Cops and Courts, News

Convicted murderer appeals his conviction

KINGWOOD — Convicted murderer John Wayne Strawser Jr. is again appealing his conviction in Preston County Circuit Court.
A hearing has been set for July 9 in Preston.
Strawser was convicted of first-degree murder and fleeing in a vehicle with reckless indifference in an August 2016 jury trial. That October, he was sentenced to life in prison without the possibility of parole, plus another five years for the fleeing conviction.
The jury found him guilty of shooting and killing his former girlfriend, Amy Lou Buckingham, outside her Tunnelton home.
In November 2017, the state supreme court upheld the Preston court’s decision to deny Strawser’s motion for acquittal or a new trial.
The new appeal is in the form of a post-conviction habeas corpus, meaning he alleges that he was denied his rights and is unlawfully imprisoned.
This appeal says a state trooper misled the grand jury, witnesses weren’t called who would have said cars other than his were seen in the area of the murder, a witness was mentally unstable, his phone was unlawfully accessed and other rights were violated.
Strawser, 40, is currently in jail in Franklin County, Pa., awaiting trial for a first-degree murder charge tied to the January 2014 killing of a motorist on Interstate 81.
Officials believe Strawser mistook the man for a member of a couple he’d been looking for after an argument regarding Strawser’s alleged stalking of the wife.