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Dowaliby was convicted of murdering his 7-year-old stepdaughter, Jaclyn.  Police initially assumed that the window, through which an intruder had allegedly entered to abduct Jaclyn, had been broken from the inside of their home.  There was more broken glass on the outside than on the inside but forensic analysis established that it had been broken from the outside.  During the investigation, Dowaliby and his wife, Cynthia, had followed police advice not to talk to the press, but such refusal had made them appear guilty.

At trial, for which both Dowaliby and his wife were charged with first-degree murder, the prosecution presented a witness, with a history of mental illness, who stated that he saw someone with a nose structure resembling Dowaliby on the night the victim had disappeared and near where her body was found five days later.  This witness, Everett Mann, made this identification from an unlighted parking lot 75 yards away on a moonless night.  The prosecution also presented 17 gruesome autopsy photos that are disallowed in many jurisdictions because they serve to prejudice a jury.  The trial judge gave Dowaliby's wife a directed verdict of acquittal, but the jury convicted Dowaliby.

Afterwards, in an interview, the jury forewoman said that fist marks on the door of a bedroom were critical to the jury’s decision to convict Dowaliby.  These marks appeared in one of the evidence photos, but were never mentioned by either side.  The jury concluded from these marks that Dowaliby had a terrible temper.  In fact, they had no bearing on the case, as they had been present years earlier, before the Dowalibys had moved into their home.  The jury forewoman also said, that if given the chance, the jury would have convicted Dowalibly's wife as well.

An appeals court reversed Dowaliby's conviction in 1991, on the grounds of insufficient evidence.  The case came to a legal end in 1992 when the Illinois Supreme Court declined to hear an appeal by the prosecution.  The case is the subject of a book, Gone in the Night: The Dowaliby Family's Encounter With Murder and the Law by Protess and Warden (1993) (NL)  [12/06]

Julie Rea was convicted of stabbing to death her 10-year-old son, Joel Kirkpatrick.  Julie maintained that a masked intruder stabbed her son.  The intruder also left a bruise over her eye and an inch deep gash on her arm.  A physician noted that Julie's injuries, such as the horizontal scrapes on her knees, did not appear to be self-inflicted.  In escaping, the intruder ran through two sets of glass doors.  One wonders if Julie would take the unpredictable risks of hurling herself through two glass doors, just to stage a crime scene.  If Julie tried to stage a crime scene, the prosecutor was not impressed as he complained the house was too neat for there to have been a struggle.  Julie stated that her conflict with the intruder was more of a chase than a struggle.

Despite the bloodbath found in her son's room, Julie was found with no blood on her except for a small transfer pattern presumably caused by her contact with the intruder.  Her toilets, sinks, washer, and dryer were found free of blood.  A search of her septic tank and the lines leading to it failed to reveal the presence of any blood.  Her ex-husband, Len Kirkpatrick, with whom Julie had a bitter divorce, had recently gotten residential custody of Joel, because he remarried, allowing Joel to have a two-parent home.  The prosecution alleged that Julie's thinking regarding custody was, "If I can't have him, nobody will."  Julie was not charged until three years after the murder.  No new evidence had surfaced after the initial investigation, but her ex-husband and chief accuser had become a sheriff's deputy in a neighboring county.  He had vowed in writing to "destroy her."

After the case was featured on "20/20," serial killer Tommy Lynn Sells confessed to the murder.  Sells was a cautious killer who liked to kill but learned to avoid danger to himself.  He would often kill sleeping victims, as awake victims were more dangerous.  After a would-be adult victim sent him to the hospital for a week and to prison for five years, he stuck exclusively to killing children.  Sells is also a suspect in the Texas intruder murders of Devon and Damon Routier.  Their mother, Darlie Routier, has been sentenced to death for the murders.  The state denied Sells confession, but the confession is reportedly too accurate to be dismissed as coincidence.  In 2004, Julie's conviction was overturned because her prosecutor did not have the legal authority to try her.  She was acquitted on retrial in 2006.  (ABC News) (http://justiceforjulieandjoel.org) (NL)  [11/05]

After an intruder entered his home, and brutally murdered his wife, Marilyn, Sheppard was accused and convicted of the crime.  The Sheppard home was in Bay Village on the shore of Lake Erie.  Sheppard had an affair some months before and this was portrayed as a motive.  Sheppard had some wounds from the real attacker but the prosecution claimed these were self-inflicted.  Sheppard described the attacker as a bushy haired man and other witnesses claimed to have seen him.  Although its creator denied it, the 1963 TV series, "The Fugitive," was widely thought to be based on this case, due to obvious similarities.

Sheppard's defense was not allowed access to forensic evidence prior to trial.  When examined after trial, it found that Marilyn had apparently bitten her attacker as one of her teeth was broken outward, and that the killer must have been splattered with blood as the bedroom walls were all splattered except for a spot that was shielded by the attacker's body.  Apart from a small spot, Sheppard had no blood on him, nor any bite marks.  Backswing blood spatter indicated the attacker swung his weapon with his left hand, while Sheppard was right-handed.  Appeals based on this new evidence were denied.  Eventually a young lawyer named F. Lee Bailey got interested in the case, took it to the U.S. Supreme Court, and had the conviction overturned.  Sheppard was acquitted on retrial in 1966, but died at age 46 in 1970.  DNA tests in the 1990's revealed the attacker was a mentally ill man who had once worked at the Sheppard home.  [9/05]

Brewer was sentenced to death for the rape and murder of his live-in-girlfriend’s daughter, three-year-old Christine Jackson.  Christine had been taken from her home in the early morning hours and found dumped in a creek.  An intruder could have entered the home through a broken window.  Brewer was the boyfriend of Gloria Jackson, the victim’s mother.  Christine had been sleeping on a makeshift pallet of sofa cushions at the foot of the couple’s bed.  In the morning, the couple discovered that Christine was gone.  Two other children were present in the home.

In 2002, DNA tests showed that the semen from the Christine’s rape kit did not belong to Brewer.  Despite the test results, the prosecution has held Brewer for years, although in 2006 he was allowed out on bail.  The prosecution plans to retry him on the grounds that he assisted the unknown rapist in Christine’s murder.  It has refused to compare the DNA test results against the state’s DNA database, saying there is no database, but the assistant director of the state crime laboratory, says, “We’ve been up and running on our DNA database for years.”  (NY Times)  [10/07]

George S. Revelle, the CFO of Ozark Bank, was convicted of murdering his wife, Lisa, at their home in Fremont Hills.  Revelle told authorities that intruders broke into their home and shot his wife in a bungled extortion attempt.  He was convicted because he had a $500,000 life insurance policy on his wife and an old letter in which she criticizes him for being materialistic.

Five months into the investigation, the apparent murderers sent a confession letter to police. They said they were fugitives living outside the U.S. They stated George’s stepbrother had originally approached them about kidnapping George and forcing him to go to his bank so they could rob it. The letter writers revealed the location of a pond where the murder weapon was found. The prosecutor never investigated any of this evidence, except to test the stamp on the letter envelope for Revelle’s DNA.

Revelle's conviction was overturned in Nov. 1997 because an appeal's court found that his wife's note should not have been allowed as trial evidence.  On retrial in Dec. 1998, Revelle was acquitted.  (Beyond the Yellow Ribbon) (GNS)  [4/08]

Routier and two of her sons were attacked by an intruder in their Rowlett home at 5801 Eagle Drive.  The two sons died.  The prosecution claimed the attack was staged and convicted Routier of murders.  An investigator took steps to steer the investigation away from his son, who is now in prison for other violent crimes.  Prosecutors and the courts continue to stonewall against turning over or testing evidence that will prove her innocence.  (JD01)  (www.fordarlieroutier.org)  (www.justicefordarlie.net) (ODR)  [6/05]

Henry Watkins Skinner, also known as Hank, was convicted of bludgeoning to death his live-in girlfriend, Twila Busby, and stabbing to death her two sons, Randy Busby and Scooter Caler.  Hank was sentenced to death.  The murders occurred at 801 East Campbell Ave. in Pampa.  Hank, then 31, had been drinking earlier in the evening and passed out after taking codeine to which he was severely allergic.  A friend, Howard Mitchell, arrived to take Hank and Twila to a New Year’s Eve Party at 9:30 p.m., but he could not rouse Hank.

At the party Twila, 40, was stalked by her drunk uncle, Robert Donnell, a big man, who made rude sexual advances.  Twila became agitated and asked Mitchell to take her home.  She arrived home between 11:00 and 11:15 p.m.  Shortly afterwards she was bludgeoned to death.  Her younger son Randy was stabbed to death in his bed.  Her older son, Elwin “Scooter” Caler, 22, was also stabbed, but managed to escape to a neighbor’s yard where he collapsed on the porch.  He never regained consciousness.  The neighbor found him and called police at 11:59 p.m.

It is believed that after the attacks, Scooter revived Hank and led him outside, but left him in an alley.  Hank suffered a cut on his right palm that night, possibly from stumbling.  Other than that possibility, Hank suffered no noticeable harm from the attacks, either because Scooter scared off the intruder(s), or the intruder(s) were only interested in attacking Twila and her sons, and Hank, being comatose, posed no threat.  Hank managed to find his way to a different neighbor’s house, the home of Andrea Joyce Reed, where he was arrested three hours later.  Following his arrest he was unable to stand on his own for police photos.  After being photographed, he was then taken to a hospital to give blood samples.  The samples, taken six-and-a-half hours after the murders, showed a blood alcohol level of .21, more than twice the legal limit for intoxication.  Tests also revealed high levels of codeine in him.  Hank could not have drunk alcohol at his neighbor’s house as she was a recovering alcoholic and did not allow it in her house.

Autopsy results of Twila showed that she suffered a skull fracture that required great manual strength of someone wielding a club to inflict.  Hank, besides being in a stuporous state at the time of the murders, was only 5’9” 140 lbs. and had a handicapped right arm.  His right hand was too handicapped for him to have inflicted the strangulation injury found on Twila.  Whoever strangled her was strong enough to inflict bone fracture.  In contrast to Hank, Scooter towered over him at 6’6” 265 lbs. and was in good health.  Yet allegedly Hank was able to manually injure him and two other victims, without receiving any defensive wounds or bruises, aside from the possibility of his palm cut.

At the time of the murders, a witness, Ronnie Campbell, then in the county jail, phoned the house.  Scooter answered and Ronnie heard an unidentified man who was not Hank speaking with Twila.  On speaking to the frightened Scooter, he asked to speak to Twila but was told that she was speaking to "some guy."  Ronnie claimed that he heard Twila "screaming hysterically in the background."  Ronnie’s jailer confirmed that Ronnie reported the conversation to her shortly after it occurred.  Hank’s appointed attorney called neither Ronnie nor the jailer at trial.

The neighbor, Ms. Reed, who aided Hank after the murders, was threatened with being charged as an accessory after the fact and with harboring a fugitive.  She was also threatened with having her children taken away.  In response, her trial testimony made it seem as though Hank forced his way into her home and that he was physically capable of committing the murders.  She later felt remorse and signed an affidavit saying he did not force his way in and that he was unable to stand on his own.  She said that she had to practically carry him wherever he went in her house.

After Twila left the New Year's Eve party, her uncle, Robert Donnell, reportedly left 5 minutes later.  There was some evidence that Twila was raped.  She was found with her pants unzipped and her blouse was pushed up over her abdomen.  Although vaginal samples was preserved in a rape kit, police refused to test it.  Donnell's truck was identified by a neighborhood boy as being present at the time of the murders.  Following the murders Donnell thoroughly cleaned his truck, replaced the carpets, and repainted the exterior.  He was never questioned by the police.  He was later killed in a drunken auto accident.

Hank had been something of an irritant to the district attorney’s office and to the sheriff’s office.  He was an outspoken advocate of prisoner’s rights and had participated in inmate lawsuits.  He had many interviews in the Pampa newspaper on the way the prior sheriff, Jimmy Free, treated inmates in the jail and violated their rights.  He was previously arrested on a bogus burglary charge, but by demanding a rare examining hearing, got the matter dropped before he could be indicted.  Hank is still imprisoned as of 2007.  (www.hankskinner.org) (ODR)  [4/07]

Army Capt. MacDonald, wife Collette, 26, and two daughters, ages 5 and 2, were attacked by intruders to their home.  MacDonald survived with wounds including a collapsed lung.  MacDonald was acquitted of the murders at a Ft. Bragg Army hearing and probably would not have been tried again had he not angered the prosecution by criticizing them during interviews on national TV.  MacDonald's Army acquittal meant that he could not be court-martialed, but he could still be tried in federal court and he was.  Before his federal trial MacDonald invited author Joe McGinniss on his defense team to write a book and hopefully help to establish his factual innocence.  At that trial MacDonald was unfortunately convicted.

Author McGinniss, who prior to publication acted like he was MacDonald's best friend and biggest supporter, revealed his personal morality by writing a best-seller Fatal Vision in which he portrayed MacDonald as a monster.  MacDonald sued McGinniss.  At the lawsuit trial McGinniss had famous authors like Joseph Wambaugh and William F. Buckley defending journalists right to lie or tell "untruths" to people in order to obtain information that they would not get if they behaved honestly.  Jurors, uneducated in such rationalizations, were appalled.  McGinniss ended up paying the imprisoned MacDonald, $325,000 to dismiss the suit.

Two of the intruders to MacDonald's home are known but the Army refused to investigate them because one is the daughter of a retired Army colonel.  She is also a known drug user and an informant for the Ft. Bragg military police.  MacDonald's in-laws were overwhelmed by the tragedy and wanted him to visit the graves every day.  Some time after the Army hearing, MacDonald was offered a job in California, which his in-laws insisted he not take.  They threatened him in front of witnesses, "If you move you'll live to regret it."  When MacDonald moved, his father-in-law turned against him and said he became convinced of MacDonald's guilt.  MacDonald is pursuing DNA tests and hopes that such tests will exonerate him.

Proceedings prior to MacDonald's trial and the trial itself were a mockery of justice in the suppression of evidence favorable to the defense.  At trial, the prosecution argued that there was no evidence of intruders in the MacDonald household, but it was later shown that there was plenty of evidence.  A second book was written about the case, which is pro-defense, entitled Fatal Justice.  (Crime Library) (www.themacdonaldcase.org) (48 Hours)  [7/05]