Jerome Kowalski

On May 1, 2008 Richard and Brenda Kowalski were found dead at their Livingston County home in rural Michigan. Both had been shot. In the 911 call, their adult son named his uncle, Jerome Kowalski, as a suspect.

Jerome was addicted to alcohol, and after being questioned by police began to think it was possible he committed the crime but didn’t remember. When he was told the murder weapon was a 0.38 gun rather than the 9mm gun he owned, he realised he couldn’t have done it.

Lead detective Sean Furlong  started accusing Jerome’s sons of committing the murders. Jerome denied it. Furlong then threatened to bring them in for questioning.

Jerome claimed he didn’t want his sons to go through what he was going through, so he finally gave police a signed confession.

At trial, forensic pathologist Werner Spitz testified the time of death was in the middle of the night, when Jerome was working security at a military base.

Jerome’s attorneys expected to get the confession thrown out, but this was denied by Livingston County District Court Judge Theresa Brennan, who also refused to allow an expert on false confessions to testify, calling the expert witness “unreliable and irrelevant.”

However, Brennan was having an affair with the lead detective, failed to recuse herself and lied about the affair. She has now been removed from office by the Michigan Supreme Court, and pleaded guilty to a charge of perjury ( other charges were dropped ).

Jerome’s attorneys have requested a false confession expert be allowed to testify at the new trial, scheduled to take place in January. Shiawassee County Circuit Court Judge Matthew Stewart will rule on the motions on December 17, 2019. The retrial is set for January 20, 2020.

Excellent 3-part documentary ( with transcripts ) here: https://truecrimedaily.com/2017/06/07/judge-detective-love-affair-could-derail-double-murder-conviction/

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Michael P. McCarthy

On June 25, 2015 two-year-old Bella Bond’s unidentified body washed up on shore in a trash bag, on deer island in Boston Harbor.

Bella was the third child of Rachelle Bond, who had a lengthy criminal history. Rachelle’s first two children had been removed from her care, but the Department of Children and Families (DCF) nevertheless deemed Rachelle fit to care for Bella.

In July, police set up a tip line, and a woman called in who told them that the washed up child was Bella, and Rachelle had been behaving in a psychotic fashion when Bella was last seen, however there was no follow-up on the tip.

In September after Bella’s father Joe confronted Rachelle, police called to question Rachelle, but she jumped out of a window and fled. She then told Joe that Michael had killed Bella, and held her hostage for four months. When Joe became upset, Rachelle said “shut the F–K up, they are on to me, you’re going to get me bagged.”

When finally questioned by police, Rachelle told yet another bizarre story claiming Michael had killed Bella and “I couldn’t call the police or anybody after that as he held me hostage and had hitmen waiting outside of my house that would shoot me if I called 911.”

In spite of the changing, bizarre and impossible stories from a woman who was apparently mentally ill, police decided to charge Michael with murder, even though there was nothing to corroborate Rachelle’s impossible story.

At trial, Rachelle’s testimony was contradicted by the Medical Examiner. In spite of the obvious credibility problem, and no independent evidence to link Michael to the crime, the jury convicted Michael of 2nd degree murder after deliberating for just over four days.

Michael Doolin, a Dorchester criminal defense attorney who followed the case closely said he was very surprised by the verdict.

Jonathan Shapiro, defense attorney, said the verdict was a travesty of justice and incomprehensible.

News report and video on the verdict:
https://www.bostonglobe.com/metro/2017/06/26/jurors-bella-bond-murder-trial-resume-deliberations/CNxd2oc4Mlaj2lsubYjbEO/story.html

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Paul Skalnik – jailhouse informant

Paul Skalnik learned about the benefits of being a jailhouse informant when he was in the Harris County Jail in Texas in 1978 for passing bad checks.

Skalnik had drained his wife’s checking account, used her good credit to buy a Lincoln Continental and a customized Dodge van, and opened credit cards in her name, according to a New York Times Magazine investigation with ProPublica.

Skalnik was in jail when police began asking inmates for information on the “Moody Park Three,” anti-police-brutality activists who were charged with inciting a riot. Skalnik called the DA’s office and said he could help.

In court, Skalnik told jurors that one of the defendants had confessed to him in prison that his plan all along was to “incite the Mexican American youngsters.” The defendant and his two co-defendants were convicted.

Skalnik soon learned how his information would benefit him in Florida, where he had been convicted of grand larceny and sentenced for violating probation. Prosecutors recommended he that Skalnik be moved from jail to work release.

Since then, Skalnik’s testimony helped send dozens of people to prison, including four on death row, according to the article. In Pinellas County, Florida, alone, Skalnik testified or supplied information in at least 37 cases from 1981 to 1987.

Read more here

Juan Corona

Juan Corona was framed by Edward Wayne Edwards and John Gotti for the murders of 25 migrant farm workers found buried in shallow graves in peach orchards along the Feather River in Sutter County, California, in 1971. ( Two trials ) Juan died in prison, March 2019.