Travis Soto case once again headed to appellate court

OTTAWA — Travis Soto’s long and winding journey through the Ohio criminal justice system kicked off its second tour last week when the Napoleon man charged with murder in the 2006 death of his son appealed a ruling denying the dismissal of new charges against him.

Putnam County Common Pleas Court Judge Keith Schierloh in June rejected a motion asking that a plea deal Soto had entered into with Putnam County prosecutors in 2006 — which resulted in a five-year prison sentence on child endangering charges — be upheld.

Soto’s attorneys maintained that the 2006 agreement effectively barred the state from bringing new charges against their client that include murder, felonious assault, kidnapping and tampering with evidence.

Schierloh overruled that defense motion on June 6, setting the stage for a jury trial inside the courthouse in Ottawa. On July 2 Soto filed several additional motions with the court, including a notice that Sheirloh’s ruling would be sent to the Third District Court of Appeals for an ultimate ruling.

Kandra Roberts and Randall Porter of the Ohio Public Defenders Office were appointed as counsel for Soto throughout the appeal process. A scheduled July 25 pre-trial hearing in Putnam County Common Pleas Court was vacated.

Soto was originally indicted in August 2006 on charges of involuntary manslaughter and endangering children related to the death of his son, Julio, in what he initially said was an all-terrain vehicle mishap. Soto entered into a plea deal with prosecutors and served five years in prison on the child-endangering charge. But in 2016 the Napoleon man walked into the Putnam County Sheriff’s Office and admitted he actually had beaten his son to death.

Soto was indicted on the new charges, but his attorneys filed a motion to dismiss all counts on double-jeopardy grounds, which prevent defendants from being tried twice for the same crime.

That motion was overruled in the local court, but the ruling kicked off a lengthy series of appeals surrounding the double-jeopardy argument that led the case from the Third District Court of Appeals to the Ohio Supreme Court. The U.S. Supreme Court declined to hear Soto’s case, and in August 2023 the Sixth Circuit of the U.S. Court of Appeals in Cincinnati agreed with the Ohio Supreme Court that the double-jeopardy clause of the U.S. Constitution does not bar Soto from facing the current charges, effectively returning the matter back to the Putnam County Common Pleas Court.

Soto continues to be held at the Putnam County jail, where he has served as a trustee in the inmate worker program.