Convict’s Relative Says He Didn’t Tamper With Jury

RIVERSIDE -The brother-in-law of convicted arsonist and murderer Raymond Lee Oyler pleaded not guilty today to jury tampering charges linked to Oyler’s trial.

Christopher Vaughn Hillman, 47, faces seven felony counts of jury tampering and remains free on $250,000 bail.

He appeared before Riverside County Superior Court Judge Michael Donner, who set a felony settlement conference for Feb. 11.

Prosecutors allege that in late February 2009, during Oyler’s two-month trial, Hillman placed fliers of newspaper articles about the case on numerous vehicles in county parking spaces reserved for jurors in downtown Riverside.

The fliers contained information regarding Judge W. Charles Morgan’s decision to bar the defense from introducing evidence of possible third-party culpability in the Oyler case.

The former Beaumont mechanic’s attorneys, Mark McDonald and Tom Eckhardt, had wanted to argue that a former federal firefighter, Michael Karl McNeil, could have started some of the fires blamed on Oyler.

Three Oyler jurors discovered fliers on their windshields during a court recess, and sheriff’s deputies located fliers on other jurors’ vehicles as well, according to court papers.

According to sheriff’s investigators, evidence pointed to Hillman, who was arrested in August.

In March, the jury convicted Oyler of starting the 41,000-acre Esperanza wildfire, which caused the deaths of five U.S. Forest Service firefighters trying to defend a home north of Twin Pines on Oct. 26, 2006.

Oyler was also convicted of lighting around two-dozen other fires in the Banning Pass and was sentenced to death.