Crime Fix with Angenette Levy - 12 Shocking Moments in Dramatic Pike County Massacre Sentencing

Episode Date: January 6, 2025

Jake Wagner and his mother, Angela Wagner, were sentenced for their roles in the 2016 murders of eight members of the Rhoden and Gilley families. Rita Newcomb, Jake's grandmother and Angela's mother, was also sentenced for a misdemeanor obstruction charge. Hannah Hazel Gilley's mother gave a heartfelt victim impact statement and Jake and Angela also spoke. Law&Crime's Angenette Levy looks at the hearing and the tension between the new judge and special prosecutor in this episode of Crime Fix — a daily show covering the biggest stories in crime.PLEASE SUPPORT THE SHOW: Get 50% off of confidential background reports at https://www.truthfinder.com/lccrimefix and access information about almost anyone!Host:Angenette Levy  https://twitter.com/Angenette5CRIME FIX PRODUCTION:Head of Social Media, YouTube - Bobby SzokeSocial Media Management - Vanessa BeinVideo Editing - Daniel CamachoGuest Booking - Alyssa Fisher & Diane KayeSTAY UP-TO-DATE WITH THE LAW&CRIME NETWORK:Watch Law&Crime Network on YouTubeTV: https://bit.ly/3td2e3yWhere To Watch Law&Crime Network: https://bit.ly/3akxLK5Sign Up For Law&Crime's Daily Newsletter: https://bit.ly/LawandCrimeNewsletterRead Fascinating Articles From Law&Crime Network: https://bit.ly/3td2IqoLAW&CRIME NETWORK SOCIAL MEDIA:Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/lawandcrime/Twitter: https://twitter.com/LawCrimeNetworkFacebook: https://www.facebook.com/lawandcrimeTwitch: https://www.twitch.tv/lawandcrimenetworkSee Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

Wondery Plus subscribers can binge all episodes of this law and crimes series ad-free right now. Join Wondery Plus in the Wondery app, Apple Podcasts, or Spotify. You're evil. You're evil. You are the spawn of satans. And the satan is Billy Wagner. Billy Blackburn. A grieving mother gets her chance after more than eight years to speak to the people who murdered her daughter and seven others in Pike County, Ohio, as one of the killers speaks. And I can tell you today, I am not sorry I got caught. I'm sorry for what I've done, but I am glad I got caught. I take you to the emotional sentencing with the most stunning moments. All you had to do was call in.

Stop the whole thing. The depravity was that you didn't see the moral need to shut it all down. Plus, I'll give you the details about why there's tension between the judge and the special prosecutor. Welcome to Crime Fix. I'm Anjanette Levy. Nearly nine years after eight members of the Roden and Gilley families were murdered in the middle of the night in Pike County, Ohio, two of the family members who admitted to their roles

in the murders have been sentenced. And one of those sentences, Jake Wagner's, left many people, including me, speechless. I'll talk more about that in just a little bit, but first, a little background on the case. I've been covering it since day one. On April 22nd, 2016, eight members of the Roden and Gilley families were shot to death in four different locations in the middle of the night. Most of them were sleeping when they were shot, and some had children by their sides.

The case has been called the largest criminal investigation in Ohio's history. Some family members of the victims feared that these murders would never be solved. Chris Roden Sr. and his cousin Gary Roden were shot in Chris's trailer. Chris's ex-wife Dana Roden and their children, Hannah Mae and 16-year-old Chris Jr., were shot in their trailer down the road. Hannah Mae's four-day-old daughter was laying in the bed next to her. And Dana and Chris's oldest son, Frankie, and his fiancée, Hannah Hazel Gilley, were shot as they slept, their six-month-old baby boy in the bed between them. And Frankie's older son, with another woman, was also in the home. Kenneth Roden was found shot once in the eye later that day in his camper, miles away. One thing that was always curious,

none of the children who were there at the time of the murders were hurt. In October of 2018, more than two and a half years after the murders, Jake Wagner, his older brother George Wagner, and their parents, Billy Wagner and George Wagner, and their parents, Billy Wagner and Angela Wagner, were charged with conspiring to murder the rodents and Hannah Hazel Gilley. Rita Newcomb, Angela's mother, was accused of forging custody documents for Jake and George's children. She later pleaded guilty to lying at her daughter's request about notarizing those custody documents.

The motive? Prosecutors said that Jake Wagner and his family wanted sole custody of a daughter that he shared with Hannah Mae Roden. In 2021, on the fifth anniversary of the murders, Jake Wagner, in a shocking move, pleaded guilty to his role in the murders and he agreed to a sentence of life without parole

and said he would testify against his other family members in exchange for the death penalty being taken off the table for all of them. Months later, Angela Wagner then pleaded guilty to helping plan and cover up the murders. She said she wasn't there when they were carried out, but stayed home with Jake and Hannah Mae's toddler daughter and George's son. Angela Wagner is serving 30 years for her role in the murders of the Rodens and Hannah Hazel Gilley. I wondered whether any of Angela Wagner's charges for the case would show up in a search, so I put her name in truthfinder.com. Truthfinder is one of the largest public record search services out there, and it can show you a lot. Angela's Pike County case comes up along with the burglary counts she pleaded guilty to in the Roden and Gilley murders.

Truthfinder is great because it will show you a person's past and current addresses, phone numbers, social media accounts and more. And it will also show you the sex offenders who live near you. You should try it. And right now you can get 50 percent off of background reports, just log on to www.truthfinder.com slash lccrimefix and start accessing information about almost anyone. In November of 2022, George Wagner IV was convicted of the murders and sentenced to life in prison without parole. He's appealing. Jake testified that George was there that night but didn't kill anyone. Fast forward to the sentencing of Rita Newcomb, Jake Wagner, and Angela Wagner in Pike County. The special prosecutor wanted the sentencings delayed until after Billy Wagner's upcoming trial to ensure the three followed through on testifying against Billy.

But the new judge on the case, Judge Jonathan Hines, said no way. The sentencing was moving forward. The case has been dragging on far too long. Special Prosecutor Angie Canepa even tried to have Judge Hine removed from the case twice. It didn't happen. So there was some tension in the court when Canepa tried to object. Take a listen. Are you going to make a recommendation on sentencing? I got your objection. It's been in the record five times. I don't need to hear it again. It's overruled, so please make your recommendation. I understand the court is going to overrule me, but I need to make a record. So, Mr. O'Brien, be ready to stand in

because there's no public debate today. The argument I'm hearing from your co-counsel has been beaten dead. It's been beaten dead. I asked her to make a sentencing recommendation. I asked her previously not to talk over me. The next thing that happens is she'll move to the back of the courtroom, and after that she'll be escorted out of the building, in which case you need to be ready to step in, because I'm not interested in old hash. She objected so many times I have it in my sleep.

I don't need it again. It's in the record. So I'm going to ask her again to make a sentencing recommendation on all three cases. If that doesn't work, then I'll take some disciplinary action. It's really easy to follow the rules until you don't have respect for the rules. So there's no debate today. We're just going to do this. I'd like you to be ready to step in in case it doesn't work for her. Yikes. Judge Hine was letting everyone in that courtroom know who was in charge. Canepa remained in the courtroom and Judge Hine, in a decision that some found odd, allowed just 10 minutes for the victims to address the court. Hannah Hazel Gilley's

mother, Andrea Shoemaker, was the first to speak and she didn't hold back. You three don't plan to carry out and murder my greatest son, Rupert, who was six months old, laying in the bed between his mom and dad, Frankie, Robin, and Hazel Gillian, let alone your granddaughter's mother. How greedy a heaven of a grandmother are you? How greedy? You killed your grandmother's mother. Your grandmother's mother. You're evil. Now, because there are so many people involved in this case, I'll tell you again, Andrea Shoemaker is talking to Angela Wagner about the murder of Hannah Mae Roden, who shared a daughter with Jake Wagner. You can feel Shoemaker's pain. Let's pick it up where she left off. You're evil. You are the spawn of satan. And the satan is Billy Wagner.

You are the evilest mother to help plan, carry out, and take the lives of three of the mothers. My daughter was only 20, and you want 30 years of your life behind bars? 30? She was 20! 20! She never even got to buy alcohol. She got six months of her life with her kid.

Six months, and Hannah Mae Roman, the love of your life, her kid. Six months. And Hannah Mae Rogan? The love of your life, Jake Wagner. The love of your life. Your daughter's mother. She got four days. Kylie Rogan got four days. Do you know what kind of answers I have, questions I have to answer? First, it was bad people came in. Next, they see your faces on the news. So guess what? I had to explain more. Because they're not kids, little kids no more.

They're not six months old. They're not four days old. Rupert's soon to be ten. Ten years he's been without a daddy to teach him how to fish, to teach him how to do all the man things. He has to depend on uncle's cousins because of you, Jake. Greedy Jake Wagner, you. Shoemaker lets the entire courtroom know how much pain these murders have caused her and the children left behind the children who are now older are growing up without parents i want you to suffer i want this is what i want and i told all bci i want your mother to live and you boys to die as well as your dad i want you to die so

your mom feels a heartache of what it's like to parent a child. It's a heartache that never goes away. I hate you. You ruined my life. You ruined innocent children's lives. I hope you die. I pray every day you die. I pray your grandchildren and your children

never want anything to do with you and i hope they never do andrea shoemaker continued by talking about some of the things that jake wagner did after the murders and it's chilling i hope your daughter hates you with a passion and as much heart as I hate you, Jake Wagner. You shook my hand, and after this, you was my friend. After you shot my daughter five times in the head, five times, whacked her side leg between them. And Hannah Mae, she's holding her little girl, and you shot her. How cold and evil you are, Sponsors of Satan. I'll say it again, Sponsors of Satan, you and your brother.

And you, evilness, created them. And Miss Rita, I feel so sorry for you because I know you're ashamed to have such a daughter and grandsons that evil. Because you were the first to feel the guilt and say you were sorry and it was your Christian duty to tell the truth. So I have not very many words mean worse than my heart breaks for you to have such an evil evil control in response of saying special prosecutor angie kanepa then read statements from two victims. One of them was Bobby Joe Manley, Dana Roden's sister, who discovered the bodies that morning.

She called Jake Wagner a coward and said he didn't deserve to live and said his daughter has lost everyone. It's difficult to hear. So listen very closely. It's taken an hour and a half from you're a good action-providing force. You've got to always remember you're the Austin Tower, nothing but love and nuts. All I really want to know is why. Why do they all have to die? Why do you think you have the right to take it? It goes.

Lisa Weisel, the niece of Chris, Dana, and Kenneth Roden, then spoke on behalf of the Roden family. Jake, we are no longer family. You've said that over and over. We will always be family. No. We will Rodin family. Jake, we are no longer family. You said it over and over. We will always be family.

No, we will not. I will no longer ever think of you after today. With those clothes behind you, you will be an afterthought to the rest of our family. Then it was time for Angela and Jake Wagner to speak. They planned the murders of eight people. Angela is very difficult to hear. Her lawyer said that she's participated in programs in jail and mentored female inmates.

I didn't consider the consequences of the action. When the death came, they would frame her on the residence. I know the pain was David Frankl on the resins are amidst. I know the pain must be unbearable because separated from my family, the ones I love most in the world, brings me unbearable suffering one time to see. And if we did, I didn't seem to be sorry. I can't undo what's happening. And to a great end of the divorce that I feel is my daily reminder not to run once once until I do not ever want to be alone. Thankfully today I'm housed at one. I've committed myself to change, to grow spiritually, mentally, emotionally, for letting God be my guidance.

Judge Hine didn't have to go along with the recommended 30-year sentence that came with Angela Wagner's plea agreement. He could have gone with less time or more, but he went along with the 30 years and he let Angela Wagner know how he felt about her part in these murders. You helped the state make the case. Jake helped the state make this case. Jake helped the state make its case. That wisdom, wherever it came from, was the

difference between a much worse outcome that might very well have been appropriate. I understand you didn't go to four scenes. Nobody seems to talk about the fact that you're the only person, the only person that could have stopped the whole thing with one phone call. You're standing there with cell phones that people want you to ping to make it look like your home. All you have to do was call in. Stop the whole thing. The depravity was that you didn't see the moral need to shut it all down.

I don't need an explanation, but clearly any decent human being could have done that little bit to save so much. So with the fact that you accept the responsibility and cooperated, I was willing to follow the agreement. Then it was on to Jake Wagner, and this is where things took a turn. Remember, I told you that Jake agreed to spend the rest of his life in prison without the possibility of parole for murdering the Rodens and Hannah Gilley. But I've had friendship or relationships with a lot of people, you know, many of you. And I know full well that the weight of my crimes, what I've done to you and your family. There's no amount of apology I can give today, no amount of explanation,

no thing I can do to help you with the pain you have, loss, anger, hate. Nothing can save you. But, I'm not going to tell you oh, this, this, and that. I'm going to tell you about me.

Because, yeah, I used to get manipulated. Ms. Gillian affirmed that and I truly was. But after I committed this crime, I was still with you. Ms. Gillian, I'm going to look at you because I feel you have the most hate. This is for you. Whenever I committed those crimes, it was probably two or three weeks later, I was waiting down to do what I did.

And I said the most sincere prayer to that day I ever said to that date. And I asked God. I didn't like what I did. I didn't like how I was living. I didn't like how the possibility of my daughter or even my nephew would grow up to be. And I asked God, I said, put me and my family back on the straight and narrow path by any means necessary. Jake Wagner believes he's been saved by Jesus. He gave that as a reason for pleading guilty and finally admitting to the

murders. And he fancies himself as a pastor. He testified at George's trial that they actually call him Pastor Jake at the jail. who made me get caught to answer my prayer so he could become exactly who he's supposed to be to each of us. Lord, Savior. Because, let's get with it. Now, I don't show much emotion. Not in a quiet, fiery night. Just me and God, I do. I don't show much here. I'm kind of breaking up a little bit, but that's just me.

I can tell you from my own experience, hate will not heal your heart. I'm not asking you to forgive me. I don't. But I ask you, if you are a woman of at least some kind of faith, you should do anything you can buy. Because hate won't do it. Hate won't condemn yourself. At one point, all of this became a little too much for some of the victim's families to stomach. They walked out of the courtroom. I've committed murder. I've committed every single sin

that the Bible lists. Why is someone denying Christ like Peter did. No, he never actually said it. But I have been in silence and I heard someone else say it. And it's just my sin. Me? I'm going to tell you exactly how God changed me. And I know it's taking a little bit of time, but I feel the judge will allow this.

It took me about two months. I read that Bible twice. I recovered. And I did not. I did not like what I found. Not the fact that it doesn't give salvation. The fact that I realized I did not have it.

I realized I did not have it. I realized I did not have repentance and never did. At points, it almost felt as if Jake Wagner was lecturing members of the Roden and Gilley families about how he can feel their pain. And they were disgusted. I can tell you, I'm not in spite, but I'm not miserable. I don't live in misery. I've experienced your loss, experienced your pain. This is my mom's condition. Because I believe that God done this to me so he could help me have the compassion and empathy to feel what you guys have felt. Shoot, he's taken my daughter from me, my nephew, most two more, precious people in my life. And he's done that, I believe, so that I would know how he feels about all his lost children. And that's what I do.

I don't need to tell you about how good I am or this and that or what the things I do, because it's not important. I tell you this only because I care for each of you, each of your pain, each of your loss and your sorrow. This sermon of sorts went on for some time, longer than the victim's family members spoke. Now take a look at this. And I don't care how much I get persecuted for being called a snitch, being called everything under the sun. And it's odd because they don't criticize me for what I did, for the crime. They criticize me for taking the plea.

They criticize me for standing up here and doing this, what I did for my brother. All of that. Mr. Wagner, wrap it up for me, please. My last sentence. I'm sorry. I just want you to know, Jesus has a cost.

Obedience, repentance, and total commitment. That was the second time that Judge Hine told Jake Wagner to wrap it up. But Hine said Wagner's use of religion meant nothing to him. But what happened next was kind of shocking. Jake Wagner and his lawyers in 2021 agreed that he would spend the rest of his life in prison without the possibility of parole. But Judge Hine felt that might not be fair. First problem was a recommendation on your case that was the same as it was on your brother's life without parole, which is what he got, right? How did he get there?

He went to trial. He had ten weeks of trial. And he had thousands of dollars, and dozens of witnesses, and emotional energy, and staff energy, people energy, resources energy, to get him to his conviction. Yet the recommendation here is the same,

giving you no credit for all the cooperation that you gave, as Mr. McKinney said, if you don't have corroboration of a cooperative witness, you may not have any case. So I have to resolve the first problem, which is how is it that I'm supposed to treat you the same when, in fact, you didn't act the same? That's the first problem is how is it that I'm supposed to treat you the same when in fact you didn't act the same. That's the first problem. The second problem is how do I resolve the good deal that your mom got?

Thirty years is a really long time. That's a really good deal for the level of the conduct, especially since she could have stopped the whole thing dead in its tracks before it ever happened. And I don't let her off the hook because she didn't go to the scene. I put her equally responsible because the eyes of the law put her equally responsible. So my second problem is how do I resolve what looks to me like some sort of gender violence. Here's how I resolve it. I give you the opportunity of parole after 20 years on your prison sentence. So you do six on the gun spec, you do six on the gun spec, you do life on all the other

counts, everything concurrent with the opportunity of parole at 20 years. So 32 years out, you get your chance because you cooperated, because you did something to acknowledge the responsibility for the crime. That's not a feel, but that's as close as I can come to solving the problem that's handed to me by these ancient plea agreements. If everybody wants the last judge's sentencing deal, they should have sentenced him under the last judge. Everybody knew Judge Deary was gone right after the last trial. But nobody rushed in to get it, and when I show up, I solve the problems the way I'm supposed to. So you get your chance to talk to the parole board 32 years from now, and then they do their job, whatever it might be. So I'm not going to

sign off on a deal where you get the same for cooperating as your brother does for gone to trial. There's the explanation. It was kind of unbelievable. Even Jake Wagner's prior attorneys agreed he would get life without parole. But now Jake Wagner will get a chance to go in front of the parole board. And even Jake Wagner seemed dumbfounded. He looked up at one of his attorneys in a state of disbelief. For all of Jake Wagner's talk about God, I'm pretty sure he most certainly believes in God now. Jake Wagner's grandmother, Rita Newcomb, as I told you earlier, was also sentenced. She lied about notarizing custody documents for the children of Hannah Mae, Jake, and George.

She said her daughter, Angela Wagner, asked her to lie. She got five years probation and a six-month jail sentence, which was suspended. Billy Wagner appeared in court separately. His trial was scheduled to begin this week, but that's been postponed. The Roden family is appealing Judge Hines' decision to move the trial to another county, and the state is appealing Hines' decision to remove the death penalty as an option for punishment from Billy's case. That decision led Special Prosecutor Angie Canepa to ask the Ohio Supreme Court to remove Judge Hine from the case. Canepa wanted the death penalty specifications to remain in place until Jake Wagner testified against his father as part of his plea deal.

But the judge said there was no reason to keep them in place. Canepa accused Hine of being biased and asked the state's high court to remove him twice. Both requests were quickly denied. So she's appealing Heinz decision. And that's led again to another delay in the case. So there's no telling when Billy Wagner's trial will begin and where it will be held. That has yet to be announced. And that's it for this episode of Crime Fix.

I'm Annette Levy. Thanks so much for being with me. I'll see you back here next time.