Fishbein decides to accept legal counsel

Van Wert independent

After a day of reflection, former Delphos business owner Robert Fishbein apparently decided that being his own attorney wasn’t something he really wanted to do.

Fishbein, who is currently serving a three-year prison term at the Southeastern Correctional Facility in Lancaster on charges of intimidation of a witness and telephone harassment, was indicted last Friday by the Van Wert County Grand Jury on eight new counts of violating a civil protection order, all fifth-degree felonies.

The original case stems from Fishbein’s obsessive harassment of a former woman employee of I&K Distributing in Delphos. Fishbein was CEO of the company at the time.

During his arraignment hearing Wednesday morning, Fishbein indicated he wished to serve as his own attorney in the case. However, Judge Charles D. Steele continued the arraignment hearing for a day to give the man time to mull over that decision.

In the end, Fishbein decided that having a regular attorney was a better idea and Judge Steele appointed Ryan Warnecke to represent him in future proceedings.

A pretrial conference was also scheduled in the case for 8 a.m. Wednesday, May 14.

From being a successful businessman, Fishbein’s life has spiraled downward after his indictment three years ago on 23 felony counts of telephone harassment, all but two of those felony offenses. According to court documents from his original case, Fishbein made hundreds of telephone calls to a former woman employee of I&K.

He also got in trouble after he used his cellphone in the third-floor lobby of the Courthouse just minutes after Judge Steele banned him from using any telephone, including at work. That resulted in Fishbein’s bond being revoked and him being jailed until he was sentenced in that original case.