The Jewish religious divorce “Get” and Professor Dan Markel’s murder in 2014 in Tallahassee, Florida, United States

By Sally Ramage, Legal Scholar.

24-10-2016.

Background facts

Florida State University (FSU) Professor Daniel Eric Markel[1] was murdered at his home in Tallahassee, Florida, on July 18, 2014. He was known to friends and colleagues as ‘Dan Markel’ and to family and friends as ‘Danny’. Dan Markel was a law professor at FSU, a Canadian-born legal scholar and a Juris Doctor from Harvard University. He had 31 law papers published at the Social Sciences Research Network hub (www.ssrn.com) which were distributed to various universities around the world. He had also co-authored a law book published in 1999 by Oxford University Press. In 2006, whilst an associate professor at FSU, he met and married Wendi Jill Adelson of Coral Springs, South Florida and the couple settled in Tallahassee, the Capital City of the state of Florida, United States (US). She was a law STUDENT WHEN THEY MET. She soon passed all the examinations and quickly gained high status employment as SENIOR lecturer at FSU. Wendi, had studied at her local university. However, if one visits the professional website www.LinkedIn.com, Adelson is listed there with all Dan Markel's qualifications as her own, ie that she attended Cambridge University, England , as he did, etc. LinkedIn website should be made aware of the offences they aid and abet, impersonation, obtaining pecuniary advantage by deception as per Fraud Act 2006. I have been asked what to do by a barrister on LinkedIn whose husband lost many dozens of thousands of pounds from his pension savings It is embezzlement. He  went into partnership with a conman on Linked in who spent  hundreds of thousands of pounds, leaving her husband ,to bear the debt, and apparently moving on to spend other people's nest eggs in similar circumstances.

There are others on that website who appoint people without the necessary checks and balances and worse, without the qualifications for the jobs. This is truly wild west situation.

(Wendi Adelson could not compete With the brains of Dan Markel her husband  but did manage to have one single paper distributed by SSRN).

In a few months they were married and before long the couple managed to secure her employment at FSU as well as having two children, Benjamin Markel in 2009 and Lincoln Markel in 2010 and to the outside world they appeared to be the perfect, middle class couple with two children, two cars, both teaching at FSU and living in a well-heeled part of Tallahassee, very close to FSU.  But in the year 2012, after just 6 years of marriage, Dan Markel’s wife decided to divorce him.

CALLOUS AND DISHONEST Removal of Dan Markel’s children, savings and chattel by Wendi

When Dan Markel returned from a business trip in July 2012, he found that Wendi had moved out of the marital home, taking with her:

(1)    most of the furniture from their house (which she put into storage);

(2)   The sum total of six hundred thousand dollars from the his bank account[2]; and

(3)   their two children, Benjamin Markel and Lincoln Markel.

Wendi  his wife had made meticulous, calculated plans and had taken, cold, strategic steps to divorce Dan Markel- she did not leave the marital home in the heat of the moment. She had retained a divorce law attorney. Divorce papers were ready to be served on Dan Markel some days before he was due to leave home to attend a business conference.

 She had organised for a removals company to empty the marital home of furniture and all of her personal possessions as well as the children’s clothes and toys.

 She had emptied Dan Markel’s savings bank account (whether by counterfeit signature or otherwise, the police and news media did not say).

She had divulged all the details of this highly confidential married life to all of her relatives and new boyfriend, new lecturer to FSU Social Work Department 

 to temporarily stay with her parents in Coral Springs, South Florida, with no note or explanatory letter but she left copy divorce papers  thus served on Dan Markel by placing them on their older son’s mattress which she left behind in a bedroom.i

Dan Markel tried a reconciliation with his wife, WENDI ADELSON but she was determined to press on with severing their marriage by way of a civil legal divorce and decree nisi.

Papers at the divorce court informed the judge that they had made consensual financial arrangements (which she persuaded him to agree to)and so the decree absolute was granted in July 2013, although custody issues for their two sons continued to be litigated.

But if the trial for the murder of Law Professor Dan Markel results in her being proved  to be a member of that conspiracy to murder  Dan Markel, her husband,  then equity should prohibit such a claim.

Divorce litigation case and Dan Markel shot dead in 2014

Dan Markel’s ex-wife WENDI ADELSON applied to the court for leave to move away from Tallahassee to live near her parents, 400 miles away in south Florida, but he successfully made a case for the children to remain in Tallahassee in order that he could fulfill his responsibilities and obligations to care for his sons. When she was subpoenaed last week (Oct 2019) to court to give evidence she answered the deputy District Attorney with the stunning reply that she was relieved that she was made to return to live there, because she liked her job, she told the Tallahassee Court recently.

According to the sworn evidence in her affidavit and application to leave for Miami with the boys, whilst still undergoing divorce proceedings. Was this perjury, or was what she said in court under oath last week-perjury??

There is a Court Order to that effect.

His ex-wife by then had bought a house similar to the former marital property in Tallahassee and near to FSU where she continued to work at the FSU until just after Markel and for a time they shared access rights to the children until 18 July 2014, when Dan Markel, having taken his sons to nursery school at 9.00 am, had returned to his house where he was shot in the head through his car window as he drove into his garage where one  was waiting for him, the other waiting ready to drive up Dan Markel’s driveway to allow the shooter swift exit from Tallahassee. It was a well-planned,  cold, callous but slick execution of Dan Markel.

Two men indicted for Dan Markel’s murder in 2016

The police dragged their feet and did not arrest anyone for over almost two years and then on 26 May 2016, Tallahassee Police Department (TPD), assisted by the US Federal Investigation Bureau (FBI) successfully won the right to arrest two men, having submitted extensive and detailed Probable Cause Affidavits to the Court. Sigfredo Garcia and Luis Rivera were the subjects of these probable cause affidavits, the latter man already in prison, having been convicted and imprisoned for 10 years on separate drug dealing charges.

In particular, it is to be noted that soon after Dan Markel was shot,  police went to Wendi’s house (10 minutes away from Dan Markel’s) and proceeded invite her to the police station to help them with their investigation for the killer or killers of Dan Markel. She comfortably remained at the police station for six hours, voluntarily agreeing to provide her mobile telephone, her fingerprints; her photographs, etc and voluntarily spoke non-stop with police for this period of time.

Police tested her hands for evidence of gunshot residue and her car was taken away for a full forensic examination. Mrs Markel, aka, Wendi Jill Adelson spent SIX HOURS in TPD buildings before returning to her own house. She was not charged. SHE SHOWED NO ANXIETY TO BE BACK WITH HER YOUNG SONS.

In October 2016, a third person was arrested in this murder investigation, which remains ongoing. The third person is Katherine Diane Magbanua[i], the once common-law wife of arrested person Sigfrido Garcia for whom she bore two offspring in Miami, Florida and who allegedly was employed in the Dental Surgery of Wendi’s brother Charles Adelson, quickly , it was reported, becoming his lover also. Katherine Diane Magbanua has also been charged with first degree murder of Dan Markel and she was refused her application for bail

TPD Probable Cause Affidavits before the Attorney General

The Probable Cause Affidavits included the fact that WENDI JILL ADELSON, ex-wife of the deceased Professor Dan Markel had told police investigators during an interview soon after Dan Markel’s shooting,  that her brother Charles Adelson had joked about hiring a hit man to kill Dan Markel, but she quickly stated thereafter that her brother made a lot of jokes in bad taste and that she did not think her brother would actually commit such a crime.

The Probable Cause Affidavit in support of indictment of Garcia and Rivera states that after Dan Markel’s ex-wife called her mother to tell her of  Dan Markel’s death,  telephone records show that her mother, Donna Adelson,  then telephoned her son Charlie Adelson, who then telephoned  Katherine Diane Magbanua, an alleged employee of  Charles Adelson’s dental surgery (whom he was also dating at the time). Katherine D. Magbanua was the former common –law partner of  the now indicted Sigfreda Garcia and she is the mother of Sigfredo Garcia’s  two children. This last telephone call, as stated in the Probable Cause Affidavit, was significant because police investigators believe that Katherine Diane. Magbanua is the person who facilitated Dan Markel’s murder by her ex-partner Sigfredo Garcia and his friend Luis Rivera on the instigation of Charles Adelson and his and Wendi’s mother, Donna Adelson-   in that Katherine D. Magbanua is the causal link between Charles Adelson (Dan Markel’s ex-brother-in-law) and the men who travelled to Tallahassee from south Florida just to shoot and kill Dan Markel.

The Probable Cause Affidavit notes several other records of telephone calls made between Sigfreda Garcia, Katherine D. Magbanua and Dan Markel’s ex-brother-in-law, Charles Adelson.

Probable Cause Affidavit to indict Katherine D. Magbanua and Charles Adelson

Initially, the State Attorney General was of the opinion the telephone call records collected by police investigators were not sufficient evidence, on their own, to arrest Charles Adelson and Katherine D. Magbanua. TPD wanted Katherine D Magbanua and Charles Adelson of South Florida to be arrested and indicted and TPD had prepared the relevant additional Probable Cause Affidavits. But the prosecutor said that there was not enough evidence to charge the two.[3]

Misfortune relating to police covert surveillance in Florida Law

 The law of Florida did not allow police to tape suspects’ telephone conversations, but merely to record that a telephone call was made by X to Y and it lasted Z minutes. In this respect, Florida’s criminal laws are way behind those of the United Kingdom (UK).

Second Probable Cause Affidavit to indict Katherine D. Magbanua and Charles Adelson: Magbanua charged with murder

The second Probable Cause Affidavit which TPD prepared alleges that Katherine D. Magbanua received large sums of money into her bank account, after Dan Markel’s murder, to a sum total of almost $50,000.00. Many cheques were made out to her and written and signed by Donna Adelson. These cheques did not even tally with the dates in related invoices allegedly for employment at the Adelson’s Tamarac Dental Surgery[4]. In total over $44,000.00 was paid by the Adelsons into Katherine D. Magbanua’s bank account. Furthermore she undertook breast enhancement surgery some two weeks after Dan Markel had been murdered at a cost of $ 67,000.00 and she was given a Lexus car which had Wendi J. Adelson’s father as having been the former Owner.

I FAIL TO COMPREHEND HOW SUCH SOLID DOCUMENTARY EVIDENCE COUPLED WITH PHONE CONVERSATIONS IS NOT ENOUGH EVIDENCE TO ARREST MIDDLE_CLASS DENTIST CHARLES ADELSON.

However in October 2016, Katherine D. Adelson was arrested and indicted on the charge of first degree murder and b she was denied Bail. By this time Wendi J Adelson’s mother and father and brother had retained a clever cunning-with-words-criminal law attorney named David Oscar Marcus. The criminal attorneys in this case looked as if they could themselves squeeze unhurt from underneath a stone, so cunning was their brow-beating words without a word of law spoken.

THIS LEFT CHARLES ADELSON UNTOUCHED AGAIN. MONEY SPEAKS LOUDLY.

Charles Adelson

The second Probable Cause Affidavit  alleges that Dan Markel’s  ex-brother-in-law, Charles Adelson, (a dentist like his father ) is connected to Markel’s  killing, but the Florida State  Prosecutor has decided not to arrest Charles Adelson . Florida State Attorney Willie Meggs, told the media that this murder case is still under investigation. Gentlemen's club.

Local police: friends and secret enemies?

Tallahassee Police Department (TPD) had prepared this second Probable Cause Affidavit relating to the murder of Dan Markel. This Probable Cause Affidavit that the TPD had prepared is a lengthy and detailed Probable Cause Affidavit.  It was no surprise when Luis Rivera on 3 October 2016, in a deal with prosecutors, confessed to the murder of Dan Markel and he is to receive a seventeen year prison sentence for his part in Dan Markel’s murder. Luis Rivera is actually already in prison, having been convicted of drug dealing.  Rivera is presently serving a ten year sentence to run concurrently with the punishment for Dan Markel’s murder in exchange for revealing all to police. He was due to go on trial for Dan Markel’s murder before a grand jury on 31 October 2016. Note that the other person charged, Sigfredo Garcia, will still be tried before a Grand Jury in November 2016

Homicide: a serious violent crime

Since the readers of this law paper will include readers around the world who subscribe to Westlaw, Thomson Reuters’ [5]it is fitting to discuss how murder law compares among at the UK and US and Commonwealth countries. The subject matter of murder is, in fact,  and in fiction, not likely to disappear and the boundaries between actual murder and fictional murder have become blurred in the media. The number of homicides (murders) in the United States (US) is well over the 24,000 each year as recorded a decade ago and has now been recognised as a major health problem in the US and is classified as a ‘serious violent crime’ with the definition of ‘homicide’ being ‘the wilful, non-negligent killing of one human being by another person or group’ with ‘violent offences’ having the following characteristics:

‘The risk of physical harm is present, even though only homicide leads to death; the victim of such an act is placed in a situation in which a great deal of anxiety is present and there are long-lasting consequences for the perpetrator and the victim.’