OFF THE WIRE
By Andrew Clevenger
The Charleston Gazette
Corey Charles "Mohawk" Hinkle said he was at the Pour House to pick up his mother.
CHARLESTON, W.Va. -- A federal magistrate judge revoked the bond of a Charleston member of the Pagans Motorcycle Club on Monday after he was found in a Dunbar bar last month past his court-imposed curfew.
Corey Charles "Mohawk" Hinkle, 30, told police that he went to the Pour House to pick up his mother, who had been drinking there, said his lawyer, Herb Hively, during Monday's hearing.
"And as he was coming out, someone hit him with some kind of object," Hively said. "He got hit in the head."
According to a petition filed by federal probation officer Mildred DeVore, Dunbar police found Hinkle at the bar after 1:30 a.m. on July 25. Hinkle has been held at South Central Regional Jail on the bond violation since Aug. 3, according to the jail's website.
In January, Hinkle was involved in a scuffle with a Charleston police officer at the IHOP restaurant in Kanawha City after Hinkle had celebrated his 30th birthday at a different bar.
After that incident, U.S. Magistrate Judge Mary E. Stanley ordered Hinkle to stay away from bars and to stay at home between the hours of 11 p.m. and 5 a.m.
On Monday, Hively asked Stanley to allow Hinkle, a former Kanawha County school bus driver, to remain on bond with electronic monitoring, noting that his sentencing date is Oct. 28.
Assistant U.S. Attorney Blaire Malkin asked Stanley to revoke Hinkle's bond, noting that the incident at the bar was the second time Hinkle had violated the terms of his bond.
Malkin said it was an "unlikely coincidence" that Hinkle happened to be at a bar where other Pagans were socializing. There was evidence that indicated he had been inside the bar with his girlfriend, and had tried to go out the back door when the police arrived, she said.
Stanley told Hinkle that she didn't believe his explanation, and ordered him held without bond pending his sentencing.
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Corey Charles "Mohawk" Hinkle said he was at the Pour House to pick up his mother.Advertiser
"When I read the police report, I didn't believe what you told the police, and I don't believe it now," she said.
On July 8, Hinkle pleaded guilty to one count of aiding and abetting obstruction of justice. Acting on orders from Floyd "Jesse" Moore of St. Albans, the club's national vice president, Hinkle removed a large container containing clothing that Pagans had commandeered from another motorcycle club from the Pagans' clubhouse in St. Albans in February 2009, according to a stipulation of facts attached to his plea agreement.
At the time, Hinkle knew that federal authorities were investigating the Pagans and collecting evidence against them, the stipulation states. Some members had been subpoenaed and testified in front of a grand jury.
"The topics of the searches and the grand jury testimony were discussed frequently and often among members of the PMC," the stipulation states.
Moore was concerned that the government would seize the clothing as part of the ongoing investigation, according to the stipulation.
Hinkle put the clothes in a garbage bag and gave them to someone else to destroy, according to the stipulation.
Although the crime Hinkle pleaded to can carry a prison sentence of up to 20 years, Hinkle entered into a binding deal with prosecutors which set the maximum sentence at one year and one day.
Hinkle was one of 55 defendants named in a 44-count racketeering indictment against members and associates of the Pagans unsealed in October. While many entered plea deals in federal court, 17 out-of-state defendants pleaded guilty to misdemeanors in Kanawha Magistrate Court and paid $5 fines, and their federal charges were dropped.
Prosecutors dropped all charges against another six defendants after a judge ruled that they had to be paid wages or some other tangible benefit before they could be charged with illegally acting as bodyguards for a convicted felon. Five other defendants entered pretrial diversions, in which prosecutors agreed to let the charges go away if the defendants can stay out of trouble for one year.
Reach Andrew Clevenger at acleven...@wvgazette.com or 304-348-1723.
