Freda "Susie" Mowbray

The only thing that this case has in common with the last two blogs that I have done is that the accused was a woman, oh and they were convicted for a crime. The difference here is that Susie Mowbray was retried after serving nearly nine years in prison and acquitted. There are some that think she should have never been charged and others who believe she got away with murder. In the end, whether you believe she was guilty or innocent even the second jury admitted it came down to the investigation conducted by law enforcement and the behavior of the prosecution.

Several years later Cameron County Texas, where this case took place, would be rocked with a scandal involving corruption that most say was so deep and outrageous only a fiction writer could talk about it. It was not clear just how long the corruption went back but more than a dozen people were involved including a judge, a State Representative and several current and former members of the DA office. Some of the corruption came from accepting bribes to have more favorable outcome for defendants. However, it apparently could go the other way too. Sometime after Susie's conviction but before her acquittal it was said that a “respected investigator” in the department had committed suicide after confessing to lying on the witness stand to win a conviction in at least one other murder case.

Some say some of that corruption was involved in this case, others argue it is just an excuse to get away with murder. To be fair I am not sure what I think exactly. I lean very heavily towards the fact that Susie Mowbray was innocent but I have a few problems with the case. As a whole I like to believe that investigators do not plant or alter evidence but I am not naive enough to believe it does not happen. The severe corruption found in the county surely does make one take a second look.

In the early morning of September 16, 1987 J. W. “Bill” Mowbray was shot in his Brownsville Texas bed. His wife, Susie, would claim it was suicide. Investigators would claim it was murder. Susie and many others would proclaim Bill's seemingly constant threats, and attempts, at suicide while the investigators would say that the lack of blood and brain matter on Bill's hand pointed to murder.

Bill Mowbray had a lot issues going on at the time of his death. While he owned a car dealership it was described as “broke” and nearly going out of business soon. Recently, Luke Fruia, who Bill saw as his “right hand man” had announced he was leaving and taking a job in Dallas. Then there was the issue of the IRS. They were looking to criminally charge him for tax evasion and commercial fraud. He was involved it seems in something called “double floor planning” in which he would get banks to make multiple loans on new cars. Whatever it is called or details it is apparently also illegal.

Bill had mentioned suicide to multiple just in the days leading up to his death. Luke Fruia claimed he talked about it when he discussed leaving and a bank manager claims Bill went there looking for a loan and said if he did not get it he was going to kill himself. He did not get the loan. He also apparently told multiple people that he would commit suicide before going to jail on the other charges. But, here is the thing, Bill was not one to just “talk” about suicide, he tended to attempt to follow through. A year before he had shot himself in the stomach in one of those attempts but had apparently survived.

Susie would first tell authorities that she had woken up to find Bill pointing the gun to his head and that when she reached up to touch him it went off. She would later say that she had talked to him and begged him not to do it before she went to touch him and the gun fired. Investigators however say that when they arrived at the home Bill Mowbray was laying on his left side in a sleeping position, with his left hand under a pillow and his right hand was under a cover that was pulled to his shoulder. The bullet that had been fired went through his head, the pillow and then his left hand. The coroner would confirm the findings and conclude that Bill could not have shot himself. But of course they needed more than that to arrest, let alone convict Susie for murder.

Investigators had been suspicious from the start of Susie, which in and of itself is not unusual. They would claim that after Bill had been shot she had gone downstairs and the first call she had made was to Luke Fruia. She then called 911 but told investigators that she had never gone back upstairs to check on him. When asked why she stated that the sight of blood made her sick. As is often the case, investigators just thought her behavior to her husband's death was odd. But, I am going to give her the benefit of the doubt on that for two reasons. First, according to Susie and many others Bill had been threatening suicide for at least three years. He had already had at least two attempts previously. Maybe she was over the worry and the stress from it all. I know that sounds cold, but cold does not necessarily make her a murderer. Secondly, she would tell investigators that after Bill shot “himself” she had taken two of his pain pills, something others would say he was addicted to, almost immediately, and later, after her parents arrived at the scene she had taken more. If this is true then they could have also adjusted her mood and behavior.

Prosecutors finally decided to arrest Susie and charge her with murder after a lab technician and an officer who was also a blood splatter expert stated that blood had been found on Susie's nightgown when it was sprayed with Luminol. Detective Hesskew, the blood splatter expert, claimed that the pattern indicated that she was practically sitting on top of him as she shot him. There were two problems with this. First, Luminol can react to many different chemicals and is to only be used to get a preliminary finding. If it does react with the material then further tests are to be done to confirm the findings. Apparently a few days after the initial findings Steve Robertson, the lab technician, ran two more tests to confirm but both returned negative results. It is said that Robertson did not report his findings to the prosecutor. In the meantime the prosecution had called in another expert named Herbert MacDonnell. He found no evidence of blood and turned his findings over to the prosecution. One of the investigating officers, George Gavito would say that MacDonnell had discussed his findings with him and had said he believed that Susie had shot Bill but had been naked when she did so. However, that does not seem to be the position that MacDonnell actually took and Gavito is the only one to say so. Regardless on December 4, 1987 Susie was indicted by a grand jury and was arrested two days later.

Herbert MacDonnell was not called to testify for the prosecution obviously because his findings had not been favorable to them. It appears that the defense had issues with getting the prosecution to comply with a lot of discovery and it got to the point in which the judge on the case had threatened the prosecution with sanctions before they turned over some of the evidence. They would basically “dump” information to the defense some two weeks before the trial was to begin. Buried inside that information was MacDonnell's report of not finding any blood evidence on Susie, or evidence that she murdered Bill.

Despite having the report from MacDonnell the prosecution contended that blood splatter was found on the nightgown and Officer Hesskew testified as such. He would also state that GSR had been found on her hands and this all proved to him that she had murdered her husband. At least one other officer, or it could have been Steve Robertson, testified to the same. Officer Gavito apparently would testify at some point that Bill was planning to divorce Susie and remove her from nearly $1.8m in life insurance policies. To be fair I found no other statements or evidence that this was true.

The defense, apparently led by Susie's first husband, Gerald Burnett, had person after person testify to Bill's state of mind leading up to the days of the shooting Many stated he had made threats of suicide. It appears they had nothing available at that point to fight any evidence of blood splatter on her her nightgown but I imagine that their argument would be that it would not be unlikely to see some on her considering she was laying in bed next to him when the gun went off.

But, it appears that the jury did not believe the defense theory and instead believed the prosecution. It took them only two hours of deliberation to convict Susie of first degree murder. She would be sentenced to life in prison.

Many people believed an innocent woman had gone to prison, especially Susie's family, but most of her, and even Bill's friends. Susie's son Wade Burnett went on to go to law school but his number one case was that of his mothers. Sometime in 1995 Wade came across Herbert MacDonnell's report. A post conviction hearing was filed, she had already been denied one appeal and clemency from the governor, and a hearing was scheduled for June of that year. Another hearing was held in August and it was apparently at this hearing where “two officers” recanted their trial testimony by saying that they had nothing to scientifically back their findings. Adding to this was the MacDonnell file. It had been discovered that despite the fact that the prosecution had the information for months before the trial they had not given it to the defense until just two weeks prior, not giving them sufficient time to find it, let alone determine what to do with it.

I am unsure that I have done many, if any cases, in which I have discussed a “post conviction hearing.” I have heard of them but I am going to guess that this is the first case in which a significant decision was made. This is not apparently the same as an appeal but a recommendation from I can only assume a court assigned to look at cases before sending their recommendation to the higher court. In November of 1995 it was recommended that Susie's conviction be overturned and she be granted a new trial. Over a year later in December 1996 the recommendation was accepted.

The State obviously did not like this ruling and so they appeal that decision themselves. In the mean time on May 16, 1997, after nearly nine years in prison Susie was allowed to post a $35,000 bond and was released while the State wanted to hear about their appeal and decide what to do next. The following month the courts denied the State's appeal. Susie Mowbray would go back on trial in January of 1998.

By now several things were starting to come to light, not just in this case but in Cameron County itself. Sometime after her conviction “a respected investigator” (I found no name to know if he had been involved in her case) had killed himself after confessing to his superiors that he had lied in court to win a conviction in at least one other murder case. Later another investigator would plead guilty to charges he took money for dismissing or reducing charges in criminal cases. Eventually years later it would be determined that several people involved in the County were involved in such schemes. There would be more than a dozen convictions, or at least indictments. It was said they went from simple investigators, to the district attorney's office, to a judge, to even a State Representative. As I described this in the beginning, it is unclear when exactly this behavior all began but it was clear it had not happened overnight.

At the second trial it seems that the only real “evidence” they had on Susie Mowbray was the coroners findings that there was no blood splatter or brain matter found on Bill's hand, forearm or fingers. He testified that this absolutely should have been present. Then there was the testimony of responding officers who would say that Bill was covered in a blanket to his shoulder when they arrived. The prosecution still maintained that Susie Mowbray killed her husband for the nearly two million dollars in life insurance.

The defense had a lot more this time. First they had the recantations of the two previous officers who had to admit they had no scientific proof of any blood splatter, but they not only had MacDonnell's report, they had him too. He would testify this second trial that in his opinion Bill had likely committed suicide. As far as a “pending divorce” I found no evidence of such. There did seem to be testimony from friends who stated that while the couple loved each other they had gone through a few separations and Bill had had affairs. The point I believe being made is that separation or divorce would have been a non-issue for Susie according to many who knew the couple. These were not seemingly just her friends as we often see but also friends and business associates of Bill's who said these things. His friends would describe Bill as being a very generous and loyal friend but “given to drastic mood swings, compulsive spending, womanizing and was dependent on pain pills.”

One of the prosecution arguments seemed a bit sketchy to me. It appears when discussing what they thought was odd behavior, and apparently having to answer as to why there was not more evidence taken they would say that she had cleaned the crime scene quickly. Now, I am unsure what “quickly” meant to them, but I am going to have to gander to guess it was after they had released the scene. It was said that friends had come to the home and either helped her, or cleaned the room themselves. This seems fairly reasonable as who would want to live in a home where the evidence of this occurrence was still there?

This jury took significantly longer than Susie's first jury to come to a verdict. While the original jury took only two hours to find her guilty, the second jury took ten hours to find her not guilty. The jury foreman would later be quoted as saying, “The outcome of this trial was due to the improper handling of the evidence by members of the Cameron County law enforcement officials involved in this case.” So in essence the foreman was saying that it was more of a State loss than a defendant win.

Whether it was during her trial or sometime after, possibly in a civil suit she filed in 2001 against several law enforcement members and the county, Susie made several claims. She would state that prior to going downstairs after the shooting, and allegedly never returning, Bill's arm had not been under the cover as was claimed. Whether there were pictures of this position is unclear. She would also allege that investigators must have watched blood, brain matter and GSR off of his hand before positioning it. To be fair there was no evidence of this. She also claims that the the t-shirt Bill was wearing disappeared as well as a blue blanket (the one covering him ??). Her appellate attorney would only say they could confirm the issue with the t-shirt.

Eventually, although it did not seem to be clear why, Susie's civil suit was dismissed. It had eventually come down to only Officer George Gavito but he too would be dismissed. It was not clear if it was in this same civil suit or in another that she would also sue Jeanne (Bill's mother), James (Bill's brother) and Margo (I am uncertain of her relationship) Mowbray for the return of the insurance money they collected due to her apparent conviction. It also seems that law suit failed also for her. Some, including James Mowbray saw this as a cold hearted act. James would say that he believed Susie was guilty of murdering his brother but he would be on the way to “forgive” her and then she would say or do something that would change his feelings again. He felt this lawsuit was one of those things. To be fair however, I am unsure how I feel about it. If we truly believe that Bill committed suicide and that Susie should have never faced prison, let alone nine years, then she was entitled to that money in the first place. I found nothing that said she was successful in getting any kind of compensation for the nine years she spent in prison.

So did Susie Mowbray murder her already suicidal husband? I lean towards the fact that she did not but I do admit that if there is proof that his arm was under the blanket when officers arrived I have question that. Then again, maybe Susie was in shock and covered his arm without realizing it. Did the officer's stage the scene? My other issue is with the absence of blood and brain matter on his arm. Often when I do these case I “bounce” things off my husband. I personally did not see this as much as an issue. I pictured the shooting of the gun and immediately the arm falling and the blood and brain matter would go elsewhere. While there was discussion about how the bullet penetrated through the pillow and into Bill's left hand, I do not recall finding anything that said if this was a direct shot or if there was distance behind it. It was said that the gun was a .357 caliber revolver. My husband agrees that regardless how fast the arm fell that the second the bullet was shot and made contact with the head there should have been splatter on his hand. I am not so sure and know that we have seen stranger things.

One thing that always makes me suspicious however is when prosecutors “bend” the rules or hide things. Of course we see this from defense attorney's quite often. Then again their job is to refute the evidence. The prosecution is to present it and stand by it. In this case several people chose to either not report evidence, report false evidence or hide evidence that did not support their case. It just seems “fishy” to me. A prosecutor stands by the merits of their case, they do not make things up. If the case is not viable they do not file charges. This is not how the justice system works. Officer Gavito was one of the responding officers at the scene. He has seemingly made several statements that could not be proven or were seemingly out right lies. He is one who continued to say he believed Susie to be guilty but he is also the first to say he found her behavior suspicious at the scene. Was he clouded by tunnel vision? Is he one of those that are so arrogant that he will not admit when he is wrong? I do not know, be he seemed to be overly involved in this case in my opinion.

Regardless if you believe Susie Mowbray to be guilty or innocent in the murder of her husband, you must admit that she did not receive a fair trial in 1988. She did not for the exact reason the foreman in her second trial stated. Would she have been found guilty had all the evidence been presented and not twisted? I am unsure. But one thing I am sure about is that there should have been more.