Kevin Brian Dowling
Summary of Cases
Kevin Brian Dowling was charged with of the robbery
of 43-year-old Jennifer Lynn Myers. Fourteen months after the robbery,
when Dowling was out on bail, Myers was murdered. Dowling was convicted
of both crimes and sentenced to death for the murder.
Myers was robbed by a gunman on Aug. 5, 1996 at the
shop she owned named Tailfeathers Gallery and Custom Framing in West
Manchester Twp., Pa. At the time of the robbery, a police officer, Peter
Haines, saw the apparent robber leave Myers' shop and get into his car
about 10:50 a.m. The suspect crossed the street right in front of his
eastbound moving police cruiser to his car parked on the eastbound
shoulder. An elderly passenger, William Jarmon, in the car ahead of
Haines, also saw the suspect. Neither was aware a robbery had just
occurred. Several miles down the road Jarmon’s car was passed by a car
that in all likelihood was driven by Kevin Dowling. After passing
Jarmon, Dowling got stopped at a red light, with Jarmon getting a good
view of it as his car, driven by his wife, pulled up behind it.
The next day Jarmon read a newspaper account of the
robbery that included Haines’ sighting of the suspect. After convincing
himself that the car which passed him was the same as that used by the
robbery suspect, Jarmon called the police. Nine days later, following
hypnosis, Jarmon identified the car as 1991 or 92 Lincoln Town Car, a
model type which matched Dowling’s car. However, Officer Haines had
given a much different description of the suspect’s car. He described
the suspect’s car as having a slanted rear-end and a license plate with
a white background. Dowling’s Lincoln had a boxy rear-end and a license
plate with a dark background.
Police collected car registrations of Lincolns which
fit Jarmon’s description from nearby counties including Lancaster where
Dowling’s car was bought and registered. A few weeks after the robbery,
Dowling started a new job at a Sheetz convenience store in Hanover, Pa.
and began commuting to it five days a week, passing the robbery location
each way. Evidence suggests police noticed Dowling, found out where he
worked, and informally asked Myers to stop at his store and
see if anyone there reminded her of the robber.
At the time of the robbery Myers said the assailant
wore a dark cap and aviator style sunglasses. She said he had held a gun
in his left hand, dropped it, and picked it up with his left-hand. The
assailant had a military or police demeanor and told her that he had
just gotten out of prison and did not want to go back. Dowling is
right-handed, had no military or police training, had no prior
convictions, had never been imprisoned, and did not own any clothing
that matched the assailant's. Myers described her assailant as being in
his late forties, about 5'6" tall, and weighing about 185 lbs. Dowling
was 38 years old, at least 5'11" tall, and weighed 205 lbs. He had a broken pair of sunglasses (non-aviator) in his car when
arrested four months later. Officer Haines, who saw the robber leave the
store, agreed with the physical description given by Myers.
Following the robbery, a U.P.S. delivery driver, Gary
Altland, arrived at the victim’s shop at 11:00 a.m. He said she reported
she had been robbed at gunpoint and tied up. She told him that the
robbery was a joke which she would handle herself and did not want
police to be called. Altland left and mentioned the crime to a woman at
a nearby animal hospital who called police at 11:09 a.m. He told police
he did not see a suspect or vehicle. Myers called police at 11:15 a.m.
perhaps because she saw an Officer Crider arriving the same minute.
Prior to the robbery Myers had worked for a man named
Randall Turner but had left to start her own business in a building
Turner rented to her. She told witnesses including Jacqueline Rutledge
and Marie Ellis that she suspected Turner of being behind the robbery.
Jennifer’s husband, Steven, also suspected Turner of being behind the
robbery and said it was rumored that Turner “had people who would do
things for him.” Months later Dowling’s defense counsel Karen Kuebler
told him that police and D.A. Stanley Rebert believed Turner had hired
him to commit the robbery. Kuebler became uncooperative after becoming a
prosecutor, but her handwritten notes verify her statement. Following
the murder Turner shared the proceeds from the sale of Myers’ business.
Three months after the robbery, during a follow up
contact with police, Myers mentioned that two weeks before she had
stopped at a Sheetz convenience store in Hanover, Pa. and saw a man she
said reminded her of the robber. Police never mentioned asking Myers to
visit the store. Instead they acted as though Myers’ report was made on
her own initiative. The apparent “lineup” identification of store
employees requested by police failed as Myers picked a person other than
Dowling.
A police report states that the man Myers identified
was wearing a Manager nametag. The store she went to trained store
managers for the region. On any given day there were 1 or 2 Assistant
Manager trainees and 1 or 2 General Manager trainees along with clerks
and a Training General Manager. Assistant Managers wore Manager
nametags. Dowling was a General Manager and wore a nametag that said
Kevin. This nametag is noted in a police report. Myers said she was “not
certain” that the man she saw was the robber. She had said she could not
visually identify the robber as he was wearing sunglasses and a hat. She
never went back to the store to specify which Associate Manager she
meant. Police arrested Dowling for the robbery because he drove a car
identified by witness Jarmon and worked at the store identified by the
victim supposedly on her own initiative.
The day before Dowling's arrest, Myers suddenly
remembered she had been sexually assaulted as well as robbed. Such a
remembrance may have been encouraged by the police in order to create
juror prejudice against the person they planned to charge with the
robbery. At Dowling’s trial, 20 months after the crime, the U.P.S.
driver, Gary Altland, would change his account of his encounter with
Myers to accommodate this alleged assault. At trial Altland claimed that
Myers came down the steps tossing ropes off, with a torn blouse and a
bra up around her neck. He claimed she said the robber tried to rape
her. An Officer Crider testified he arrived at 11:15 a.m., and found the
victim on the phone to police then herself. He was not told about an
attempted rape, her clothes were in order, and he saw no rope marks on
her wrists or ankles, as Altland claimed. Altland also claimed that he
saw something go by him quickly as he was bringing in packages and then
heard tires squealing and horns blowing. In connection with the robbery
Dowling was also convicted of an attempted sexual assault of Myers.
Ten months after Dowling's arrest, while he was out
on bail, Myers was shot to death at her new shop in Spring Grove, Pa.
The following day Dowling's attorneys filed a motion on their own to
dismiss the charges against him because the case could not proceed as
their client was now unable to confront the victim with her past
statements when others accused him on her behalf. Dowling did
not speak to his attorneys until after the motion was filed. The timing
of the motion raised suspicion that Dowling killed Myers to get the
robbery case against him dismissed. The trial judge delayed ruling on
the motion, giving police and prosecutors two months to meet with other
witnesses and coach new statements from them about what Myers allegedly
told them. None of the witnesses’ statements were reported to the police
prior to the murder. These statements were ruled admissible as “excited
utterance” exceptions to the ban on hearsay testimony.
On the day of the murder, Dowling went fishing at
Muddy Run Lake and Recreational Center in Holtswood, Pa. He said he
planned to fish the whole day but because the fish were not biting, he
left at 11:05 a.m. to go to Adult World entertainment establishment in
Harrisburg, Pa. Adult World and the fishing lake are both about an
hour’s drive from the scene of the murder. Adult World is also about an
hour's drive from the lake. Dowling was in Harrisburg at 12:57 p.m.
which according to the prosecution was when the murder occurred. He then
returned to the lake to fish, arriving there about 2:30 p.m. Dowling was
known as an avid videotaper and would likely have videotaped himself
fishing even if he did not have a second use for his video. He made short clips of
himself fishing containing comments to his family and children. When he
returned to the lake after his Adult World trip, he altered the time on
the videorecorder so that the next four clips appeared to be made while
he was away from the lake. He did not want his wife to guess that he left the lake as she would have questioned him on where he went.
Dowling also made clips with the correct time for the remained of his
fishing trip.
Early the next morning, while Dowling was working an
overnight shift, police came to his house and questioned his wife about
his whereabouts the previous day. She told them he spent the day fishing
and showed them the videotape, which police seized. At Dowling’s trial
the prosecution presented the videotape as a false alibi intended by
Dowling to fool detectives investigating the murder of Myers. However,
neither he nor his attorneys presented it as an alibi or in a notice of
alibi. He told his attorney the day after his arrest for the murder that
he was at Adult World at the alleged time of the murder and within days defense
investigators visited the location.
Dowling’s leaving the lake was more or less public
knowledge to everyone except his wife. Clarence Hess, the agent who
rented a boat to Dowling, knew full well that Dowling came to the lake
at 10:20 a.m., left at 11:05 a.m., and returned at 2:30 p.m. Hess
noticed that upon his return Dowling parked his car in a different spot,
closer to his boat. Hess even saw Dowling videotaping himself in the
parking lot. Dowling was the only person who rented a boat that day.
Dowling avoided returning his boat to Hess at 11:05 a.m. so he would not
have to pay for a second rental upon his return. Hikers in the area,
along with Hess, saw
Dowling’s boat tied up on the shore of the lake during the midday hours.
The victim was found dead in her store at 3:07 p.m.
Since entering customers would likely have seen her body and reported
the murder, it appeared that she was killed just minutes before. But
police soon learned that Hess gave Dowling a 2:30 p.m. alibi at the lake
and a 1:27 p.m. road trip alibi to the lake. So police had to set an
early time of murder if they hoped to keep Dowling as a suspect. They
set the time of murder to 12:57 p.m. It implied no customer or other
person entered the store for more than 2 hours, a highly unlikely
scenario for most stores. The police gathered some
witness evidence supporting their time of murder, but none of the
evidence is compelling. Dowling's defense did not comprehend the time of
murder issue and failed to dispute the time at trial.
The day after the murder Steven Myers told police he entered the front
door of the store, walked towards the counter, and observed his wife lying on the
floor behind it. Police apparently did not like the implication that his
wife was highly visible to customers and induced Steven Myers to change his story. At trial Steven
said that he walked through the front room, saw no body, walked through the
back room, and then on re-entering the front room, happened to glance
down and see his wife’s body.
Dowling’s court alibi prevented him from
arguing at trial that he was at any location other than Adult World
during the alleged time of the murder. Nevertheless, after the alibi was filed,
the prosecution went and hired an astrophysicist named Robert Boyle to
dispute the timestamps on the fishing videotape which Boyle did at
trial. Boyle had done work for NASA. Presumably the prosecution was
trying to create the impression for jurors that the fishing tape was an
airtight alibi intentionally made by Dowling to cover up the murder
and that they had to hire a top space scientist to dispute it. Boyle
determined or tried to determine times that several video clips on the
fishing tape were made using the angle of the shadows that the sun cast
on objects in the video. He selected single frames of each clip to
analyze.
Boyle’s stated results were that the video clips Dowling
made at 10:44 a.m. and 3:05 p.m. had correct timestamps but the
timestamps of three clips made in between had incorrect stamps. It was
not clear how much Boyle was influenced by the statements Hess gave
police, but he completely agreed with him.
Years later the Court TV show Forensic Files produced
and aired a TV episode entitled “Shadow of a Doubt,” that focused on the
alleged videotape alibi being scientifically disproved by Boyle. The
show’s producers did not consult with Dowling or anyone connected with
his defense. Two other TV episodes were produced about the case, one by
the series American Monster and another by the Investigation Discovery
series Solved. Both also focused on the alleged alibi as proof of guilt.
There is much evidence that Dowling had been at Adult
World on the day of the murder. He knew the name of a visiting out-of-state
dancer who worked the 11 a.m. to 3 p.m. shift. He
knew the layout of the rooms; that there was a $6 fee for the theater; that patrons were given a ticket so that they could leave and return
again the same day. Visible security cameras in the parking lot and in a store
area likely recorded Dowling. A review of the recorded tapes might have
completely confirmed his visit. Unfortunately the tapes were reused every
week and were not requested in time.
Numerous witnesses saw the apparent murderer in the
hours before the murder. Two school bus drivers, Karen Wood and Kim
Able, saw the murder suspect in a parking lot near the murder scene
between 7:50 and 8:20 a.m. A third witness saw the murder suspect in the
same parking lot between 10 and 10:35 a.m. when she went into a store to
shop. She said that after she exited the store at 10:50 a.m., the
suspect almost hit her with his car. According to witness Hess, Dowling
did not leave the lake until 11:05 a.m. and could not have arrived
before 12:05 p.m.
Much evidence implicates other suspects in robbery
and murder. One of them is the Randall Turner mentioned above. Another
is Howard Poteet, a man who went on a robbery spree in the York County
area. In his known robberies Poteet wore clothing similar to those
described by Myers. In 1995 Poteet had spent months in prison on forgery
charges before being paroled 9 months before Myers' robbery. Myers'
robber told her he had recently been in prison and had no desire to
return. Poteet was also known to have been in the general area of Myers'
shops at the times of the robbery and murder. He was known to return to
the same locations to commit crimes twice. A witness of the murder
suspect made a composite that bears a strong resemblance to Poteet. A
second witness identified a newspaper photo of Poteet as being similar
to the murder suspect she saw.
Another suspect in the murder is Steven Myers, the
victim’s husband. A pair of sunglasses were found near the decedent’s
body, and although Myers talked to police on the day of the murder, he
did not admit the sunglasses were his until days later, after it became
obvious that police were interested in them as a means of identifying
the murderer. It is not clear if Myers provided a copy of his work
timecard, but in any event he worked less than 10 minutes from the
murder scene and could presumably have slipped away from work for 20
minutes without punching out, possibly in the guise of taking a lunch
break or a smoking break. His employer, United Defense, had over 1000
employees so it is not clear that anyone would notice his absence.
The murder weapon was determined to be a .357 caliber
revolver, Smith and Wesson model. Steven Myers owned this same model.
Steven’s brother, Lonnie Myers, turned over Steven’s gun to the police
17 days after the murder. On TV episodes about the case police and
prosecutors repeatedly stated that it was ruled out as the murder
weapon. But the police gun analyst at trial explicitly stated it could
have been the murder weapon.
There was much evidence in the case that was withheld
from Dowling's defense during his trials or destroyed by the police. The
two 911 calls made reporting the robbery were destroyed by police along
with transcripts made of them. In 2001, three years after his
convictions, Dowling got photocopies of two boxes of withheld discovery
material from both of his trials. In it was proof that the prosecutor
coached and tampered with witnesses in both trials. In 2007,
Pennsylvania Governor Rendell signed a death warrant for Dowling.
Dowling's execution has since been stayed.
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