photo by: Emma Delk

William Carman, right, remains expressionless as he and Assistant Public Defender Nicholas Yovich hear the guilty verdicts against Carman on first-degree murder and other charges Thursday in Ohio County Circuit Court.

WHEELING — After just a few hours of deliberation, an Ohio County jury found William Carman guilty of first-degree murder in the September 2021 death of a Mozart woman.

The jury also recommended that Carman receive life in prison without mercy. Carman stood trial this week in the murder of Anorah Schostag, taking the stand in his own defense Thursday.

The jury also found Carman guilty of first-degree robbery with a firearm and gross child neglect creating a substantial risk of serious bodily injury or death to a child. After the murder was committed, Carman left his daughter and Schostag’s son alone in the house.

Carman’s face remained expressionless as Circuit Judge David Sims read out the verdict, slowly sitting down when the judge told him to.

Carman’s attorney Martin Sheehan said “we’ll just have to see” as to whether Carman would appeal. Sheehan said he and Assistant Public Defender Nicholas Yovich have a “few rulings they are focused on with the judge” because they had “some objections to things that happened on the bench and a few issues in the case.”

Ohio County Assistant Prosecutor Shawn Turak applauded the jury’s decision.

“William Carman showed absolutely no mercy to Anorah Schostag and to her son, and I think the verdict is representative of a correct and absolute just result,” she said. “I thank the Wheeling Police Department, they did a fantastic job.”

Turak also thanked Sgt. Robert Safreed for his “incredible investigation” and his “hours and tireless work” in the investigation that led her to “the correct and just result.”

The defense’s case was built around Carman being made a “patsy,” and that his ex-wife Amanda Allison framed him for Schostag’s murder so Allison could then steal money and jewelry from her. Carman testified Thursday that he and Allison planned to rob Schostag’s house for drugs and money.

Carman recounted that while the robbery fell through, he decided instead to sell his gun to Schostag for drugs and money. He said that Schostag told him to go to the basement of her house and pick out an “item she couldn’t care less about” as part of the payment for the gun.

Carman recounted falling asleep on a couch in the basement when he went down, as he said he had not slept in “five or six days” due to being high on methamphetamines. According to toxicology reports, all three adults in the house had methamphetamines in their systemps on Sept. 17, 2021.

When Carman woke up, he said he went upstairs to find Allison and Schostag, saying he noted a bag at the top of the steps “haphazardly packed with a ton of random things in it.”

Carman said he found Schostag and Allison in the office and assumed they were making plans to go somewhere. He then claimed Allison pulled out a knife and stabbed Schostag.

Carman said he went to “separate them on instinct,” and was stabbed in the hand. He claimed he went downstairs to care for the wound and returned to find Schostag dead.

Turak began her questioning of Carman asking why he had covered up his face tattoos with makeup the entire trial, wondering if he was “trying to hide anything from the jury.”

Carman responded that he just wanted to put his “best foot forward” to the jury.

Turak then wondered if Carman was “overjoyed” when Allison told Carman in a jail call that she lied to the police by telling them the attacker she saw leave Schostag’s house on Sept. 17 was wearing a mask. To help “refresh his memory of the conversation,” Turak then played a snippet from the phone call.

Carman told Allison on the call, under the impression that spousal protection would prevent Allison from testifying against him, that she could “say whatever she wanted to these clowns.”

“Then when things go down, you can be like, ‘I’m not saying (anything),'” Carman added in the call. “You know that, right?”

At the end of the phone call, Allison reminded Carman that since she filed for divorce in October, she would have to testify.

Turak then had Carman clarify that Allison lied to the police to protect him, which he confirmed made him “very happy.”

“That was part of the plan,” Carman told Turak. “When I told her to leave the house after she had just done that, I told her that I would take the blame and that she could testify against me, but there wouldn’t be any evidence.”

Turak then asked Carman to confirm that he “planned to take the hit” for Allison, to which Carman responded, “that’s what love is.”

In her closing remarks, Turak reminded the jury of the crux of the prosecution’s argument that Carman committed first-degree murder, which is the “mountain of evidence” incriminating him, including “testimonies, photos, videos, physical evidence, scientific evidence and medical findings from forensic pathologists.”

Turak said it was “laughable” that Carman was trying to paint himself as the “hero trying to protect Schostag.” Turak added that Allison “had no motive” to kill Schostag.

Yovich’s closing argument contested the “mountains of evidence” Turak referenced, saying that “it looks good on paper,” but the forensic evidence does not tell the jury “who was holding what” when Schostag was murdered.

Yovich said all there was left to rely on was “human testimony,” which is why they had Carman take the stand to give “the other half of the story.”

In Turak’s final rebuttal before deliberation, she asked the jury to think about “what Anorah Schostag would have said if she could still testify.” She reminded the jury that Schostag’s now 5-year-old son has “been condemned to a life sentence without his mother” because of Carman’s actions that day.

“‘Tell my son my dying wish was for him to live,'” said Turak when speculating what Schostag’s testimony would have been. “‘Tell my son I’m sorry I couldn’t win that fight, my killer was too big, too strong and too heavily armed.'”

“‘Tell my son I will love him for the rest of his life.'”