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5 Years Later, Grisly Killings Unresolved

Tribune photo by JAY CONNER

Investigators search the backyard garage of Steven Lorenzo's home in this 2005 photo.

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By ELAINE SILVESTRINI

esilvestrini@tampatrib.com

Published: October 12, 2008

Updated: 10/12/2008 12:12 am

TAMPA - Suspected of helping Steven Lorenzo drug, torture and kill two men in his Seminole Heights home, Scott Schweickert had information detectives badly wanted.

They questioned him for hours. Although he denied knowing anything at first, Schweickert eventually gave a gruesome description of the men's violent deaths.

Steven Lorenzo

Despite the admissions, and convictions on drugging and conspiracy charges that sent Lorenzo and Schweickert to prison for decades, they have escaped prosecution in the slayings that could put them on death row. Nearly five years after the killings, a decision on whether to go after the two on murder charges is delayed by concerns about the way Schweickert was questioned by police.

Hillsborough County State Attorney Mark Ober says the case remains "open and viable."

Jason Galehouse and Michael Wachholtz, each 26, vanished within a day of each other in December 2003 after visits to 2606, an Armenia Avenue nightclub. The decomposed body of Wachholtz was found outside an apartment complex. Galehouse's remains have never been found.

After federal trials, Lorenzo was convicted on charges that he drugged men, including Galehouse and Wachholtz, to commit violent crimes. Schweickert, who lived in Peru, Ill., was convicted of conspiring with Lorenzo and giving a drug to Wachholtz to commit violence. Lorenzo, now 49, was sentenced to 200 years; Schweickert, now 43, to 40 years.

Wait Weighs On Families

Neither has been charged with killing Galehouse or Wachholtz. The wait has been trying for the young men's families.

Galehouse's mother, Pam Williams of Sarasota, was so frustrated she said she recently wrote a letter to Gov. Charlie Crist complaining that the state attorney's office hadn't taken action.

"It's been five years, and they have all the evidence they need, and why are they not pressing these murder charges?" she asked.

The governor's office, she said, wrote back that the decision was in Ober's hands.

Ober's office is deciding what to do about a recent Florida Supreme Court ruling that could affect how much of Schweickert's statements can be used as evidence.

In May 2005, detectives were looking for answers into the December 2003 disappearances. Lorenzo had been indicted on federal charges of drugging and torturing seven men, and investigators hoped to link him to Galehouse and Wachholtz. They found transcripts of Internet chats between Schweickert and Lorenzo where the two talked about torturing unsuspecting men and making them disappear.

On May 3, 2005, Drug Enforcement Administration Agent Scott Albrecht traveled to Schweickert's Illinois home and handed him a subpoena to appear before a federal grand jury in Tampa.

Conversations, Confrontations

A week later, Schweickert flew to Tampa at government expense. Before and after his grand jury testimony, police detectives pressed for answers about what had happened.

At first, he denied knowing anything. Then his story began to change. In front of the grand jury, he testified he saw Lorenzo kill one of the victims with a chokehold and then helped him move the body outside to a trailer. After that, he said in the grand jury testimony, he left Tampa.

After his testimony was over, detectives bought him lunch and started talking again. The conversation went on for hours, until the federal courthouse closed. Then they all walked to the Tampa Police Station, where the interview was recorded.

The detectives asked questions, lots of them. They cajoled. They confronted him with inconsistencies. They urged him to come clean. They told him his life was on the line. A few times, the conversation grew intense. "In for a penny," they urged him, "In for a pound."

Eventually, Schweickert said he helped Lorenzo kill both men. He talked in excruciating detail about how he and Lorenzo dismembered Galehouse and put the parts in trash bags that were tossed around the city.

Lorenzo, Schweickert said, "got a good little chuckle" out of dumping one of Galehouse's body parts behind a church.

The statement helped convict Lorenzo and Schweickert of federal charges of drug-facilitated crimes of violence.

Although the victims' families were gratified by the federal convictions, they long for murder charges.

Mother Ruth Wachholtz said she is in the dark about the case.

"I have not been kept up to date on anything and that has upset me, but not enough that I've made a lot of waves trying to find out because I still kind of expected that justice is moving forward, although at a very slow pace."

Even Lorenzo has expressed impatience. In a Nov. 27, 2005, letter to News Channel 8 reporter Samara Sodos, he wrote: "I fully anticipate and encourage the filing of these pending charges. The obvious delay by the authorities has not been in the best interest of all concerned."

Ruling Could Affect Cases

Whether state prosecutors bring murder charges could be influenced by a state Supreme Court ruling in another case that could affect prosecutors' ability to use Schweickert's statements against him.

Ober and spokeswoman Pam Bondi said the Lorenzo and Schweickert prosecutions are on hold while prosecutors consider appealing a "very significant legal ruling from the Florida Supreme Court."

The court overturned a criminal conviction in a weapons case Sept. 29 because the form formerly used by Tampa police to advise suspects of their Miranda rights was flawed. The form, which was used during Schweickert's interrogation, said suspects have a right to an attorney before questioning, but didn't mention that right also applied during questioning.

The ruling could cause havoc to Hillsborough County's criminal dockets, imperiling prosecutions. Bondi said officials don't know how many cases will be affected.

But it's not clear whether it would significantly affect the Lorenzo and Schweickert cases. Lorenzo was questioned only in the presence of his attorney. Although Schweickert was questioned for several hours without an attorney, it's possible detectives weren't required to read Schweickert his rights.

The U.S. Supreme Court has said suspects are required to be told their Miranda rights only during "in-custody interrogations." In other words, the warnings are mandatory only when suspects are not free to leave.

Evidence presented in federal court, including transcripts of Schweickert's interrogations, seems to suggest Schweickert was free to leave investigators.

After he was questioned, the evidence shows, Schweickert left the police station and slept in a hotel at government expense. The next morning, he met detectives and rode with them around Tampa pointing out places he thought body parts had been dumped. Then he flew back home, returning at investigators' request nine days later.

During the interview, the transcript shows, a federal prosecutor told Schweickert he was free to leave.

Was He In Custody?

Two law professors who were provided summaries and details of the interviews said the courts likely would conclude that Schweickert was free to leave the investigators.

"I think there's a really strong argument that it's not an in-custody interrogation," said Bruce Jacob, a law professor at Stetson University.

"In the overall, it doesn't seem to me like custody has been established," said Robert H. Whorf, associate professor of law at Barry University in Orlando. But, he added, there are portions of the questioning that seem more intense and could be considered custodial.

Schweickert's federal court-appointed attorney, Pedro Amador, said he argued in court that the interrogation was done in custody - "That has always been our position" - and further, Schweickert asked for an attorney but wasn't provided one.

Schweickert testified during a hearing that detectives promised him immunity if he talked to them. But the investigators denied this, and a judge allowed prosecutors to use Schweickert's statements as evidence in his trial.

The judge didn't elaborate on his reasons, but Whorf suggested one rationale might have been an issue of credibility. The federal prosecutor who cross-examined Schweickert established that the defendant had lied under oath in his grand jury testimony, raising the possibility that he was lying again.

Brian Winfield of Equality Now has advocated for the victims' families and pushed for murder charges.

Winfield said he is glad Ober is pursuing the case.

"On the one hand it's good to hear that it's still active," Winfield said. "On the other hand, it's been frustrating that it's taken this long to bring justice to the family and friends and the community."

Reporter Elaine Silvestrini can be reached at (813) 259-7837.

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