A criminal case against a Bradford Township man accused in a neighbor dispute has been dropped.
Richard D. Yovichin II, 60, was awaiting trial for 21 misdemeanor and summary counts including stalking and terroristic threats. Court records indicate that a request to nolle pross the case was granted Aug. 5.
Yovichin still faces charges in an apparently unrelated case in Foster Township.
District Attorney Stephanie Vettenburg-Shaffer indicated the decision to nolle pros the case was related to a second case involving the ongoing neighbor dispute.
“The Assistant District Attorney filed a motion to nolle pros a case following the Superior Court’s decision in another case involving the same defendant. In that case, the defendant was convicted and sentenced.”
A jury found Yovichin guilty in 2019 of charges of recklessly endangering another person and propulsion of missiles onto a roadway. Yovichin filed an appeal, and the state Superior Court recently overturned the conviction, asserting insufficient evidence.
“The Commonwealth agreed with the jury’s decision in that case in which it convicted the defendant and we are disappointed that the Superior Court overturned the jury’s finding. However, we must accept its findings,” Shaffer said.
Regarding the decision to subsequently drop the other case, she explained, “Each case has to be analyzed based on the strengths of evidence and most recent law, including Superior Court reasoning.”
Shaffer noted that a third case against Yovichin is still pending.
Yovichin is scheduled to appear for a preliminary hearing Wednesday for a new case on allegations from June 23 at Keystone Fireworks in Foster Township. He faces misdemeanor charges of recklessly endangering another person and disorderly conduct.
According to the criminal complaint in the new case, store video footage showed Yovichin walk into the store, then flick a lighter at an employee at the front counter. Yovichin proceeded to shop, picking up two packages of fireworks and approaching a different employee at the front counter.
Yovichin flicked the lighter next to a package of firecrackers, “which seemed to light some black powder on the outside of the box,” the complaint stated.
When the employee asked for Yovichin’s ID, he showed identification from the Federal Correctional Institution at McKean, from where he retired. The employee explained he needed to show a valid Pennsylvania driver’s license, and Yovichin left the store.
He is free on $2,500 unsecured bail.
There is one reminder of Yovichin’s alleged threatening behavior that still hangs over his neighborhood: a lack of mail delivery.
Home mail delivery was suspended in the neighborhood in spring 2019 for allegations that Yovichin threatened a mail carrier. The U.S. Postal Service investigated the allegations in-house, and the results of the investigation have not been made public.
Mail delivery has not resumed there, a neighbor indicated on Monday.
