As lawyers do, she promised the world, and delivered nothing, raising no claims about my illegal sentence, no claim about the clearly manufactured scientific testimony and evidence, and no claim related to my patently ineffective lawyers, or to my competency to stand trial.  What she did raise, was a claim that (you aren't going to believe this one) I was Norris' victim also, in that Sheila testified that "Norris made Kimberly do this and that". In other words, she argued on appeal that I was guilty, however only guilty because Norris made me do it.  I strongly objected to this nonsensical and inaccurate assignment of error and told her that Norris is innocent, and if he is, then how in the hell could he have made me do anything?  Ms. Wagner filed her brief raising that claim, regardless of my specific instruction that I did not want her to do so, and I have never heard from her since.

As is routinely the practice in all cases involving "black on white crime", the Stark County Fifth
Appellate Court affirmed and upheld my conviction, though what was truly amazing, was that Norris was arguing on his appeal a claim of actual innocence, so the court, in an effort to undercut his claim of innocence, consolidated our two appeals, wherein my appeal was arguing that we were both guilty nonetheless.

With my unconstitutional conviction now affirmed, I contacted Professor Dean Carroll of the Akron University School of Law to file an appeal to the Supreme Court of Ohio from the judgment of the Stark County Fifth Appellate Court.  This appeal was filed, and less than 90 days later, the Ohio Supreme Court refused to hear the appeal on a single paragraph order, stating that there existed no substantial constitutional question which would require their review, and at that juncture, I simply quit!  I couldn't withstand the emotional battery of one denial after another, I stopped writing Robert, and simply wanted to die.

Everything seemed so hopeless, and even though Robert was appealing in every State and Federal court in Ohio (including the US Supreme Court), for all his tireless effort, and despite the overwhelming truth, justice was just not available.  The years were so very bitter, I watched as my children grew up without me, my family abandoned me one by one, I cried rivers when my father died, and still, Robert hammered away.  It's been 8 years now in this nightmare, and if I've learned now in all of my life, I've learned from Robert that there is simply no substitute for hard work, as this "patient fisherman" has never stopped fighting for the both of us, even despite my inability to fight for myself.  And don't you know that he's finally proven with their papers, their records, and their documents that our conviction is the product of intentional, calculated, and deliberate perjury.

He is not fighting for just himself, and he thinks that I don't know it, but he told Mr. Case of the Ohio News network, and Mr. Hirsch and Channel 4 News in Columbus, Ohio, "Just get Kimberly home to her children, and I can live with that."  He's carried me over all of this madness, he's sacrificed more than any man should, and then he dares to say "let the girl go- I'll suffer the difference.",  but I say this:

Let us both go, and let Stark County, Michele M. Mitchell, Robert Budgate, Detectives
Barone and Armondo, and John F. Boggins suffer the difference!

They said that the semen was proof that I had kidnapped and raped Sheila Knutty?  -but that
semen didn't even match Robert, so how could it possible have matched me?  We've committed
no crimes, the facts speak for themselves, as our only sin has been our helplessness, to which I
pray to you for your God sent intervention.

  Sincerely,

  Kimberly Southall, #32137