My name is David and I am the unfortunate victim of an act of vindictive criminal prosecution in Western North Carolina. Today I am publicly calling for the resignation of our elected District Attorney, Mrs Ashley Hornsby-Welch. Would you please stand up with me today by signing this petition and speak truth to power.

Ashley Welch represents the westernmost region of North Carolina, the 43rd Prosecutorial District includes all of Cherokee, Clay, Graham, Haywood, Jackson, Swain Counties.

Beginning in August 2022, I was arrested and falsely accused of a crime that I did not commit. I am and remain 100 percent innocent.

I refused the state’s plea deal on more than ten occasions. I was then subjected to four calendar years of pretrial confinement for a low-level Class H Felony and a misdemeanor charge. On April 5, 2023 Mrs Welch’s assistant D.A. attempted to blackmail me into accepting a plea deal that I didn’t wish to sign. I was threatened that the State would “drop the charges against me and refile them the next day”. I was also told at that time that the eight previous months of jail credit which I served would not be accounted for “unless you accept the plea deal on the table right now!” I still refused the offer and they made good on their threats by dismissing the charges without prejudice and refiling the charges only one hour later on the same day. This was one of many manipulations and schemes the district attorney pulled against me.

I was neither afforded an opportunity to have a pretrial bond hearing, nor was I represented by effective counsel. These 5 different useless and ineffective court-appointed “public pretenders”, who acted at the pleasure of Welch and State interests, deliberately filed continuances for years, prolonging my unjustified detention. I was deprived of my constitutional protections and even though I filed a pro se Motion for Speedy trial, the district attorney’s office disregarded my request and Welch did everything within her power to hamper my defense through these delays and by the withholding of exculpatory evidence that would have proven my innocence.

Meanwhile, the county government deliberately and intentionally violated my due process rights by initiating an illegal and unconstitutional “quick-and-fast” delinquent property tax foreclosure sale against my home of 20 years. They didn’t bother to serve any process on me or afford me the opportunity to a hearing on the matter. The D.A.’s office also seized my van subject to my arrest and denied me due process on that matter as well. 

The collusion of Welch, the Jackson County Sheriff’s Department, the local judicial officials, the Clerk of Courts, the Tax Collectors Office and the County Tax Attorney to deprive me of a hearing before swiftly acting to deprive me of my property rights was one of their most notable “achievements” in this calculatedly cruel attempt to ruin and undermine an innocent man. 

County government officials have proven themselves to be aggressively manipulative, underhanded and corrupt. They only serve themselves and are merely imposters acting in their public capacity. I would also like to call on NC Attorney General Jeff Jackson to start an inquiry or investigation into these unconstitutional acts of local government.

The end result of this four year ordeal is my current situation of homelessness. The prolonged confinement was both intentional and deliberate. 

I was unwillingly forced to serve more than four times the maximum sentence for the alleged offense prior to my trial. When the trial was finally scheduled last August, Welch and her assistant D.A. fabricated evidence against me. The criminal case itself was merely speculative in nature and the evidence was 100 percent circumstantial.

Welch suborned perjury against me, even inviting my 93-year-old neighbor to bear false witness against me, resulting in my wrongful conviction. When I filed my notice of appeal, the trial judge abused his authority and discretion by setting an appeal bond twenty times greater than my pretrial bond, with the purpose and intention of keeping me indefinitely detained in the Sheriff’s custody, even through my appellate review. 

I was given no other choice except to file a Petition for Writ of Habeas Corpus with the North Carolina Court of Appeals and they noted the trial court’s abuse of discretion. The State Appellate Court appropriately responded to my habeas petition by ordering my immediate release from custody on November 21, 2025.

Friends, let’s stand together today and say enough is enough! Let’s call on District Attorney Ashley Welch to resign from public office today and demand for her to issue an apology for her disservice to this community through her questionable legal tactics and vindictive schemes against the public.

Signed,
David Windseth of Sylva, NC