A Fort Myers man jailed on two first-degree murder counts is asking for his attorney’s dismissal, saying his attorney has failed him.
Court records show that Wade Wilson, 29, in a letter written June 28 and filed with the courts July 5 asked Lee Circuit Judge Nicholas Thompson to dismiss his hired attorney, David Joffe.
According to the motion, Wilson claims that Joffe “has no intention” of helping Wilson win his case, as well as “no intention of providing effective counsel.”
Wilson said Joffe didn’t return for depositions in the case after taking a lunch break during a May meeting. Additionally, Wilson wrote, on June 14 Joffe wasn’t present for a separate motions hearing in the case.
“He disrespected this honorable court by not at all appearing,” Wilson’s letter reads in part.
Wilson is asking the court to hear testimony from his girlfriend Alexis Williams, 31.
As grounds for the motion, Wilson lists three separate statements allegedly made by Joffe regarding Wilson and Williams’ relationship and a fourth alleging Joffe wouldn’t file any motions in the case because Thompson “will only strike them.”
When Williams asked about seeking advice from another attorney, Joffe replied that Wilson will lose his case and any attempt would delay reaching “the same result.”
Wilson wrote that, based on his actions, Joffe has proven their attorney-client relationship is “damaged beyond repair, and a fair honest defense of the defendant without bias is unlikely.”
Wilson has at least twice faced additional charges since his initial incarceration at the Lee County Jail for the homicides in 2019. In April, he faced charges in a narcotics scheme.
According to an arrest report from the Lee County Sheriff’s Office, on April 20, a K9 found narcotics at the main Lee County jail, 2115 Martin Luther King Jr. Blvd.
More than two years prior, in October 2020, Wilson, along with a man accused in a domestic violence case, was thwarted in a bid to escape Lee County Jail.
Wilson and his cellmate at the time, Joseph Katz, 33, were both involved, authorities said.
When their roughly 10-foot-by-10-foot cell was checked, the only window in the unit showed signs of tampering with the metal frame holding the window removed and the thick security glass window showing several cracks in it.
The sheriff’s office report said Wilson was the primary planner and instigator of the attempt and that Katz could not have been ignorant of the attempt or not have taken part in it. Both men refused to make a statement to deputies after discovery of the tampered window.
Wilson already faced 12 charges, including the homicides of Diane Ruiz and Kristine Melton in Cape Coral.
Melton and Ruiz were killed within days of each other in October 2019. Melton was found dead in her home; Ruiz’s body was found in a field days after her disappearance.
Wilson also faces the possibility of the death penalty for each of the two victims and was indicted by a Lee County grand jury in November 2019. He has been in Lee County Jail since October 2019.
The News-Press couldn’t immediately reach Joffe for comment. Wilson is next due in court Thursday for all three cases.