Please Note: There are two errors in the series:
First, My father did not serve even one day in jail - he was arrested, booked and arraigned all in the same day and was released on a 1k PR bond. Secondly, the missing documents were first noticed in 1987 when TWO copies of the official transcript were ordered and BOTH were missing the page that would have explained the plea deal and the relevance of the confessions.
First, My father did not serve even one day in jail - he was arrested, booked and arraigned all in the same day and was released on a 1k PR bond. Secondly, the missing documents were first noticed in 1987 when TWO copies of the official transcript were ordered and BOTH were missing the page that would have explained the plea deal and the relevance of the confessions.
Searching for justice
Lana Lawrence
IN THIS UNDATED PHOTO Lana Lawrence, in polka-dot dress, is shown along with other unidentified children with her father, Walter Lawrence Sr. (on motorcycle), who at the time of the photo was an officer with the Owosso Police Department.
Posted: Monday, August 26, 2013 11:00 am | Updated: 10:38 am, Wed Aug 28, 2013.
Note: This is the first in a three-part series detailing the experiences of Owosso-native Lana Lawrence in her quest for answers related to charges brought against her father for abusing her as a child.
For more than three decades, Lana Lawrence has believed that her father got away with years of abusing her physically and sexually.
Now, the Shiawassee County Prosecutor’s Office has admitted that aspects of the 1977 criminal sexual conduct case that left her with emotional scars were “troublesome” and that a first-degree charge, which could have put her father behind bars for life, could have been pursued rather than the fourth-degree charge to which he later pleaded no contest.
Shiawassee County Prosecutor Deana Finnegan reviewed the decades-old case at the request of former Owosso resident Lana Lawrence.
Finnegan recently issued an apology letter to Lawrence on behalf of the prosecutor’s office, in which Finnegan noted several “red flags” in the case, including confessions by Lawrence’s father, Walter Lawrence Sr., that seemed to be ignored.
“Having prosecuted child molestation cases for over 20 years, I can honestly state that your case is one of the most heinous I have ever encountered,” Finnegan wrote in the letter, a copy of which was obtained by The Argus-Press.
The case began with a report to a school counselor and later revealed multiple alleged rapes and other abuse before finally concluding with a series of inexplicable proceedings in court. In the end, a case that could have resulted in life in prison resulted in no jail time, outside of 38 days the father was held in jail during court proceedings.
Lawrence Sr. was sentenced to two years probation and was ordered to continue therapy.
Finnegan recently said Walter Lawrence Sr. “got away with it.”
In 1977, Walter Lawrence Sr. pleaded to a single count of fourth-degree criminal sexual conduct (sexual contact or “fondling”), a misdemeanor punishable by a maximum of two years incarceration. Fourth-degree CSC is the lowest-level CSC charge available.
Lana Lawrence also was ordered by the court to attend therapy and, as a result of probate court hearings, was placed into foster care after her mother and father’s parental rights were terminated. Lawrence said she chose to go into foster care to get away from her father, who also allegedly beat her. In addition, the court placed her under a “no contact” order regarding not only her parents, but her siblings as well.
“I felt as though I was being punished,” she said. “I was the one getting bounced around from foster home to foster home and his life didn’t change.”
Lawrence Sr., now 81, still resides in the city of Owosso. In a phone interview, he would not comment on whether he engaged in forced sexual intercourse with his daughter, but said he was apologetic for “screwing up her life.”
“I do regret it and I want to say I’m sorry. I tried to tell her I’m sorry,” he said, adding he considered the therapy to be a sufficient sentencing.
“I already screwed up one life and if I went to jail I would have messed up more lives,” he said, speaking of his family. “(The therapy) cleared my mind up from wanting to molest.”
The arrest and issuing of charges
The police investigation began after Lana Lawrence disclosed accusations against her father to then-Owosso High School counselor William Black.
According to the police report, Lawrence Sr. was arrested June 21, 1977, by then-trooper Michael Greene on suspicion of first-degree CSC for alleged repeated rapes of Lana Lawrence, dating back to at least the age of 8.
“My father raped me every way that you can rape a person; orally, anally, vaginally,” said Lana Lawrence, who was 16 at the time of the case. “To tell you the truth, I can’t even count the number of times that man raped me. I can think of four times on one trip.”
According to the police report, Lawrence Sr., after being read his rights, admitted to the trooper in an interview he had sexual intercourse with Lana Lawrence about three times, anal intercourse twice and oral sex on several occasions.
Lana Lawrence told Greene she was forced to have sexual intercourse with her father on at least one occasion and that he had attempted anal and oral intercourse on several others, according to the report. She told The Argus-Press she was fearful, at first, of the repercussions from her parents for speaking out about the abuse.
“I recall being terrified that I was telling the state trooper that my father was abusing me, and I feared that nothing would happen to him because he was a former cop, and he would retaliate against me when he got the opportunity to do so, just as he did when I told my mother,” she stated in an email to The Argus-Press from her home in coastal Delaware. “I finally told them that my father anally raped me often, and that it was how he preferred to abuse me.”
Finnegan said that allegation alone could be enough to warrant first-degree charges.
“In the police report, certainly there is a basis to charge first-degree criminal sexual conduct and that certainly is what we would have charged now,” she said. “The defendant, Mr. Lawrence, made statements implicating himself.”
Scott Ryder, who was an assistant prosecutor at the time, handled both the criminal and probate cases related to the allegations. The investigation was conducted by Michigan State Police, because Lawrence Sr. was a former Owosso police officer, though he left that position in 1965, according to city records.
A warrant issued by Ryder dated June 21, 1977, reduced the first-degree charge recommended by Greene to fourth-degree CSC. Lawrence Sr. was arraigned in district court and bound over to circuit court on the fourth-degree charge.
Finnegan, in the letter to Lana Lawrence, stated she “found the charge troubling, since the offense involved the repeated rape and molestation of a child.”
Ryder — who served under then-prosecutor Gerald D. Lostracco, who is now seated as 35th Judicial Circuit Court Judge — said in a phone interview he did not recall the specific case, but stated there would have been valid reasons for pursuing only fourth-degree.
“If a fourth-degree (charge) was allowed, there had to be a good reason for it, other than he was an Owosso police officer,” Ryder told The Argus-Press. “I can never recall any incidents where the status or position of a potential criminal defendant ever resulted in any deals. We just did not do that. We had more integrity than that.”
He added that — while he was the only prosecutor present at any of the hearings, both in criminal and probate court, outside of three adjourned arraignments in which Lostracco attended — he would not have been able to approve such a deal himself.
“There was no way this was my decision alone,” he said. “No high-profile case would ever have been pleaded without a complete examination of that case and complete review by the prosecutor, at that time that’s (Gerald) Lostracco.”
Ryder — who is now the court administrator and Indian Child Welfare Act attorney for the Nottawaseppi Huron Band of the Potawatomi near Athens, and previously served as juvenile court director in St. Joseph County and chief juvenile court referee in Kalamazoo County — declined a request made by The Argus-Press to review the case file.
Lostracco said he did not remember the case or “anything about the case that Scott handled for us.”
Ryder, as well as Lostracco, said there must have been conversations between attorneys or the court that resulted in the fourth-degree charge, but neither would expand on what that might have entailed.
Lawrence Sr. was not represented by an attorney until at least after the probate court preliminary hearing — which, according to court documents, took place the day after his arrest. By that time, the charge had already been reduced to fourth-degree.
‘Red flags’
Finnegan said she has several concerns with the case, noting the primary issue is that officials seemingly disregarded admissions of intercourse.
On June 22, 1977, the day after Lawrence Sr.’s arrest, a probate court hearing was held to review the petition by Greene for the court to terminate the parental rights of Lana Lawrence’s parents.
According to the petition, Greene alleges much of the same sexual abuse and rape as he did in the police report, but also accuses Lawrence Sr. of physically abusing Lana Lawrence, to the point of bruising her face.
In an audio recording of the preliminary examination in front of then-juvenile court referee Don Peters, Lawrence Sr. admitted to all of the allegations in the petition. Ryder, child services representatives, Lana Lawrence and her court-appointed attorney Harry Kurrle, both parents and Greene all were present at the hearing, which took place three months prior to Lawrence Sr.’s criminal no contest plea.
It’s unknown whether his admission could have been admitted in criminal court, but Finnegan, who listened to the audio recording, said she believed it, as well as the admission to Greene, could have. Lawrence Sr. was informed of his right to an attorney, as well as the right to remain silent (Ryder can be heard at least once stopping proceedings in order for the parents to again be read their rights).
But according to the transcript of Lawrence Sr.’s circuit court arraignment from Sept. 20, 1977, those admissions weren’t presented to then-Circuit Court Judge Peter Marutiak. At the hearing, Marutiak asked Ryder whether any oral or written confessions had been made. After defense attorney Clark Shanahan stated there were no written ones, Ryder was asked again if there were any oral confessions.
Ryder’s response was, “I was just checking, your honor... I don’t believe so.”
In an interview with The Argus-Press, Ryder offered no insight into why he did not present either admission. “If that was said, I don’t know why I would say I don’t recall. I just don’t remember,” he said.
Marutiak accepted the plea agreement Sept. 27, 1977, during a hearing in which prosecutors agreed not to pursue a third-degree charge, a 15-year felony, against Lawrence Sr. in exchange for pleading no contest to fourth-degree. Prosecutors also agreed not to make a recommendation on sentencing.
Oftentimes, plea deals in CSC cases are arranged in order to avoid requiring assault victims to appear on the witness stand, Ryder said. Since admissions on record are not always sufficient in securing a conviction, he added, the victim’s willingness to testify becomes vital.
But on Sept. 27, 1977, Lana Lawrence took the stand in circuit court in order to provide a factual basis for the charge her father pleaded no contest to, something both Lostracco and Finnegan said was uncommon in a plea case. Usually, Lostracco said, a factual basis in that situation can be provided by the police report.
Lana Lawrence — who remembers her testimony with vivid clarity, even recalling the outfit she wore 36 years ago: navy blue dress slacks and a light blue, cowl-neck sweater — said she had prepared herself to give full testimony on multiple rapes by her father.
“It wasn’t as though (Ryder) didn’t have a strong witness to take into court to tell of my father’s crimes. We know that I was strong because he put me on the stand during the (no contest) hearing,” she wrote in an email to The Argus-Press. “We know that I was determined because I never missed a court date, or an interview, or a meeting with respect to this case.
“I remember being terrified, but determined to testify because I wanted to stop my father from harming any more children, and I wanted him to go to jail because I did not feel safe living only two blocks from him in my foster home,” she said.
Instead, Lana Lawrence, according to a transcript of the proceedings, was asked approximately 10 yes-or-no questions addressing just one incident in which her father had carried her to a bed, held her hands down, touched her in an intimate area and did so without her permission. Lana Lawrence confirmed she knew the charge against her father, fourth-degree CSC, but told The Argus-Press that as a 16-year-old, she did not know what that meant.
On Nov. 7, 1977, Lawrence Sr. was sentenced by Marutiak. In the transcript, Marutiak considered “the prosecutorial recommendation that there be no prison commitment,” despite Ryder stating during a previous hearing that no recommendation would be made. According to the transcript, no prosecutor is listed as attending the hearing and none spoke during the sentencing.
Lostracco said all information in the case, including the two admissions, would have been included in the sentencing report for the judge’s consideration.
“In my 24 years of prosecution, I have never known of a sentence for a high-court misdemeanor being carried out without the presence of a prosecuting attorney,” Finnegan wrote in the letter to Lana Lawrence.
Shanahan, after reviewing the case file at the request of The Argus-Press, recently said he considered his former client “a lucky man” for avoiding first-degree charges and jail time.
While he did not recall the case specifically, he said he likely argued in court that sending Lawrence Sr. to prison would devastate “what was left of the family,” something he admitted “would not fly” in today’s court system.
Lawrence Sr. was a security guard for General Motors at the time, and the sole provider for his family.
“Apparently the establishment felt keeping what was left of the family together was better than the alternative of putting him away,” said Shanahan, who served as probate court judge from 1956 to 1964 before returning to private practice. “That concern was to the benefit of the defendant.”
Lana Lawrence said she’s never come to grips with the fact that her father was not incarcerated. She described feeling devastated after reading the sentencing report and couldn’t help feeling it had something to do with his time as an officer.
For years, she blamed Marutiak, but after reviewing the case decades later, she said she felt it had more to do with the prosecution of the case.
“I wish someone would have given me as many breaks as my father got from the county. I wish someone would have seen me for the traumatized girl that I was at the time, and would have worked hard to see that my justice was served, and not given away, gift wrapped, with a bow on top,” she stated in an email. “The prosecution knew that I wanted my father to go to prison because I told Scott Ryder that I did.”
Ryder, when asked about the accusations by Lana Lawrence, denied ever considering her father’s law enforcement past by virtue of those kinds of considerations not being how he operated. Lostracco said no one in his office would have conducted business in that manner.
“I’m very proud of the record we had as a prosecutor’s office,” Lostracco said. “We never would sell any victim short or down the drain, most of all a CSC victim.”
Lana Lawrence said her experience left her feeling victimized a second time.
“The end result is that the victim was given the message that she holds less value than a child molester,” she said. “I held less value than a child molester with the judicial system in my home county... That’s a difficult message to hear and to ever recover from.”
— See Tuesday’s paper for Part 2 of Lana Lawrence’s story, which covers the trauma she suffered as a result of her abuse, as well as the lack of closure she had with her father’s sentence.
