I meet Rev. David Croyle back in the early 20s when he was interested in purchasing the then WAVL 910 AM Radio station in Apollo Pa.
He asked me if I could stay on and engineer for him while he was under a LMA agreement with the current owner and he eventually asked me to do some engineering and security work for him at his location in Kittaning where he owned WTYM 1380 AM.
Unfortunately the agreement with WAVL fell thru and station was sold to some one else but stayed on their as engineer and for David.
David owned several joined buildings in downtown Kittaning on N Jefferson Street .One store front was his community Newspaper operations and also served as an small entertainment venue in the rear
the next store front was the family life chapel where he was minster the next store front was the Radio station Operations which included a low power TV studio and finally the last storefront was his apartment and storage
I took care of station engineering and also did minor electrical work for David in the buildings and fixed minor computer networking issues when he had them on a casual as needed basis.
Many in the community did not like David they saw him as a grifter and conman and a little on the weird side.
But David was a good man who did a lot to help his community.
He Ran for and became a Armstrong County Commissioner and that's when the problems started .
Including several break ins and having to update his security alarms and cameras. Some one was not happy he had become commissioner and was determined to see him done in.
But Davids world would come crashing down 2 days before he was ready to launch his new FM translator when he and a Fire Marshal from community across river from his where Arrested
https://www.cbsnews.com/pittsburgh/news/church-pastor-fire-marshal-teen-boy-sexual-assault/
David had little money for defense and a friend put up most of the money to defend him.
While he was out on bail David came to my fathers funeral and swore to me he was innocent and was being set up by those who he had dirt on who where corrupt and stealing from the public. including high ranking Armstrong politicians and Judges .
Davids attorney asked for and was denied a change of venue this should have been automatic grounds for appeal due to fact David was a commissioner.but appeals judge ignored Davids appeal after his conviction.
After reading the trail transcripts I saw many legal challenges which where missed and should have been explored including the Grinder Account a gay meet up site on Davids computer which I never saw when working on them for him.
Plus knowing there had been several small break-ins that as far as I know David reported to police it would have been easy to plant evidence.
The 14 year old in the case also had a history of lying and false accusations according to David who hired him to deliver copy's of the paper he printed.
David claimed photos of him supposedly having sex with the kid where not true and he had marks on him he could prove that it was not him.
But despite all the questionable stuff to the case David was convicted and served his sentence of 5 years and was denied an appeal ..The fire Chief was convicted and committed suicide while on bail.
Davids friend who paid for his defense and kept his apartment paid for called me and said he had He developed cancer while in prison and asked for compassionate release again he was denied and he died just a few days after release.
David swore the truth would come out by Gods own hand when he was released ,and who knows Karma is one of those strange things.
Was David lying to me the whole time ? who knows and now we will never know . Hopefully some group or person in the years to come who has the time and money to take a hard look at the case come along and prove or disprove his accusations .
In the mean time I hope David and the victim have found peace.
.
