Dickerman (or her family) besides her status as a UVA student. I believe Gregory Manweiler indeed pulled strings and manipulated the system to get his daughter special treatment, which was all too easy given her UVA student status.

This isn't the first time the Manweiler family has used personal connections to get special treatment they were never entitled to. Dickerman's parents used their connections with school officials and the head of the school board during her high school years to get Dickerman special treatment - just so that she could remain in competition with another girl for the Valedictorian spot. So in addition to manipulating things to get the red carpet treatment from law enforcement, they also appear to have manipulated the school system to get their daughter an academic honor she didn't legitimately earn.
Nicholas Rudman of Charlottesville VA:

Rudman was the investigating officer of my case during the time of his crimes. Rudman was criminally negligent and incompetent with his handling of this case. He ignored blatant tampering of the email printouts that were right in front of his face (a March 12th printer timestamp on emails Dickerman dated as being sent in April/May as one example).

Since I did not confess to threatening Dickerman during the interrogation, Rudman and the prosecution "lost" the tape recording of the interrogation and Rudman then claimed a confession took place when it did not. Once the tampering of the email evidence by Dickerman was spotted, the Charlottesville police cooperated with the prosecution in a cover-up to avoid scandal and lawsuit.

Nicholas Rudman claimed the computer hard drive confiscated from my home was somehow damaged by the police during their investigation, and that no evidence could be retrievable for at least 9 months while it was under repair. With this destruction of evidence, along with Dickerman's further destruction of evidence, there was no way to verify the email printouts from Dickerman that were the sole basis of the criminal charges against me. Despite having no verification on blatantly tampered and fabricated emails, the prosecution began their railroading of me to secure a false felony conviction - they threw me under the bus to save their own asses.

In later years after the case, Michelle Dickerman contacted the Charlottesville prosecutors and informed them of the blog posts I was making. The prosecution had Rudman conduct an investigation of my blog, in which the evidence I had posted proving Dickerman fabricated the emails was witnessed by Rudman. No attempt was made by Charlottesville law enforcement to correct the mistake or prosecute Dickerman. I recently attempted to file motions and FOIA requests related to this case to retrieve emails from the police and prosecution. They denied the FOIA requests, but I made it pretty clear what happened in 2006 and what my evidence was. The Charlottesville police and district attorney's office both know I caught them in the act, but since I haven't been able to get media attention nor get all this all out in a court room, they are content to sit on their asses and do nothing. I did attempt to speak to Internal Affairs while in Charlottesville for a motion I filed in court, but Rudman had already retired from the police force by then and I was told there was little IA could do with Rudman gone.

Joseph Platania of Charlottesville VA:

An assistant district attorney handling my case at the time of his crimes, Platania is now the head district attorney for the City of Charlottesville after his boss retired. He is also an adjunct professor at UVA School of Law.

Platania expressed inappropriate affection towards Dickerman, even going so far as to have an inappropriate locker room conversation over the phone with my former attorney William Johnson about Dickerman. As Johnson put it they were discussing Dickerman's achievements and her "assets" - to which Johnson emphasized the word "assets" and with a big grin on his face. This conversation ended up getting Platania excited, at which point Johnson stated that Platania blurted out enthusiastically "So you want to go talk to her?", clearly offering to set up some meeting with Dickerman. Johnson replied that he didn't see the point in traveling from Matthews County to Charlottesville for something that would have no affect on the case. He was actually mocking how Platania said it when retelling the conversation to me, and appeared to be concerned by Platania's behavior and surprised by the outburst. Given that Johnson was quite the womanizer himself and made constant inappropriate comments on Dickerman to my mother at the meetings, it is interesting that even he became bothered by Platania's antics. Further instances of Platania's affections towards Dickerman will be discussed in a longer writeup, but it is very clear that his actions were extremely unprofessional and he should have recused himself from this case.

Platania became aware of Dickerman's crimes and aided his boss Chapman in the cover-up to avoid scandal and lawsuits (see Warner Chapman below). Platania began making threats to coerce a guilty plea in support of this cover-up, in violation of civil rights statutes.

Fairly recently (2019 IIRC) I attempted to try a bit of a shakeup with Charlottesville. I filed a motion in Charlottesville Circuit court to have a sealed file in my court records open. In the motion I made it clear what my accusations were while still trying to maintain a certain decorum with court affairs. The motion was forwarded by the judge to the prosecution for their comment. Platania deliberately tried playing games with it and sitting on it rather than making any comment for a very long time. So when I filed FOIA requests with the Charlottesville police and district attorney's office, decorum went out the window and I flat out made plenty of accusations about the actions of the police department and the prosecution. I made it clear I could prove Michelle Dickerman fabricated evidence.

So both the C'ville PD and Platania are completely aware (especially since they went to my blog after reading the paperwork). I got a condescending letter back from Platania that blew me off, which I rather expected. The point was to make it public record that he knew what the accusations and evidence were. When the court clerk pushed for a response to the motion, Platania decided to play games with tax payer money and contest the release of the records. He knew he would lose and the judge would release the documents, he just wanted to give me a middle finger. The coward couldn't even show up in court, he had his deputy assistant handle all his cases that day while making an excuse to be elsewhere. But one mission was accomplished - I wanted to get all of this in front of their faces and on public record. Platania and the C'Ville police are legally obligated now to drop the felony charge on me and file charges against Michelle Dickerman. They refuse because they know it won't go well for them either given all that happened. 

Warner Chapman of Charlottesville VA:

The head district attorney at the time of his crimes, Chapman eventually retired while his underling Platania took over the reigns. He was a graduate of UVA School of Law. During the 2006 criminal case, Chapman became aware of Dickerman's fabrication of evidence after I had already been arrested. Because they decided to rush out and crack me over the head without verifying any evidence first, Charlottesville law enforcement was now in a very bad position. Once learning of Dickerman's crime Warner Chapman had two options. Either drop the charges against me and accept the media scandal from their mistake and risk lawsuits against the city and his office for their negligence. Or cover-up the crime and railroad me into a charge Chapman knew I didn't commit in order to hide his error. Chapman chose to do the latter option.

Chapman threatened me out of my civil right to a fair trial via his underling Platania. Additionally, when I attempted to fire my attorney and replace him with Charlottesville attorney Katherine Peters, Chapman threatened me with heavy consequences if I attempted to fire my incompetent attorney - thus threatening me out of another civil right. My former attorney admits to this happening via a tape recording conducted after my release from jail. After the conclusion of my case, Chapman hired Katherine Peters as an assistant district attorney to work under him. Funny how he just happened to hire the very lawyer he threatened me out of replacing my attorney with after the case was resolved. Ms. Peters by the way had not only been informed of the problems with the evidence showing Dickerman's tampering, but had also been told of all the negligent and inappropriate actions conducted by the police and district attorney's office.

William Johnson of Matthews County VA:


Johnson was unfortunately my attorney in 2006. Johnson handled my case in a negligent and incompetent manner. He verbally abused my mother and I, made multiple inappropriate remarks about his attraction to Dickerman, and aided the prosecution in their railroading by threatening me into pleading guilty (stating that if I refused to plead guilty he would not defend me during the trial and let me go to jail). I believe Johnson at least suspected that the prosecution were covering up Dickerman's crime, as it is very clear through his notes and tape recorded comments that he came to the conclusion that the evidence had been fabricated. He appears to have even been working hand-in-hand with the prosecution towards the goal of helping cover for Dickerman's criminal acts, to the clear detriment of his client.
Not only did the prosecution seem to magically read his mind and know what Johnson's plans against them were too precisely to be coincidence, but certain penalties by the prosecution were never brought up until after I informed Johnson of certain post-conviction actions I intended to take. This mysteriously resulted in the prosecution having proposed at the last minute a penalty that conveniently prevented me from taking such action for as long as possible - as if they had been told about my plans by the only person I had informed about them. Johnson aided the prosecution at the very least due to his constantly stated admiration and attraction for Dickerman. I believe however that the strong potential exists that financial incentive from the Manweiler family may have held additional influence.
I firmly believe that Johnson was financially bribed to throw the case by Dickerman's father Gregory Manweiler of Williamsburg. Johnson clearly stopped being my attorney and was instead working for the benefit of the Manweiler family. More than enough of his actions, notes, and own words prove he was no longer operating for his client's interests. William Johnson was recorded by my mother during her meetings with him and in the lobbies of the District and Circuit courts of Charlottesville. These tape recordings not only back up my accusations of Johnson, but also back up the evidence against the other parties. Thanks to Virginia's "One Party" law on recordings, they are also completely admissible as evidence in court.
This guy took advantage of my family's desperation and demanded $15,000 up front, saying he wouldn't have a problem with that felony (look how that turned out). This guy was too lazy to even travel down to Charlottesville to look at evidence. Without having seen any of the evidence he claimed it was sufficient (how the hell do you tell that without having even laid eyes on it) and continued to come up with plea agreements for me to plead guilty to in order to wrap up the case with minimum effort. He never looked at a single piece of evidence until the afternoon prior to the preliminary hearing, making him completely unprepared for the hearing (he even told me that on the day of the hearing with a shrug of his shoulders).
Johnson even noticed some of Dickerman's tampering, in fact his notes I obtained from him after my release (after fighting just to get that) are one of the key pieces of the evidence against Dickerman. Additionally Johnson was confronted by my mother in a meeting with some of Dickerman's tampering. Johnson was not interested in discussing this - how many defense attorney's refuse to look at something that could win them their case? We've got him on tape admitting to this tampering being present, as well admitting to other things on multiple tapes like I said. He's actually pretty screwed once everything gets out. On one tape recording outside the courthouse on my sentencing, without prompting from my mother he fully admitted he was well aware I never had any intentions of harming Dickerman or anyone related to her - thus admitting he had me plead guilty to a felony he knew I hadn't committed. Because if you admit your client never had intent, you don't even have the basis justifying a misdemeanor for such a charge let alone justification for a felony.