The Dowaliby Mystery

The unsolved murder of a child. The parents under suspicion. Long before the Jon Benet Ramsey case there was the mysterious murder of Jaquelyn Dowaliby. The murder stunned the small town of Midlothean Illinois. Was she taken in the night or was she taken by her own Family? Before it was over her Father would be in prison for her murder and then released. Leaving way more questions than answers. This story serves to illustrate that the person you most likely suspect is not always the suspect and some cases simply don't have any answers.

In September 1988, the children of Midlothean Illinois, 21 miles southwest of Chicago, were heading back to school. While most kids were pining over the end of summer, seven year old Jaquelyn Dowaliby was already looking forward to Christmas. On Friday evening, September 9th she put on her favorite nightgown and went to bed clutching a gift catalogue. Her grandmother, who was living with the Family remembers that night. Anna Dowaliby says she wanted to pick a gift out for everyone and she was circling them in the catalogue. And then she went to sleep. Around 9:45 Saturday morning her Mother Cynthia went to wake her. But Jaquelyn was not in her room.

Cynthia and her husband David checked the house and then phoned one of Jaquelyn's playmates thinking she might have gone out to play. But the little girl was nowhere to be found. The parents took their four year old Son, Davy, and made a fruitless search of the neighborhood. When they returned home Jaquelyn's Grandmother joined in the search. They all went outside in the street and yelled for Jaquelyn. Cynthia would later report that she searched the home again and discovered a broken basement window. David Dowaliby immediately called the police. Midlothean Detective's, Illinois State police officers and FBI agent's converged on the home. Their first thought was that Jaquelyn had been kidnapped.

In most cases of this sort a relative is the culprit. The authorities expected that there would be a ransom call and that the girl would most likely be returned. Cynthia told police that her ex husband Jim Getz, Jaquelyn's biological Father, had tried snatching her once before. The Dowaliby's said they suspected him right away. A few phone calls revealed that Jim Getz could not have abducted the little girl because he was in a Florida prison serving time for sexual assault. The family suggested Jaquelyn's Uncle, Timothy Getz. He had been diagnosed a paranoid schizophrenic and lived nearby. But he too had an alibi. The family then believed that Jaquelyn had been kidnapped by a stranger.

Jaquelyn Dowaliby's disappearance was made public that afternoon. Midlothean and surrounding neighborhoods were filled with young families. They were shocked by the news. David and Cynthia Dowaliby had been married five years earlier when Jaquelyn was two. At the time of her disappearance 26 year old Cynthia worked as a dietitian at a local hospital. Her husband, 31 year old David was a carpenter who had worked his way up to foreman. In nine years he had only missed one day of work... The day he adopted Jaquelyn. By all accounts David and Jaquelyn shared a special relationship. They enjoyed fishing together and often went bowling. The couple had a son, Davy, in 1984 and later moved into the house where David Dowaliby had grown up.

They had been living there for two years when Jaquelyn disappeared. The press was soon camped out at the Dowaliby home and at the police station. As the hours passed the police began taking a critical look at Cynthia and David's story. Cynthia explained that Jaquelyn had gone to bed around 10:00 PM and was asleep when she checked in on her a little after 11:00 PM. The police were skeptical of what the couple said must have happened next. The intruder, if there was one, would have had to climb through the broken window leaving a towel rack below it undisturbed, sneak up the stairs, walk down a hallway with a creaky hardwood floor, and enter Jaquelyn's room where her parent's were sleeping right across the hall.

Then, just as quietly, make off with the seven year old. According to Kevin Shaughnessy an Investigator from the Illinois State police that sounded unbelievable. David said that after waking up the next morning around 7:45 he noticed the front door was open and he closed it.He told the police he hadn't been concerned because he assumed his Mother had forgotten to close it when she went out the night before. He then made breakfast for Davy and watched TV. Police found the whole scenario difficult to believe. The only indication police could find of an alleged intruder was the broken window. There were no strange fingerprints and nothing was seemingly out of place. David's indifferent reaction to the open front door struck police as odd.

As night fell there was still no sign of Jaquelyn. She was reported missing on Saturday, September 10th, 1988. It appeared an intruder had kidnapped her in the middle of the night from her bedroom. After a day went by Midlothean police set up a task force and canvassed the area. Everyone involved knew time was running out. But early on the police made several crucial mistakes in searching for Jaquelyn Dowaliby. They never cordoned off her room or made a through search of the house. A State evidence technician took photographs of the broken basement window, where the break in occurred, but failed to get close up pictures of it. He dusted for fingerprints on the window and front door but not on the back door.

Friends keeping vigil with the Dowaliby's passed the time by cleaning. Incredibly, they swept up the glass from the broken window. The police actually watched the people in the house clean the house from top to bottom and whatever evidence that was there was now gone. That afternoon Cynthia and David both agreed to take a routine lie detector test. David passed but the polygraph examiner said Cynthia was to upset to take one. By Sunday night Jaquelyn was still missing. On Monday, two days after Jaquelyn's disappearance, the police asked that the couple be fingerprinted and provide blood and urine samples. The Dowaliby's readily cooperated. Police again questioned them, this time separately.

They noted that some of David's responses seemed suspicious. They claimed that he referred to Jaquelyn's disappearance as "the accident". David would later insist that he said "incident", not "accident". Nonetheless the police began to consider that the parents might be involved in Jaquelyn's disappearance. Perhaps Jaquelyn had fallen prey to some form of abuse. Police hoped they would be proven wrong and would find Jaquelyn alive. The search for the missing girl went on. There was an outpouring of assistance from local residents. They tied yellow ribbons around trees and organized community searches. The task force was flooded with calls about the case. But for the police the most compelling information always seemed to point back to the family.

On Tuesday an evidence technician suggested the basement may have been broken from the inside, meaning the parent's may have faked the crime scene. Slowly the suspicions of the police began to spill over into the press. Reporters repeatedly tried to talk to the Dowalibys. David's sister Rose read a statement thanking people for their support but Cynthia and David remained silent. On Wednesday September 14th, 1988, five days after the little girl's disappearance, the Dowalibys agreed to take a second lie detector test. Cynthia's was inclusive do to her emotional state. This time the authorities came to the tentative conclusion that David was not telling the truth. He was held at the police station and interrogated for another five hours.

That same evening around around 6:00 PM, the body of a young girl was found in an overgrown field behind an apartment complex four miles from the Dowaliby home. Peggy O'Connor, a friend of David and Cynthia's heard the report on the radio. The little girl was still wearing her favorite nightgown. She lay wrapped in her comforter with a 25 foot rope wrapped around her neck and her soiled underwear lay two feet from her body. It was Jaquelyn Dowaliby. Though she had been missing for only five days, hot weather and an infestation of maggots had caused her body to decompose quickly. The medical examiner determined that she had probably been strangled but he could not tell if she had been sexually molested.

At the time of the discovery, police were still questioning her Father David. They would not tell him about finding Jaquelyn's body for another hour. Police pushed him for a confession. David insisted he was innocent. When officer Kevin Shaughnessy finally revealed the truth, David didn't believe him. Suspicions were one thing but the police had no solid evidence against him and he was released. Friends and family began to gather at the Dowaliby home to pay their respects. Jaquelyn Dowaliby's funeral was held three days later. Public pressure mounted to find the killer. But the police no longer thought the murderer was on the loose. They were now convinced that David and Cynthia Dowaliby had killed their own Daughter.

The police were under increasing pressure to answer that question. But hasty police work had made it difficult to build a case against either David or Cynthia. The task force who at first was assigned to finding the little girl was now assigned to find out who killed her. The Dowaliby's were soon under siege. On the advice of their attorney they stopped talking to police. Investigators publicly accused them of not cooperating. The day after Jaquelyn's funeral 20 police officers arrived at the Dowaliby's home with search warrants and collected five bags of evidence all under the watchful eye of the news cameras. In the months that followed no new developments were announced but the police hinted that they were still focused on the parents.

Two days before Thanksgiving police arrested Cynthia and David Dowaliby and charged them with first degree murder. Prosecutors allege that Jaquelyn was killed in the home, perhaps in an accident, and that David disposed of the body. They also said that they had two eyewitnesses who said they had seen David in the area where the body was found. But there were still many unanswered questions. The biggest was why would seemingly loving parent's do this to there Daughter? Also was there really enough evidence to convict them or had there been a rush to judgement? The other big story the day of the arrest was that Cook County States Attorney, Richard M. Daley whose office had investigated the Dowalibys announced that he was running for Mayor of Chicago.

Some critics have questioned the timing of Daley's announcement insinuating that he used the murder for political gain. It took a year and a half for the murder case to come to trial in Chicago. And it turned out that all of the evidence the state had touted in the press was not all that convincing. Prosecutors still could not offer a motive. But by law they don't have to. Their argument was simple. They were sure that no outside intruder entered the house, therefore the Dowalibys had to be the killers. Prosecutor argued that an intruder would have made noise, left fingerprints, or disturbed something while he was in the house. He also noted that the towel rack under the broken window was untouched and that there was an even layer of dust at the alleged point of entry.

The defense shot back that since the police never did a through search of the house it was impossible to tell where the intruder might have entered from or what he did while he was inside. Besides, the so called dust on the basement window ledge looked like a reflection. Though the prosecutor said they had two eyewitnesses it turned out that they only had one. He was a male resident of the apartment complex next to the field where Jaquelyn's body was found. 35 year old Everett Mann testified that he was coming home around 2:00 AM Saturday morning when he saw a car in the parking lot pulling away from the edge of the field. The eyewitness could not confirm whether the driver was black or white but that the car was similar to the Dowalibys and that the driver had "a large nose".

He had picked out David Dowaliby from a series of mug shots. Everett admitted under cross examination that he had made his "nose identification" from 75 yards away in a dark parking lot. The state rested without the smoking gun it had promised. But the defense often stumbled on cross examination and failed to connect with the Jury. Neither David nor Cynthia testified on their own behalf a move some saw as a strategic error. Perhaps the biggest obstacle the Dowalibys had to overcome were the autopsy photos of Jaquelyn. The prosecution argued that the gruesome photos were necessary to show the time and cause of death. The defense thought they only prejudiced the Jury and that they should have not have been allowed in evidence.

But the photos did not sway Judge Richard Neville. Before closing arguments he advised the attorneys that he granted Cynthia a directed verdict meaning she was acquitted. The Judge ordered that his decision be kept secret because David's fate would rest with the Jury. In closing the prosecution argued that no one was in the house that night except her parents. The defense retorted that David and Cynthia Dowaliby had been railroaded. They said that under enormous pressure to solve the emotional charged case police had unfairly focused on the parents. It took three days before the jury announced the Jury had reached a verdict. The Jury found David Dowaliby guilty of first degree murder and concealment of a homicide.

The courtroom erupted when the verdict was read and at one point Cynthia shouted out "how can you do this?". Anne Dowaliby thinks it is ironic that the one person who was probably the kindest to the little girl was the one being punished for her murder. Former States attorney had been criticized for allowing the Dowaliby case to go forward. Now as Mayor of Chicago, he defended saying "people doubted the investigation and the indictment but those professional trial lawyers did an outstanding job". Still many observers were stunned that the Jury had not found room for reasonable doubt. In an interview with a local reporter the forewoman of the Jury made an extraordinary revelation about the verdict. She said that the evidence photos that showed fist marks in the door leading to Jaquelyn's room was critical to their decision.

But the prosecution nor the defense even mentioned the holes in the door. Never the less the Jury had apparently leapt to the conclusion that David Dowaliby had a horrible temper and had punched the walls and therefore could have certainly murdered his Daughter. As it turned out the marks had absolutely no relevance to the case. They had been made years earlier long before the Dowalibys had even moved into the home. The forewoman also said that if they had been given the chance they would have convicted Cynthia as well. The Dowalibys hoped that these unfounded biases by the Jury might favorably affect David's sentencing or maybe even convince the Judge to overturn the verdict. In June 1990, the Dowalibys broke their media silence. Cynthia gave an interview to the Chicago Tribune. David spoke from prison.

Both said they were innocent. David said he was devastated when he had not woken up while his Daughter was being abducted. The media barrage did no good. In July 1990, the Judge went forward with sentencing. He received 45 years in the Stateville maximum security prison. But the weakness of the prosecution's case made many people wonder if David was really guilty. Friends of the Dowalibys formed the Freedom Committee to help secure David's release. One member offered a $10,000 reward for information about Jaquelyn's real killer. Peggy O'Connor led the group. One of the Dowaliby's biggest supporter was Chicago appellate attorney Robert Bynam. At first he didn't believe the Dowaliby story. But as he got to know the facts of the case and got to know the Dowalibys he began to realize that a great injustice had been done.

Since the family was now nearly destitute, Bynam offered to handle the appeal for free. The attorney scoured the trial transcript to come up with a strategy. On June 12th, 1991 Bynam presented his argument in the David Dowaliby case to the Illinois appellate court. Public was so great that for the first time a television was allowed to record the proceedings. Murder convictions are notoriously difficult to overturn. The higher courts are not inclined to tamper with a Jury's decision. Even so Bynam was confident. His goal was outright reversal. He realized that you can't get exoneration out of a an appellate court. It wouldn't be easy. The three Judges bristled at the idea that the state had unfairly targeted the Dowalibys.

The Judges also criticized the prosecution for showing the Jury 17 photographs of Jaquelyn's decomposing body. Most appellate hearings last 20 minutes. Cynthia Dowaliby watched nervously as her husbands hearing dragged on for 2 1/2 hours. The court had three options; affirm the conviction, order a new trial, or reverse the decision altogether meaning David could never be retried for his Daughter's murder. The opinion came down five months later in October. It said, in part "although there are many unanswered questions the totality of the evidence is not sufficient to prove David guilty". David Dowaliby had won an outright reversal. On November 13th, 1991 after spending nearly 18 months in prison, David Dowaliby was released. The unanswered questions in the case of Jaquelyn Dowaliby linger.

Her murder is unsolved. For the investigators the reversal is a bitter pill. Many are certain David is guilty. The case has been scrutinized every which way their can be and there is still no agreement on what the appropriate verdict should be. However when there is a doubt it should go to the defendant. Mayor Richard M. Daley was invited to give his opinion in a press conference. He sarcastically replied "I guess appellate courts can do what ever they want, maybe we should do away with Juries". For the Dowalibys and there supporters there is no vindication. They say Jaquelyn's killer is still out there. Unless someone volunteers information about the crime, it will remain a mystery.