Episode 2: Jane’s trial

S1: Told to stand up. Put my hands behind my back. Handcuffs on and I'm taken into custody.

S2: Jane da tics life had taken a dramatic change from just the day before her husband , Bob , had gone missing on a run. Then his body was found by the side of the road. Sheriff's deputies were investigating the death as a homicide , and now they'd claimed they found the culprit. On February 16th , 2000 , two days after Bob's body was found , deputies got a search warrant for Jane's home. Remember , from the first episode , they had already been in and out of the house dozens of times. It's not usually the best police practice , but now they had an official warrant. They searched Jane's house , focusing on her bedroom where the blood was found. Then on the evening of the 16th , the whole family was gathered in the living room. There was Jane , plus her two sons , Alex and Nick. Her daughter Claire. Claire's friend Sean. Alex's girlfriend. Nicole and Jane's sister Bonnie. Here's how Bonnie later described what happened in court transcripts. Detective Rick Simpson and Janet Brzezinski came in and asked us. Asked Jane if she if she knew how or why there would be any blood in the master bedroom. The detective's theory became that Jane was motivated by marital problems and money issues , so she killed Bob in the bedroom by beating him on the head. Then she dressed him and his running clothes , dragged him out to her truck , drove him to the side of the road and left him there. And that theory would dominate the next 20 years of Jane's life and shapes who she is today. Before Bob was killed , Jane was a middle class white woman who assumed the criminal justice system worked just fine. Now she has become a hardcore criminal justice activist. And even now that she's free , she's devoting her life to going to protests , rallies , conferences , all advocating for ending life sentences completely , even abolishing prison for women entirely. Jane's story also highlights a massive change in how murders are investigated and prosecuted. Her husband's murder came during a time where science was big in the courtroom , with a lot of experts who analyze blood spatter patterns , bite marks , tire tracks , gunpowder residue. But now , 20 years later , much of that scientific analysis has been found to be , well , not very scientific. In Jane's case , her initial defense attorney didn't contest any of the quote unquote science presented by experts , and what eventually won her freedom was an incredibly methodical and careful analysis of each scientific method and the way the experts were sloppy. But Jane didn't know all of that back in February 2000. All she knew then was within three days she'd gone from working with the detectives to being led away in handcuffs. Jane's sister Bonnie said detectives told Jane they were going to get a search warrant , that the master bedroom was closed off and no one was to go in there. Bonnie asked the detectives if Jane would be able to sleep in her bedroom that night , and they said it was going to be a long night. And I said , you know , will she be able to sleep in her own bed and her bedroom tonight ? Because this has been really hard for her , and she's already really traumatized. And I want to know if she's going to be able to sleep in her own bed. The detective said it was unlikely. Jane began realizing the detectives might be looking at her as a suspect , so she made an offer. She said she'd take a polygraph. So they went down to the car to take Jane to the station for a polygraph. But her sister was telling her over and over to wait and get a lawyer first. That's when she changed her mind and said , I need an attorney. And at that point , she was placed under arrest for the San Diego Sheriff's Homicide Department. This was shaping up to be a high profile murder. And this was just two years after a different bungled murder case attracted a media circus. In 1998 , 12 year old Stephanie Crowe was found stabbed to death on her bedroom floor. Her 14 year old brother and two of his friends were initially accused of the murder. A year later , during jury selection for the trial , police found they'd made a mistake. They found Stephanie's blood on the sweatshirt of Richard to it. A man who was unhoused , addicted to drugs and diagnosed with schizophrenia. The Da did not want something like that to happen again. They wanted to lock in a murder conviction , and quickly they charged Jane with murder and everyone prepared for trial.

S3: Part of what makes it a newsworthy is that , you know , we look for people that people can identify with.

S2: This is O'Neill Soto , who was assigned to cover the trial for the San Diego Union Tribune.

S3: Um , and so part of what made this newsworthy is that it was a , you know , a couple that were living not exactly in the suburbs. I don't know that Valley Center is a suburb , but it's certainly a , um , you know , a well-to-do part of town.

S2: It's a prominent equestrian community.

S3: Uh , they were , you know , horse people. So there was interest there because of of that. She's an executive. So she's not just a , uh , you know , somebody who has had a life of crime. Um , it's got this , uh , mystery to it in terms of , you know , it's entirely a circumstantial evidence case. Um , nobody says I saw her do it. Nobody says , uh , there's no confession. Um , so it was interesting from , from that perspective in that , you know , it had a lot of pieces that are , um , that were attractive as a news story.

S2: As O'Neill sat in the courtroom , the evidence looked quite damning. The prosecution went one by one through a mountain of scientific evidence. They said tire tracks near Bob's body matched those from Jane's truck. Rope was found around Bob's neck , and it matched the type of rope found at Jane's house. They looked at the contents of Bob's stomach. It was partially digested dinner , which they said meant he was killed Sunday night after dinner , not Sunday morning after breakfast when he went on his run. They detailed all the places that Bob's blood was found in and around his and Jane's bedroom on a wooden stove , in the bedroom , on the walls and floor , under the mattress. And maybe most damning , they said they found Jane's bloody fingerprint on a syringe filled with horse tranquilizer.

S3: You have this evidence that is like something out of a crime novel. You have , you know , a bloody fingerprint on a syringe with the dead guy's blood inside the syringe.

S2: Quick note Bob's blood was not found inside the syringe. You know.

S3: You have these three tires that are , you know , unlike that , they don't match on a , you know , a pickup truck with tires from three different manufacturers. You have this rope , uh , that appeared to be , um , you know , that was found on him that was also , uh , existed at the ranch , and you had this bloody scene that was cleaned up that , um , where there was so much blood that had dripped through the floor onto onto stuff below.

S2: Jane had hired a private defense lawyer named Carrie Steigerwald , and he faced a decision push back on this evidence. The way it was collected , the way it was tested , the science it claimed to follow or accept the evidence completely and come up with a different defense. He went for the second option to come up with a different defense , and what he picked was truly bizarre. Jane told our producer about it over zoom.

S1: So my daughter came to this and she said , mom , Carrie and Dennis , Dennis , the investigator , they have a plan and we want you to go along with the plan. And Harry and Dennis say , if you go along with this plan , there's no way they're going to get you. And that part of it sounded good to me , but Claire never said to me what the plan was.

S2: The plan was to blame Claire for the murder , to accept the prosecution's argument that the murder happened in Jane's bedroom. But to say that Claire was the one who did it. The defense hinged on tricky family dynamics. Jane's two sons favored their father , while she and her daughter Claire were really close. Again , here's O'Neill Soto , the reporter.

S3: So before any trial starts , the lawyers will try to clear up some of the issues so that they don't have to do that in front of the jury. And one of the issues , uh , was that was highlighted was , I mean , Carrie Steigerwald said , I need to blame the daughter. I need to have the instruction saying , I can blame the daughter.

S2: Carrie Steigerwald wanted to introduce into evidence a letter Claire had written to her father , Bob.

S3: He had introduced the letter from Claire to her father , saying , you know , our relationship is over. Things have to change. I'm not going to take your abuse anymore. I mean , those are my paraphrases of it. But that letter that that he introduced , I mean , that was also a bombshell in terms of not only now do you have a woman accused of killing her husband , but now you also have her daughter accused of killing her father. I mean , this is stuff that goes , you know , into Greek tragedy mode , into Shakespeare mode.

S2: Adding to the Greek tragedy Shakespeare ness of the whole thing was the fact that Jane's sons testified against her. They told prosecutors about what happened when they visited their mom in jail.

S3: So he's visiting her in jail. He's saying , hey , what's going on with this bloody syringe ? What was it about ? And she didn't answer him directly. She said that , you know , she was afraid that everybody would start questioning her. So that was used by the prosecution , as , you know , evidence of her guilt. Because , you know , here she has an opportunity to tell a loved one that she's not guilty. And instead of answering that question , she says , I was afraid that everybody would start questioning me. Um.

UU: Um.

S3:

UU:

S3: But I think the more important issue is you have a son who's willing to believe that his mother is a killer , to the point where he is testifying in her trial against her.

S2: Today , Jane still doesn't speak to her sons. And when our producer asked her about them , she didn't want to say much.

S1: It's heartbreaking , and it's hard to talk about. Um , I blame I blame the lies that I know. They were told by the detectives in my case , and I know it because I listened to them , probably tapes of what they were told. So it's really all I'm going to say about it. It breaks my mind.

S2: She didn't want to talk about her sons , but is very willing to talk about her case.

S1: I mean , I want to be open and upfront about all of what happened to me in the hopes that it can help prevent it from happening to someone else. Um , but again , it's I often feel like and say this to some of my peers who are involved in criminal justice reform. It often feels like you beat your head against a brick wall to to change things , you know ? And , um , I it's a tough uphill battle , but it's mostly people are just not aware because they don't think about the prison system.

S2: It's not a spoiler to say Jane's defense plan failed Miserably. The science held up in court , and the jury did not buy the idea that it was really Jane's daughter who had killed Bob. Her original defense lawyer , Carey Steigerwald , didn't respond to interview requests , but we did speak with Jane's latest defense attorney , Mike Kowalski. He believes Jane is innocent , but he also says he will defend people he isn't so sure about.

S4: And if I don't think the truth is on my side , then I really want to focus on the burden of proof and how high that burden is , and whether or not the prosecution can meet that burden , and I'll focus on that.

S2: He says the quote unquote , blame the daughter strategy is never something he would do.

S4: What I tend not to do , what I almost never do. I may have done it very early in my career , when I was first trying cases and found that it really does not work , but certainly I've never used it in a serious felony , is where I fabricate a defense that my client doesn't believe in , that I don't believe in , and that feels like it's pulled right off of some corny television show. Um , that's not something that I would normally do. I am extremely I like to believe that I'm a very creative lawyer , and that my mind is open to all sorts of possibilities and defenses. Um , but I don't approach it as , um , uh , something out of Law and Order or LA law , um , or some other crime show. I mean , I really focus on the case and , and how best to present the truth as it is and not some Agatha Christie story.

S2: The jury didn't buy the Agatha Christie story. After three weeks of trial on June 5th , 2001 , they began deliberating. It took the jury a week to make a decision. When they came back to the courtroom , they announced they had found Jane guilty. She was sentenced to 25 years to life for the murder of her husband , Bob , a man she'd known since right after college. A man who was the father of her three kids. Someone she'd weathered all of the ups and downs of marriage with. But after her sentencing , she never gave up.

S1: The whole. Time that I was behind bars , and even when I was first sent to prison , I had this sort of overwhelming feeling that Bob is just going to show up somehow and rescue me from this. I mean , I had dreams about him , but I just felt like , I don't know , somehow he was going to come back and rescue me from this and the term will come out and it would all be over.

S2: Next time. Jane's life as a prisoner. Free Jane is hosted by me , Katie Hodgson. It's reported and produced by Clare Trager. Sound design by Am FM music. Additional producing by Lara McCaffrey. It was edited by David Washburn and Terrence Shepard. Web design by Brendan Nardi. And our news director is Terence Sheppard.