Michael Benson's True Crime Bundle

by Michael Benson

  Only a couple of minutes after the call from Denise ended on an ominous note, at 6:23 P.M., another call came into the emergency center.

  Operator: “Police Emergency. Operator Bonnell... . yes, what’s the problem?”

  The call was from a woman identifying herself as Sabrina Muxlow, who said she had solid information that her dad’s cousin Mike King had a girl tied up in his car. The dispatcher asked Sabrina for her address and she gave it, a home on Junction Street in North Port.

  “How do you know this information?” the operator inquired.

  “My father just called me and told me.”

  “Now, what would your dad’s cousin be doing with this female?”

  “The man [came] over to my dad’s house and borrowed a shovel, a gas tank, and something else.” She knew there was a third item, but she couldn’t remember what it was. After that, King got back in his car and drove off.

  The operator began asking for names, but the woman stopped cooperating.

  “My father wants to remain anonymous,” she said.

  “Where does your father live?”

  “In North Port.”

  “How did your father know there was a woman in the car?”

  Sabrina didn’t know, but she did know the captive woman had tried to escape. “The girl came up out of the car, but my dad’s cousin put her back in the car.” For a moment, her father had seen enough of the woman to see his cousin had her tied up.

  Did her father have any idea where his cousin was going with this female?

  Sabrina said no.

  “Okay, we’ve been looking for this female.”

  “You have.”

  “Oh, yes, we have a helicopter up looking for her. You are just so wonderful to call on this information.”

  “Yeah.”

  Seven minutes later, at six-thirty, the emergency operator in Charlotte County received a call from a woman who was driving in her car along a local thoroughfare. She was on her way to visit her sick grandmother in Fort Myers. It was raining, she drove a small car, and she was staying off the interstate as she coursed North Port. There were too many people on I-75 who drove like maniacs. So she was on the parallel road and had to deal with stoplights.

  “911. Where is your emergency?”

  “I’m on [Route] forty-one going south, and I’m at a cross street right now. I’m on Chamberlain. I just crossed Chamberlain, and I’m on forty-one going south. I was at a stoplight and a man pulled up next to me, and there was a child screaming in the car.”

  “What type of vehicle was he in?”

  “It’s a blue Camaro, like in the nineties or early 2000s or something.”

  “Okay, it was a baby or—”

  “No, it was a child.”

  “How old?”

  “You know, it’s dark, and I turned to look at him. He’s a white male. Sort of light-colored hair. Sort of plump. He’s behind me now, and I tried to slow down so that he can pass me and I could read his license plate.”

  “Ma’am, don’t hang up.”

  “I’m not.”

  “Okay.” There was a pause in the conversation, fifteen to twenty seconds, as the dispatch operator relayed the information she had already received. Then she was back on the line. “Okay, where are you now? Forty-one south?”

  “I am. I’m going to pass a cross street, and I believe he is still behind me. It’s Jenks Drive. I’m just crossing it and I’m going very slow, like thirty-five miles an hour, on forty-one.”

  “And he’s behind you?”

  “I believe he is behind me. He has not passed me. And he’s going slower than I am, which is not like, I mean, we’re holding up traffic and stuff. I think he saw me look at him. I don’t want to be overdramatic here, but he’s going even slower now. Is he pulling over? No. There is something going on because he is going even slower now. He is right behind me. I don’t know if the kid was, I don’t know ...”

  “What is your name?”

  “My name is Jane—Okay, he’s pulling over into the other lane now. Jane Kowalski. K-O-W-A-L-S-K-I.”

  “And give me your cell phone number in case I lose you.”

  Kowalski complied hurriedly so she could resume describing what was going on.

  “Okay, he’s going to turn. Oh, shit. He is going to turn left on Toledo Blade. He is turning left right now. I—I—I’m in the other lane.”

  “You’re going southbound and he’s turning left on Toledo Blade.”

  “Right, and it’s like a blue, I want to say like a Camaro type of car. White male. And there’s a kid in the backseat and they kept banging on the window.”

  “Left on Toledo Blade. About how old is this child? Can you tell me?”

  “I didn’t see the child. I’d say less than ten. Definitely not an infant. Old enough to bang on the window.”

  “Okay, seven to ten?”

  “I don’t know. Five to ten. Okay, now it’s green. There are green arrows, and he’s going now.”

  “He’s turning left on Toledo Blade?”

  “Yeah, do you want me to ... Do you want me to turn? Try to follow him? Or ...”

  The operator could be heard saying, “Okay. Does he want her to follow him?” Returning her attention to the caller: “Can you turn?”

  “Oh, oh, he just turned left on Toledo Blade. I don’t know if I can catch up. There’s a bunch of traffic and I can’t get over. Um, oh, boy.”

  Again the operator could be heard relaying a message: “There’s a child in the car somewhere between five and ten that was banging on the window.”

  “And screaming,” the caller added.

  “And crying,” the operator said.

  “And screaming!” the caller corrected. “Like screaming screaming. Screaming. And not a happy scream. It was a ‘Get me out of here’ scream.”

  “Left on Toledo Blade, and you say it was a blue Camaro?”

  “Blue or black. Very dark. He’s a white male. And I want to say sort of light-colored hair. Maybe a little plump in the face—not, I don’t think, obese. I am way past him now. For me to go catch him, I don’t know if I’d ever be able to go back. I mean, I would never stop him. I’m not going to put myself at risk.”

  The operator asked the caller to repeat her name and cell phone number. Jane Kowalski once again said her name, clearly enunciating, then spelling it.

  “I mean I hope they weren’t just playing around,” Jane said. Then, looking at the big picture, she revised that statement. “To me, it sounded like the kid was frightened and panicky.”

  “Okay.”

  “But, um, I don’t know. Instead of taking a chance, I just wanted to make sure I called it in.”

  The operator was typing: CALLER LAST SAW A BLUE OR GREEN CAMARO TURN LEFT ON TOLEDO BLADE FROM HWY 41 SOUTHBOUND CAMARO WAS DRIVEN BY W/M WITH LT HAIR AND THERE WAS A CHILD ABOUT 5-10 YRS OLD SCREAMING IN THE VEH AND BANGING ON THE WINDOW COMP CALLED IN THINKING THIS CHILD MAY HAVE BEEN INVOLVED IN A POSS AMBER ALERT SINCE THIS VEHICLE WAS ACTING VERY STRANGE.

  Yes, the witness had said “blue” or “black” and the operator typed “blue” or “green.” The car was actually green, of course, but this happy accident had no effect on what followed.

  “Well, I’m very glad that you did, ma’am. That’s exactly what you should do. Okay. Well, you lost him, and thank you now, and we really appreciate you calling us.”

  “Okay, can someone follow up with me? I mean ...”

  “Hold on, ma’am.”

  “Okay.”

  “Okay, hang on, ma’am.”

  “Okay.”

  The operator relayed the caller’s question and then could be heard saying, “The vehicle turned left on Toledo Blade from forty-one southbound. She is no longer with the vehicle. White male driver. Blue or black Camaro. Male had light hair and there was a child screaming in the car and ...”

  “And banging on the window,” Jane Kowalski prompted.

  “And banging on the window,” the operator
relayed. She returned her attention to the caller and said, in an apologetic tone, “I’ve got everyone hollering at me, and ... just a second. Okay, I may need you to pull over, so bear with me.”

  “That’s fine. Okay. I’m going to pull over now, let me get over,” the caller said.

  “Yeah,” the operator said, again sounding as though she was apologizing for the inconvenience. “That would be great.” There was a moment of silence broken by the operator: “I am glad that you called in.”

  “Yeah, me too. I mean, I don’t know if there is an AMBER Alert out or something like that, but—”

  “Bear with me. And where are you pulling over?”

  “I just pulled over into the Toys ‘R’ Us.”

  The operator placed the landmark immediately: “Okay, the Town Center Mall?”

  “Town Center Mall. Yeah.”

  “Okay, that’s excellent.”

  “I’m from Tampa. I’m going down to Fort Myers to visit my sister, and I don’t even know where I am actually, but okay.”

  “You’re going where?”

  “I’m going down to Fort Myers to visit my grandmother and my sister.”

  Conversation could be heard on the operator’s end. Where was the caller exactly? Anywhere near the Chili’s restaurant? What make of car was she driving?

  “Tell me what kind of car you’re in?” the operator asked.

  Jane Kowalski said that she was driving a silver Mercedes.

  “Okay, if you’ll just sit there—and your doors are locked, right?”

  “Well, yeah.”

  “No, no, I mean ... I always have my car doors locked.”

  “That’s probably a good idea, actually. Yeah, okay, all right,” the caller said, now understanding that the operator, despite her assurances to the contrary, thought there was a possibility that she was in harm’s way.

  Now there was a long pause and all that could be heard was typing on the computer as the operator input the information she knew so far.

  The typing stopped and the operator could be heard saying, “Do they want to make contact with her? She’s pulled over.” More typing. To Jane, she repeated, “Hang on, bear with me here. Forty-one south, yeah, he’d be heading toward the interstate.” A loud sigh could be heard, but it was unclear if it came from the caller or the operator. “I appreciate you holding on, Jane.”

  “I just ... Well, actually, I hope it turns out to be nothing, really. I mean, I would never ...”

  “She’s pulled over in the Toys ‘R’ Us parking lot. Do they want contact with her?” On the operator’s end, a female voice could be heard giving the operator instructions, a list that brought a frustrated response. “I have that. I already gave that to you.” More instructions. “Okay, I’m asking you. Do they want to make contact with her? Okay, Jane, we have your phone number. If we need you, we’ll call you. You’ll be at that cell phone number if we need you, right?”

  “Absolutely. And don’t hesitate. I will give you whatever information I can give you.”

  “Okay, and we really appreciate you calling in.”

  “Yeah. Oh, God, I hope—man, oh man, okay.”

  “Thanks, Jane.”

  “Okay.”

  “Drive careful.”

  “Oh, I shall. Thank you.”

  “Bye-bye.”

  The communications supervisor tried to establish a patch between North Port and Sarasota and Charlotte Counties so there could be interagency communication regarding the disappearance of Denise Lee. One dispatcher thought the patch needed to be completed before she should “air the call.” Only minutes after Jane Kowalski hung up, there was a shift change, and the new people on duty didn’t even receive the partial messages that the old shift had gotten. Eventually the information from the Kowalski call was put into the Lee file, when someone realized that the struggling child could be a diminutive woman, and the blue Camaro could be green. But still, deputies on the road were not told to respond to the Kowalski call.

  Jane Kowalski sat in the parking lot, and sat and sat. She began to fume. She knew a little bit about 911 systems. She had, in fact, worked in the 911 industry. She’d worked for a company that developed 911 software and had been responsible for the software’s implementation.

  “I had personally installed the system with my engineers,” she remembered. “I’d spent a lot of time in call centers and seen how they handled calls.” One of the reasons she’d been so precise in the information she gave was the time she spent in emergency call centers. She knew the information that was needed and had given it to them in a calm, concise, and accurate fashion.

  She understood the philosophy of keeping the victim talking until the police arrived, which was a good rule if someone was breaking into your house or if you’ve been in an accident. Jane Kowalski was not the victim here, and the perp was miles away by the time she pulled into the parking lot and stopped.

  If the dispatcher who’d taken her call had been using a computer-aided dispatch (CAD) system, one used by emergency systems everywhere, she wouldn’t have had to ask the same questions over and over again. (In reality, Charlotte County did have a CAD system. It simply hadn’t, in this instance, been used properly.)

  “I was giving her exact locations,” Jane Kowalski later explained. There were five cop cars within a mile of her. If a CAD system had been in place, they would have been there by the time she hung up the phone.

  Instead, she sat in the parking lot. When Jane called a second time, they didn’t know who she was, and the best she could get from the dispatcher was “if we need you, we’ll have someone contact you.” Rightfully feeling that she’d done all she could do, Jane started her car and continued on her trip to see her grandmother.

  Later, piecing together what had happened, one deputy sitting in his patrol car estimated that he was sitting at one intersection just as Michael King drove past with Denise Lee in the car.

  At 6:50 P.M., a man called 911—apparently, the father of the woman who had called earlier about Michael King borrowing a gas can and a shovel. Because he did not want to get involved with any investigation, the man did not give the operator the whole truth. Caller ID at the police station revealed that the man was making the call from a pay phone, which, he hoped, would further assure his anonymity.

  Operator: “911. What’s the location of your emergency?”

  Man: “I’m not sure what the emergency is exactly, but I think there’s somebody that’s been taken and they don’t wanna be where they need to be, and they’re in a ’95 green Camaro in North Port somewhere.”

  Operator: “Okay, and how do you know this?”

  Man: “I don’t know. Just ...”

  He told the operator that the man dropped by to borrow a shovel, a gas can, and a flashlight. He asked what the items were for and the man said he had a lawn mower that had broken down and was stuck in a ditch. While they were pulling the requested items out of a tool shed, the caller saw the woman try to escape. She said, “Call the cops” before the visitor struggled with her for maybe thirty seconds and finally managed to push her back into the car and “took off.”

  “Did the man say anything to you about the girl?”

  “Yeah, he said, ‘Don’t worry about it.’”

  “Okay, the car was a green ’95 Camaro?”

  “Yup. With a black ‘bra’ on the front of it.”

  “A black ‘bra’?”

  “Yup. So ...”

  “But you saw them, right?”

  “Yes.”

  “And where was she?”

  “In the car.”

  “Do you know where they are now?”

  “I have no idea.”

  “Who did they take?” the operator asked.

  “Some girl.”

  “Do you know who the guy is?”

  “No.”

  “Anything else you can tell me?”

  “Nope.

  “Okay, hold on, okay? ... Okay, do you know anything else?”

/>   “Sure don’t.”

  “Do you know when you last saw them?”

  “Off of Biscayne.”

  “Where?”

  “Biscayne and Price. It’s hard to tell now.”

  “Is he gonna hurt the girl?” the operator inquired.

  “I have no idea.”

  “You saw them, though?”

  “Yeah.”

  “And where was she?”

  “In the car.”

  “Was she okay?”

  “She didn’t seem like she wanted to be there. Let me let you go.”

  “Can you give me anything else?”

  “No. If I find something out, I will.”

  “Can I get your name and number?” the operator questioned.

  “No. I want to be anonymous.”

  “Okay.”

  “I’ll call you back if I hear anything else.”

  “Okay, let us know if you hear anything,” the operator concluded.

  The caller hung up. The man’s attempt to remain anonymous was in vain. During Denise Lee’s 911 call, police heard King refer to his cousin Harold. As it turned out, King only had one cousin by that name, Harold Muxlow—and sure enough, he lived in North Port.

  Early that evening the nearby Lee County emergency operator received a call from a man who identified himself as Shawn Johnson. Earlier in the day, he’d been leaving his job in North Port and heading to Fort Myers, where he was living at the time.

  He was at a stoplight on U.S. Route 41 when he heard a cry for help. The intersection was Cranberry Boulevard (about three-quarters of a mile northwest of the spot from which Jane Kowalski called 911). Shawn said he’d rolled down his window and heard the cry again, several times.

  The weather was nice, although it had rained earlier, and even though it was late afternoon there was still light enough to see.

  Shawn didn’t know what to think at first. He thought maybe it was a joke. He looked over at the car next to him, where the cries seemed to be coming from. For a moment, he and the driver of that car were looking right at one another.

  There was something about the sounds of the subsequent screams, and there were as many as eight of them, that made him think this wasn’t a joke. It wasn’t an angry parent yelling at a kid or anything like that.