Inside His Innocence Website
(“A Case of the Flue,” Forensic Files)
Last week’s post detailed chimney sweep Tim McEnany’s conviction for the murder and robbery of Kathryn Bishop, an 82-year-old who kept a lot of cash in her house.
He received life in jail without parole and is serving his sentence at the Pennsylvania State Correctional Institution in Somerset.
But there are two sides to every post-conviction story, and McEnany offers up his via the Pennsylvania Justice Project, which is the subject of this week’s post.
Site to see. I really didn’t want to find anything that seemed worthy of consideration on McEnany’s website. Forensic Files laid out the case so neatly in “A Case of the Flue,” and who can resist a little righteous disdain for anyone who would hurt an elderly widow?
While I still suspect that justice was already served in this case, McEnany and his supporters do offer some intriguing counterpoints, including one rather explosive theory, via the Pennsylvania Justice Project.
A review of McEnany’s website follows, but first here’s a superquick recap of the crime as portrayed in Forensic Files:
Tim McEnany and his cousin Andrew Reischman cleaned the chimney in Kathryn Bishop’s house in Hummelstown, Pennsylvania, on March 3, 1993.
Saltwater and slots. Over a beer at Shane’s Flight Deck that evening, the duo allegedly decided to return to Bishop’s house, quickly burglarize it, then establish an alibi by going back to the watering hole before anyone noticed they had left.
The part that didn’t go as planned was finding Bishop at home and awake. She was beaten to death, and her $6,000 in cash was stolen.
Afterward, McEnany — a married 26-year-old with two small children — and Reischman returned to the bar and then headed to Atlantic City for some recreation, according to prosecutors.
McEnany doesn’t have a lot of supporters on YouTube, judging from reader comments posted to “A Case of the Flue”:
Zeather Ababa
“He should have been given a sign to march in the street which says ‘I kill a old lady.'”
Joseph T.
“Murder just to take the money and piss it away, and give it to the Casino. Hope it was worth it, dumbass.”
With the Pennsylvania Justice Project, Father Francis-Maria Salvato — a priest who has taken up McEnany’s cause — hopes to disabuse the public of such unkind sentiments.
The innocence website includes nine long-form blog posts, a couple of them written by McEnany himself and the rest by Salvato. It also features audio interviews with McEnany’s mother.
Janet Callahan McEnany and Father Salvato’s most provocative contention is that the police should have investigated Kathryn Bishop’s grandson, Greg Seitz, in connection with the murder-robbery.
Treated like soot. According to the Pennsylvania Justice Project, Janet Seitz — who is Bishop’s daughter and Greg Seitz’s mother —and her husband visited Bishop while the chimney sweeps were at work. McEnany recalled the husband as pleasant and trusting, but he got some dubious vibes from Janet Seitz.
In her Forensic Files interview, Janet Seitz said she felt McEnany’s bill, between $300 and $400, seemed high.
I have to disagree. Even by 1993 standards, that sounds like a reasonable fee to have two people do work of that nature. (In addition to the cleaning, they did at least one repair to the chimney.)
Burned by media. It’s possible that some bias on Janet Seitz’s part influenced the investigation.
In one of the radio interviews, Tim’s mother said that concern about a bias toward her son spurred the McEnany family to decline media requests — including one from Peter Shellem, an investigative journalist known for helping wrongly convicted people win exoneration.
Without the benefit of having talked to the McEnany family, Shellem, who worked as a reporter for Harrisburg’s Patriot News, got the facts wrong when he appeared on Forensic Files, Janet McEnany alleges.
Charting it out. A couple of other theories the website brings up are less scintillating: that the police botched the crime scene investigation and that various law-enforcement parties used the case to win themselves promotions.
Not that those allegations are any less worthwhile to explore — it’s just that they’re pretty much standard among convicted people.
The following table boils down major points of contention detailed on the website:
| AUTHORITIES SAY THAT McENANY... | McENANY SUPPORTERS SAY | McENANY'S REASONING |
|---|---|---|
| Called victim's house twice to ensure coast was clear | Police seized his cell phone and fabricated call evidence | Authorities were anxious to solve case |
| Left bar for long enough to commit crime and return | He and Reischman never left the bar (Shane's Flight Deck) | Bar employees were guilty of serving a minor (Reischman), so they told police what they wanted to hear |
| Failed polygraph | Results can be manipulated | Mother worked for prison system, has seen corruption |
| Admitted guilt by saying beer gets him in trouble | He only meant he should have gone home instead of to a bar | Wife would be an honest alibi, unlike bar employees |
| Had paint chip in jacket, from basement window | Paint chip planted by police | Window never opened until police opened it |
| Was guilty because of forensic evidence | Police did "Forensic Files" to bolster their credibility | Police desperate to cover up injustice to McEnany |
| Got a fair trial | Trooper Jack Lotwick drove jurors to and from court, thus had a chance to influence them | Lotwick used case to win the job of sheriff |
| Kicked Bishop to death, causing Reischman to flee her house in horror | Witness says fleeing man had long hair | He & cousin have short hair. Victim's grandson's is long |
| Beat Bishop severely in a rage killing | Rage killings are personal; he had no rage toward Bishop | More likely that someone close to victim (like a relative) did it |
| Left fiber evidence from his T-shirt on victim's body | Lab scientist had doubts about fiber evidence | Even if fibers are from T-shirt, doesn't prove murder |
| Went to Atlantic City to spend stolen cash | Nothing — no mention of an Atlantic City trip on site | |
| Got a fair portrayal on "Forensic Files" | "FF" hyped up evidence to win viewers | Shows like "FF" are tools of system |
Because this post includes negative reader comments about McEnany, it only seems fair to offer a couple from his supporters:
Timothy Callahan
“Timothy McEnany is my cousin. … My cousin is innocent, a good man, and a good father. A travesty of justice has been committed by our broken legal system and as a result an innocent man is in prison for a crime he didn’t commit. He is a victim, not a murderer.”
Darya Eudora Mace-Tasker
“I can remember this years ago and it didn’t make sense then! When reading the facts now, it TRULY is injustice!!! … There are so many wrongly put into the system because the system does not work!”
What about Reischman? While McEnany continues to serve his sentence in medium-security at SCI, Andrew Reischman has never faced charges related to Kathryn Bishop’s robbery or murder.
He did, however, run into a little trouble in North Carolina. From 1995 to 2000, an Andrew Vincent Reischman collected charges of DWI, marijuana possession, resisting arrest, and “assaults or threats against the government.”
The last offense is probably less severe than it sounds, because North Carolina records indicate he received probation for that misdeed as well as the others.
A web search for Pennsylvania and the surrounding states turned up no other brushes with the law for Reischman, who was born in 1972.
In other words, it sounds as though he got his act together before hitting 30.
Hero to the railroaded. On a sad note, Peter Shellem took his own life at the age of 49 in 2009.
Former O.J. Simpson lawyer Barry Scheck called Shellem “a rare, one-man journalism innocence project,” according to a New York Times story.
That’s all for this post. True Crime Truant will be off for New Year’s vacation — back on January 18.
Until then, cheers and good tidings for 2018. — RR
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RR, Wishing you a happy New Year and looking forward to further installments…
Good wishes,
Marcus
Marcus, thanks so much for the good wishes and your informed comments all year!
Just re-viewed this ep here in UK, and considered Rebecca’s helpful tabulation of dispute. Unless we accept the claim of police stitch-up – and how could we, over against convicting evidence – too much of the claim is predicated on it.
What if the putative real perp were to appear (perhaps caught for another crime, as they not infrequently are) and confessed to this? That would almost certainly show that the police had indeed framed McEnany – surely a risk? That would mean not just loss of career but prosecution of those concerned. Would the police be that desperate to secure a conviction? This isn’t to deny that police lie (they do); rather that this goes much beyond lies.
I don’t buy that bar employees would commit perjury to avoid merely possible charge of serving a minor.
An Aunt Sally: who suggested it was a rage killing? Surely no-one. It didn’t need suggesting – and doesn’t need refuting. But it’s plausible that one or the other of McEnany/Reischmann either saw Bishop – unexpectedly – or saw violence done and fled.
The views of M’s friends and family about his character are wholly irrelevant Love, affection, and shame have transcended truth and justice. This isn’t to suggest they’re disingenuous: I’m sure they believe what he claims. But we shouldn’t accept their claims unless material to the case – which they’re not.
A final observation: Janet Bishop’s didn’t come over on FF, I thought, as suggesting her mother was been ‘ripped off’ by the fee for the work, just surprised at something she could only guess at (who of us would know industry-typical charge for the work unless we’d had it done?) This isn’t to suggest that she didn’t express consternation to those workers at the time, just that it isn’t apparent from FF. We shouldn’t assume, then, that McEnany had a genuine reason to allege her ‘bias’. It may have been invented as another Aunt Sally to enable that convenient claim.
I see nothing IN FF that suggests Janet Bishop was ‘biased’ against the suspect/perp (any more so that the loved ones of murder victims are in wanting to see the perp caught, at any rate…), and in any case her view would be wholly irrelevant to the police/prosecution.
The ‘innocent’ case here is much too tenuous. We need EVIDENCE of police malfeasance – not just words.
Amazing how every guilty criminal always claims they aren’t. Once again not to victim shame but what up with the elderly keeping large sums of money in their homes? And out in the open where the chimney sweeps could see it… It’s called a BANK people! I get paranoid carrying $100 at any time.
A bit more complicated than that, because (i) they don’t all claim innocence, and, indeed (ii) some falsely confess. Therefore in either case a ‘full’ investigation’s necessary. Question to self: ascertain what proportion of those charged with homicide confess (and are found guilty) before trial.
he is right where he belongs, extra charge for killing the elderly and his accomplice walks,what is wrong with these prosecutors-charge him with robbery at least!
Trash Myers Jr at it again.
I have news for everyone here. To beat an old lady 60 times, it’s personal. It’s one of the family or ex son in law or even the grandson. And if you believe the cops dreamworld story as to what they think happened, you will believe anything.
There are plenty of innocent people in jail as the cops will frame you if they think you did it. The forensic evidence I would describe as extremely flimsy at best (somehow a paint chip magically got into the pocket and the list goes on).
Hopefully the innocence project will take this up and can do something.
Peter: It’s material to add that he was found guilty twice (by different juries), in Nov ’95 and Sep ’97, per retrial based on improper reference to his post-arrest silence. Other things being equal, in my book this makes a conviction securer. I’m not saying I think his guilt is overwhelmingly proved but that a second conviction removes some doubt (if there was).
Appeal doc refers to victim being ‘stomped to death.’ If perp isn’t armed with a gun or knife — perhaps consistent with not expecting victim to be in or awake, as theorised — then either an object has to be grabbed in the moment to use as a weapon or fists/feet are used (on someone weaker). Thus the fact that she was kicked/’stomped’ is not probative in itself of the rage killing you suggest, though the quantity of blows could be (are we sure it was 60?) I certainly wouldn’t expect it to take 60 blows to kill an old lady — except that (i) he was probably impaired through alcohol (we know he’s been drinking and he said himself impairments caused him trouble before), which can exacerbate violence and (ii) he knew he had to kill as she could identify him — which could therefore result in ‘overkill.’
Thus I’m not persuaded by your argument that perp was personally connected to victim on your reasoning.
Tim McEnany..wow!!! The Tim I knew wouldn’t do anything like that. May that poor lady RIP.