Victim calls for man's release from prison

FREMONT — A woman who testified against Daryl Walker in one of his cases says he has been in prison far too long. Daryl Walker, 47, of Fremont, has been a state prison inmate since 1996. Walker, who was 20 years old at the time of his conviction, has long claimed that a former police detective framed him for crimes he did not commit. Amanda Young, a former Fremont resident and the mother of Walker's two children, would later testify against Walker in court regarding a domestic violence incident between her and Walker in May 1996. She said that Walker has long since apologized to her about what happened. That domestic incident listed Walker as the aggressor and resulted in his arrest. Based on testimony from Young and a friend of both her and Walker, the jury found Walker guilty of one count of felonious assault, which carries a minimum of eight years. Overall, including convictions in other cases, Walker is serving a sentence of between 32 and 40 years in prison, according to state prison records. Young said Walker has been in prison for long enough already. "I know that Daryl maybe did some dumb things when he was younger, but nothing to get him anything close to 27 years," Young said. "I have forgiven him and he has wholeheartedly apologized to me." Nail in the coffin Involved in at least some of the cases against him, Walker said, was former Fremont police detective Sean O'Connell. O'Connell, who began his career as a Fremont police officer, would eventually become Fremont's lead detective. After retiring in 2012, he became a Sandusky County Sheriff's Office detective. While serving as a detective at the sheriff's office, O'Connell's conduct came into question in a number of different cases. Perhaps most notably, O'Connell was accused of manufacturing evidence against three young Black county residents, where he attempted to frame them for the 2015 murder of Heather Bogle. It was later determined that these three people had no connection to Bogle's murder. In 2017, O'Connell would be indicted on a falsification charge and other charges, including misuse of the state's criminal database. The following year at his sentencing hearing on Sept. 13, 2018, he was sentenced to two years in prison under the terms of a plea deal and was released on July 2, 2020. Picking up the broken pieces Young and Walker's youngest son was six months old, and their oldest, just two years old, when Walker was sentenced to prison. Now ages 27 and 29, respectively, Walker's kids have since started to have families of their own despite their father's incarceration Young said both boys have always remained close to Walker's side of the family. Young is adamant that some of the accusations against Walker are untrue — specifically, an assault of a Marine in a Fremont alleyway on July 6, 1996. "I can tell you for a fact that some of the crimes Daryl got charged with he did not do. I know he didn't do them because he was with me sitting in a friend's apartment," Young said. "When O'Connell took me to the police station to question me, I told him from the very beginning Daryl did not commit this crime. But, knowing O'Connell, I knew he wouldn't believe me because I was the girlfriend." She was familiar with O'Connell for some time because he would occasionally approach Walker and her while the pair were walking down the street. She said the detective would "harass" them. Following the domestic incident between the pair, Young said, they reconciled and remain cordial to this day. Young said she would like to see Walker released for his family's sake. "I don't hold any ill will towards him for something that happened when we were young and dumb," Young said. "He deserves the chance to build a relationship with his kids and grandchildren." At Walker's most recent parole hearing earlier this year, state prison officials denied his parole due to him exhibiting "problematic" behavior and asserting that his criminal history "outweighs his rehabilitative efforts." Young said while Walker might not be a model prisoner, she felt the parole board's justification for his parole denial was a "weak excuse." Walker's next parole hearing is scheduled for June 2028.