Private Investigator's Case leads to TV Movie

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[May K. Toney]

This is an interesting story and I guess the focus is that an unsolved murder prompted a movie deal. Of course, I wonder whether the case was ever solved. Was there anything more on this story in that regard? Was the police files ever opened to the family or is the case still ongoing and unsolved?

At least one curious mind wants to know. Thanks for sharing.

[Sara E Pickett]

Yes a very interesting case indeed. Make that two inquiring minds that want to know. Did the victim go to her grave, solely knowing the events that lead up to her untimely demise?
Or was there some coverup from the onset of the investigation or even prior to that?
Can you imagine what the family must have gone through for all those years, "not having a clue", then to face the prospect of a movie deal...... Imagine that!

[May K. Toney]

Originally posted by Sara E. Pickett
Can you imagine what the family must have gone through for all those years, "not having a clue", then to face the prospect of a movie deal...... Imagine that!

Thank God I have nothing in my past or experience that would give me any idea of exactly how the family felt or must feel. But if you and I have this many questions, imagine the thousands of questions that go through their minds every day!

[Sara E Pickett]

May ,
You are right again. I can't imagine the pain and questions that the family must go through. I too am thankful that I have nothing in my past to recall or reflect upon that would bring me such sorrow or painful questions. I have been truely blessed!
See ya around the next turn in these forums. :)

[Walter C. Smith--]

Does anyone know anything about the front page story on the Reader's Digest for May. A $5 million reward is offered by a museum for the solving of the case. From the Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum, $300 million in a dozen works of art by master artists such as Rembrant, Vermeer, Degas, and Manet was stolen by two men. More information can be found at Find-the-Art.com or toll-free at 888-448-2883. The reward is open to anyone. The reward depends on how many of the works you find or recover for the Museum. Court TV will document the heist later this year. Does anyone know anything about the case in Boston on march 18, 1990.

This Looks interesting.

[Robert Smith -]

Very interesting story, so the question is still, does anyone know what happened with the case? Was anything solved or has it never been solved? But I will say, that by reading these stories and learning about these great Private Investigators and what each one has done or contributed, I am very happy that I made the decision to go into this line of work.

[Walter C. Smith--]

You can get more from the Reader's Digest May Issue. In it Detectives say that they have chased down hundreds of leads without any luck. The are counting on 100,000 readers being aware of the case and assisting them in solving it. Good Luck.

[May K. Toney]

Originally posted by Robert Smith
But I will say, that by reading these stories and learning about these great Private Investigators and what each one has done or contributed, I am very happy that I made the decision to go into this line of work.

Robert,
Thank you for expressing my very thoughts. These stories strongly suggest that those in the PI field can truly make a difference!

Take care.

[Robert Smith -]

Happy to be of service to you May. I guess great minds do think alike. I really like to hear stories about Private Investigators that break cases that no one else can. I guess it's kind of an ego thing, because it really goes to show who can do what when another can't.

[Edwina Berlijn -]

what a sad story, and a very painfull one. Not to be able to talk about it, till the parents of the twin girls died...I hope they find out soon what has happend to their Aunt Irene.

edwina berlijn

[Walter C. Smith--]

I would like to know the best way to pursue adding stories to this section. I have started to see more and more information on detectives and instances where detectivces are needed. It's funny how these thing appear when you are looking for them.

[Carolynne Giffoni -]

Walter,

The reverse is also true. Sometimes you come across a story of a private detective when you aren't looking. It just jumps out at you since your awareness level is heightened now.

Just my opinion,

Carolynne

[Walter C. Smith--]

<font Size=3 color="green"><b>Carolynne Giffoni,</b></font>

25 years ago, I had a course called "New Age Thinking". This name has since acquired a bad connotation. You have reminded me of the main principal behind my course. <i><font size=2.5 color=blue> Simply put, you go towards what you think. </font></i>
The speaker said he wanted an in-the-ground swimming pool and he could not afford it on his University of the Pacific salary. He keep thinking about it until he found one and got it home. He kept thinking about it so when he heard that expensive homes were being demonlished because of an airport addition, He drove around until he found one with a pool. He got <i>everything</i> except the hole for almost nothing.
His course emphasized that if you establish positive past action statements about yourself or what you want to do or be. You can imprint these on your mind and subconscious as if you were already there. Your subconscious will lead you to your desired result. For example, You might have five statements(<i>affirmations</i>) on a card, such as :<b><i>"I am a loving and caring father"</i> or "<i>I feel perfectly calm and relaxed when I speak before a crowd."</i> You repeat these to yourself at every stoplight or as often as possible. <i><font size=3>You will be a loving and caring person or unafraid before a crowd.</font></i></b>

[Mr Jose Bonavich Jr]

Walter,

I think they renamed it.....visualization techniques :D less likey to scare people away but still excellent advice...maybe we all should "picture" ourselves finding the stolen art and go from there ;)

[Carolynne Giffoni -]

Walter,

The course that you mentioned probably would have appealed to me.....sounds interesting since I believe in the concept. I'm always amazed that we only use approx. 20-30% of our brain and I often wonder what the rest of it is doing....I sometimes ponder such things. It intrigues me. Oh well, I try to keep the part that works active....hehe... :D

Carolynne

[Kathleen Padgett]

This is an interesting case. While I was reading the story, I found myself wanting to know more about whether this case has been solved. Then I read multiple posts wanting to know the same, that's a good sign, we all have heightened awareness and a desire to see things through since choosing to pursue a PI career.

[Michele Maconship]

This was a very sad article. But I was stunned to realize that the location of this murder was only a few miles from where I was born and raised in northeastern Pennsylvania! I had never heard about this crime, but then, I was only an infant when it occurred. I feel for the family members of unsolved crimes like this one, and it makes me all the more determined to become a competent investigator so that I may one day be able to help people in need. I may not be solving murder crime cases, but there are many needs out there and people whose minds can be put at ease by the services of a private investigator.

[Walter C. Smith--]

Michele,

There is no criminal safe today. If there is any premeditation or any asociated crime, evidense will be taken. Latent fingerprints can be raised from the skin, blood splatter experts can tell how the person was attacked, forensic experts can tell how the person was killed and when, clothing experts, can identify cloths if worn and they were caught on a video camera, foot prints can lead to shoes, tire tracks can be identified, often the gun can be identified by the grooves on the bullet, the ejected brass can be matched to a gun. Case studies on the History and Discovery channels show the ways evidense is used to apprehend felons.

Only if the killer kills at random, with an unregistered handgun which he destroys or for which he destroys the barrel, he collects his brass, wears flat shoes or over-shoes, wears used cloths from the salvation army, and wears rubber gloves, will there be a good chance for him or her to get away unless there is a witness or the killer tells somebody..

[Barbara Holtzman]

Originally posted by May K. Toney
This is an interesting story and I guess the focus is that an unsolved murder prompted a movie deal. Of course, I wonder whether the case was ever solved. Was there anything more on this story in that regard? Was the police files ever opened to the family or is the case still ongoing and unsolved?

At least one curious mind wants to know. Thanks for sharing.

The heading is a bit misleading. While it's titled "Private Investigator's Case leads to TV Movie," the article is about the murder of Irene Izak, which is, as far as I know, a still unsolved murder that took place in Watertown, NY, on a island that's part of the Thousand Islands between Canada and the US. No movie has ever been made of this story, and it's unlikely that it ever will be. A vital piece of evidence, an old newspaper with blood on it, was found missing when the case was reopened, and I believe it was never found. I would have to check that.

The movie that was made involving Gapay was about the Jessica Guzman case. Jessica was a ten-year-old girl who was murdered by Alejandro "Alex" Henriquez, who was also convicted of murdering 14-year-old Shamira Bello and 21-year-old Lisa Rodriguez, and implicated in many other crimes. The investigation was started by Gus Gapay, a housing cop at the time, who identified Henriquez (who lived in the same housing complex as the child) as the key suspect, then teamed up with homicide cop "Silky" Silverman - called that because of his finesse in getting confessions. They solved the case together.

Maybe the name Jessica Guzman sounds familiar? Because the CBS movie that's mentioned, made, I think, in 1993 or so, was about her. Not Irene Izak.

Oh - and it's the woman in the story, the niece of Irene Izak, who was from Milford, PA, I think, or thereabouts. Not Irene.

[Prem Prasad]

It was a very sad story. I wonder if ever this case was solved. I want to know more about this case.

[Larry A Smith]

The Watertown Daily Times
The Murder of Irene Izak on June 10, 1968
Tracking a 30 year old murder case in Watertown New York

THE IRENE IZAK MURDER CASE

From Scranton Times
Flannery column:

31 Years After Izak's Murder, Family Tries To Solve Case

Over 31 years have passed since Miss Irene J. Izak, 25, of Scranton, was murdered at a highway rest stop on Wellesley Island, in the middle of the St. Lawrence River, south of the New York-Canadian border. The June 10, 1968, crime never has been solved and the pain it caused still is felt by her family.

Miss Izak was the fifth of six children in her family and the last to be born in Ukraine. Her parents, the late Rev. Bohdan and Maria Izak, were witnesses to persecutions by Nazis and communists, so they brought their family to the United States in 1948 and eventually settled in Scranton, where he became pastor of St. Vladimir's Ukrainian Catholic Church.

Miss Izak graduated from Marywood University in 1963 and went to Paris to study at the Sorbonne. She taught French in Binghamton from 1964 to 1966 and in Rochester the next year.

The day she died, she was going to Laval University in Quebec for an interview, driving at night to save time.

At 1:15 a.m.. she was halted for speeding by Trooper David Hennigan, who was driving an unmarked car. She refused to pull over at first, having been scared once by a man who tried to get into her car when she stopped to fix balky windshield wipers.

However, after Trooper Hennigan put on his police hat, she pulled over, about three miles north of Watertown. He allowed her to continue with a warning.

Both cars continued north toward the Thousand Islands Bridge, where she stopped. The toll collector, now deceased, told investigators she was "edgy, nervous" and asked for a match to light a cigarette despite having matches in her purse. She asked about state police tactics and pointed at Trooper Hennigan's car as it passed.

She continued her journey at 2:10 a.m. but never got to the border. Trooper Hennigan reported at 2:35 a.m. that he came upon her abandoned car with its lights on at a rest stop off Route 191. He found her body at the foot of a rocky embankment. It was still warm but she was dead, bludgeoned about the head by rocks.

Due to the fact that the same trooper stopped her for speeding and then found her body, he was questioned. However, he was not linked to the crime. Thus, he remained on duty and served until his normal retirement time in 1983. He also became a deacon in his Catholic parish and refuses requests for interviews.

What was never reported here before this is that Miss Izak's family decided last year to sponsor a private investigation.

Inspired by the 30th anniversary articles by investigative reporter David Shampine in the Watertown newspaper, Lisa Ewasko Caputo of Taylor, a niece of the murder victim, started a computer search for an investigator to see if new clues could be found to reopen the case. She found Augustine “Gus” Papay Jr., a former New York City homicide detective who now is a private investigator in Chester. He met with family members here on July 4, 1998, and then began a new probe.

By September, he felt the state police were not giving him full cooperation and suggested to Helen Ewasko of Glenburn, a sister of the victim, that the family ask New York Gov. George Pataki to order a new investigation that would use forensic investigative techniques not available when Miss Izak was buried here.

That led to a new state police team meeting, with 16 members of Miss Izak's extended family at the Ewasko home, to discuss an exhumation of the victim's body.

The body of Miss Izak was quietly removed from the grave at St. Vladimir's Cemetery last Dec. 30 and was taken to Moses Taylor Hospital, where Dr. Michael Baden of New York, one of the most famous forensics pathologists in the nation, conducted a second autopsy, aided by Dr. Lowell J. Levine, a dental surgeon.

The results are still somewhat cloudy. Senior Investigator Stanley Weidman of the New York State Police Violent Crime Unit told the Watertown newspaper the forensic investigation has established "new and additional information." But he also said: "We have not established enough evidence to establish culpability substantiate an arrest. . . ."

Still Dr. Baden and Dr. Levine are said to have found a previously undetected cause of death, other than the battering of her head with rocks. But what that is has not been made public.

The body was reburied but the skull was kept for more tests.

The search for evidence was followed by state police questioning a number of people again. According to Mr. Weidman, "Only one declined to be interviewed and sought the advice of counsel." However, he did not identify that person.

Unlike the first time around, when Miss Izak's family was virtually frozen out of the information loop, this time the family is being given periodic reports on the ongoing investigation.

But there is no sign of a pending arrest.

[Pamela Penny]

I think they need to question that trooper again. Why does he refuse interviews. I think he might know more than he's saying. My sympothy goes to the relatives.

[Michelle A. Nelson]

I agree the trooper's actions raise serious suspicions. Although its his right not to grant interviews, actions tend to speak louder than words.

[April Rank]

Good going Barbara!

I, too, was thrown by the misleading headline.

And thanks, Larry, for the additional information.

[Victoria S Kinney]

Has this case every been resolved? I have not seen anything about it. What was the name of the movie? Thank you for any information that you can provide. Have a great weekend.