LEGAL COMMUNITY
SPOTLIGHT
LIVING HISTORY
27
FLORIDA MEMORY PROJECT
State Attorney Philip D. O’Connell, far right, discusses case with witnesses
who took part in the Peel trial, two of whom had claims to reward money
for solving the case.
ming with his hands behind his back. Was he searching for
Marjorie? Was he trying to get away? The flashlight found
him, and the killers struck at his head with a shotgun. Still
the judge swam, so Holzapfel steered the boat near enough
for Lincoln to grab him and hold on. Holzapfel cut the anchor
rope and tied it around the judge’s neck. And then he
dropped the anchor.
“Bobby let him go and he went down.”
“Describe what you saw,” State Attorney Phillip D.
O’Connell said to Holzapfel.
“I saw the pink pajamas in the reflection from the light as
he went down.”
Judge Chillingworth was 58 when he was drowned. His
wife was 56. On the night of the crime, Peel was only 31.
TAKING THE STAND
Joe Peel seemed unfazed when he took the stand in his own
defense. He flatly denied any involvement in the murders.
He denied carrying on any type of bolita gambling operations
or any other business with Holzapfel or Lincoln. He insinuated
that the whole thing was a frame-up because Holzapfel
thought he was sleeping with his wife. On cross-examination,
the defendant repeatedly denied asking the State Attorney
for immunity in exchange for giving testimony in the Chillingworth
case. The State Attorney was so frustrated by Peel’s
denial of the details of their previous conversation that he
abruptly gave up asking questions.
Peel told a reporter afterward that he was confident he
would win acquittal, or that the case would end with a
hung jury. What he got was a conviction, but to the state’s
disappointment, it came with a recommendation of mercy.
The sentence was life imprisonment. Peel had escaped the
electric chair.
Holzapfel spent the rest of his life behind bars. He died
in 1996. Lincoln was given immunity for his testimony and
never served time. He died in 2004. During the 18 years he
spent in prison, Peel continued to deny involvement in the
crime, until he made a deathbed confession to the Miami
Herald in 1982. He was paroled nine days before he died of
cancer. Just like the honorable Judge C.E. Chillingworth, Peel
was only 58.
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