'Crooks' who cheated at Ohio walleye tournament plead guilty to felony

Justice was settled on last week in the infamous case of the cheating Ohio walleye fishermen.

Jacob Runyan, of Broadview Heights, a Cleveland suburb, and Chase Cominsky, of Hermitage, Pennsylvania, drew social media attention – and local legal intervention – after the Lake Erie fish they weighed during an early fall tournament were found stuffed with lead weights and fish fillets.

A video documenting a confrontation between irate tourney contestants and a speechless Runyan went viral. For a few days, the story went global.

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Social media being fluid and flighty, the buzz quickly blew away like smoke in a Great Lakes gale. Neither fellow anglers nor enforcement officials are prone to forget fraud, however.

And thousands of dollars were at stake.

Runyan and Cominsky already had drawn suspicion because of a spectacular run winning Lake Erie walleye tournaments that garnered hefty prizes. Much of the prize money in such tournaments comes from entry fees, meaning any cheating is done at the direct expense of other competitors.

The operative word is theft.

Both Runyan and Cominsky denied wrongdoing, suggesting instead they were just darn good at what they did. That turned out to be true in an ironic sense until their day of reckoning.

The pair maintained a not guilty stance until minutes before the scheduled start of their trial Monday in Cuyahoga County Common Pleas Court. Up against something like 30 witnesses for the prosecution and a damaging video, Runyan, Cominsky and their lawyers elected to cop a plea.

Dropped was a misdemeanor charge of possessing criminal tools and a felony charge of attempted grand theft, even though the pair would’ve raked in $28,000 if they’d gotten away with the weigh-in subterfuge.

The prosecutor’s office agreed to accept guilty pleas for cheating, a fifth-degree felony, and for unlawful ownership of animals, a fourth-degree misdemeanor.

The plea agreement included a three-year suspension of Runyan's and Cominsky's fishing licenses and the forfeiture of Cominsky’s boat, valued at $100,000.

The Ohio Division of Wildlife currently holds the boat as evidence, said Kenneth J. Fitz, the division’s executive administrator of law enforcement. He emphasized that a final decision on what will happen to the vessel can’t be determined until sentencing, scheduled for May 11, although he conceded it’ll likely be forfeited.

The Cuyahoga County prosecutor’s office has recommended six months probation rather than jail time. Successful completion of probation could lead to the anglers having their convictions expunged.

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“This plea is the first step in teaching these crooks two basic life lessons,” Cuyahoga County prosecutor Michael C. O’Malley said in a statement. “Thou shall not steal, and crime does not pay.”

Not everybody posting comments on public forms agreed the punishment measured up to the crime, and presiding judge Steven Gall retains the option of sentencing Runyan and Cominsky to a year in jail, the Associated Press reported.

Neither Runyan nor his attorney offered comment after the hearing. Cominsky’s attorney, Kevin Spellacy, told the AP that the plea is Cominsky's first step toward moving on with his life and taking full responsibility.

Whether moving on will include recreational fishing won’t be known for at least several years.

This article originally appeared on The Columbus Dispatch: Competitive fishers Runyan, Cominsky plead guilty to felony