Guilty verdict in cycle theft

Jury takes just over an hour to convict Wachter of stealing ex-friend’s Yamaha

A Blair County jury on Tuesday found the purported leader of a motorcycle club called The Death Reapers guilty of stealing a motorcycle owned by a former club member and the intimidation of two witnesses who knew about the theft.

The jury of nine men and three women returned to the courtroom of Judge Wade A. Kagarise at noon Tuesday, finding George E. Wachter, 54, of Altoona, guilty on six charges.

Blair County Assistant District Attorney Derek Elensky said, based on Pennsylvania's sentencing guidelines, "He could be looking at significant state time," meaning the sentence could be served in a state correctional institution as opposed to the Blair County Prison.

Wachter will be sentenced Sept. 1, according to Kagarise, who ordered a presentence investigation.

The jury took just over an hour to find Wachter guilty of theft by unlawful taking of a motorcycle owned by Paul Diveglia of Altoona, conspiracy to commit theft, receiving stolen property, terroristic threats and two counts of intimidation of a witness.

According to testimony during the two-day trial, Wachter, Diveglia, Charles A. Holland Jr., 47, and Brian Roudabush, 36, among others, were friends and rode motorcycles for pleasure.

Diveglia was the owner of the former Tin Cup Bar on the 100 block of Sixth Avenue and was renovating the apartments above.

He permitted his motorcycle friends to use the former bar as their clubhouse after the men decided to form a group with a name and membership rules.

Diveglia indicated the group wanted to hold charity rides and raise money for children as part of its purpose.

Diveglia had a key to the building, and he said he gave another key to Roudabush.

In mid-May 2020, the group had a "falling out" and Diveglia told the group to stop using his building.

The "falling out" between Diveglia and his motorcycle friends was not fully explained during the trial, but, according to the theory of the case put forward by Elensky, the group decided to get even with Diveglia by stealing his motorcycle, a Yamaha V Star 1100, and stripping it of its parts. The motorcycle was stored in the former Tin Cup.

When Diveglia arrived at his building on the morning of May 25, 2020, he found his motorcycle gone, but many tools that he stored there had not been touched.

Altoona police Detective Terry Merritts and Officer Fred Wasser arrested Roudabush, Wachter and Holland for conspiracy and theft.

The charges also indicated that Wachter, who was known to carry a sawed-off shotgun, announced to two individuals who hung around the club, Nicholas Holland, Charles Holland's son, and John Kearnely, that if they informed police about the theft they would be "taken care of."

On Monday, Charles Holland testified for the prosecution even though he was one of the three men charged with the theft.

He was asked what "being taken care of" meant (according to club rules), and he replied it meant they would be "physically harmed."

Both Nicholas Holland and Kearnely testified they were frightened and intimidated by Wachter's threat.

Charles Holland also outlined for the jury how he, Roudabush and Wachter plotted the motorcycle theft.

Charles Holland said he drove Diveglia's motorcycle to a hunting club near Glendale and that the trio dismantled the cycle and took the parts to a location in Portage.

Both Nicholas Holland and Kearnely said they saw the various parts of the cycle at the hunting club.

In April, Roudabush was found not guilty by a Blair County jury.

He did not testify during the Wachter trial, a point made by Wachter's attorney, Robert Donaldson, during his closing argument on Tuesday.

Donaldson tended to downplay the version of events given by Charles Holland (that there was a conspiracy to steal the Diveglia motorcycle) and told the jury Holland, by testifying, was attempting to obtain a favorable deal from the prosecution with respect to a possible sentence he could receive for the theft.

Donaldson also pointed to what he called confusion over the prosecution charge that Roudabush had used his key to open the Diveglia building on May 23 and permit the theft to take place.

The defense argued that Roudabush had returned his key to Diveglia days before the theft took place.

In answering the Donaldson claim, Elensky told the jury it would have been easy for Roudabush to have had a duplicate key made.

Elensky closed his argument by noting that the only thing taken during the theft was Diveglia's motorcycle while many expensive tools in the building were not touched.

The fact that only the motorcycle was taken supported the prosecution theory that revenge by Wachter and other club members was the motive for the crime, Elensky argued.

After the verdict was returned, Wachter asserted his innocence, denying he was the leader of the group and pointing out he had not owned a gun since 2005, making the point that he could not have intimidated Nicholas Holland and John Kearnely with a shotgun.

Donaldson said it was a tough case, and he said he will be looking to appeal the jury's verdict.

Elensky said that the attempts to intimidate the witnesses was the factor that moved the case "to a much more serious level."