Deep Dive
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The further I've looked into Bob Pelley's background, the more I've wondered about his life in the late 1970s and early 80s, when he was a young man and Jeff was a young boy. How far back did Bob's relationship with people in Florida go? And was he the person everyone thought he was? While looking for those answers, that's when I ran into an incredibly significant lead.
Around 4 o'clock in the morning on Saturday, February 28th, 1976, a car was sinking fast, filling quickly with the water of San Carlos Bay near Sanibel Island, Florida. Within minutes, the red 1967 Mercury convertible was partially submerged in about 5 feet of water.
Now, I know from having lived in Southwest Florida for years that cars going into bodies of water is actually way more common than you'd think. A lot of stories I used to report on involved intoxicated drivers missing a turn and launching into a canal, or unfortunately, people wanting to take their own lives driving over a seawall. And even sometimes a person would intentionally sink their car for insurance money.
But in 1976, the Mercury in San Carlos Bay was unique because it wasn't any of those things. It was a brand new mystery that Sanibel Island police had never encountered. According to reporting by the Fort Myers News Press and Sanibel Police Records, when crews towed the car out, no one was inside.
That was definitely strange. When they checked the car's registration, it came back to a man named Harry William Stewart, who was from Fort Myers. Police knew the car didn't just roll off the Sanibel Causeway. It had been launched roughly 50 feet into the bay. Someone had to have been behind the wheel when it crashed, and it wasn't reported as a stolen car, so police thought most likely the person who'd been driving it was the owner.
Sanibel Police initiated an extensive search to find whoever was driving the Mercury. But after days of diving and scouring the coastlines of Fort Myers Beach and Sanibel, a body never turned up. So Sanibel Police were left trying to figure out who Harry's family and friends were to hopefully get more information that could help the investigation. But they were sort of beat to the punch.
The sunken car with no body in it became a headline news story right away. According to Jim McGee's reporting for the news press, Harry's landlord called the day after the car was found. That landlord's name? Phil Hawley. In 1976, Phil called the Sanibel police and claimed to be renting an apartment to a 28-year-old man named Harry William Stewart.
According to police, Phil was the only person who ever inquired about Harry. No family members or any other friends ever called about him. Phil explained that he'd known Harry for three years and they'd done business together. A few weeks after the car sunk, Phil let Sanibel police check out the apartment in Fort Myers that he rented to Harry.
According to detectives' reports published in the Fort Myers News Press, when officers went inside the apartment, they found little to no furniture, rat feces and filth everywhere, no toiletries, one change of clothes that were tattered and completely unwearable, and a stack of unopened bills on the kitchen counter that were postmarked a year old. When officers asked Phil to show them the lease paperwork for the unit, Phil produced it.
Oddly, Phil had signed it, but Harry had not. Police couldn't find Harry's signature on any of the mail or documents in his apartment. And the case of the missing man, whose car ended up in San Carlos Bay, went cold. Until a year later. According to Jim McGee's reporting, insurance claim investigators visited Sanibel in 1977 to try and prove Harry William Stewart was in fact dead.
It had been a year since his car sank and he was presumed dead. The claim investigators had been receiving calls from the beneficiary of three life insurance policies for Harry that equaled $86,000. That beneficiary? Phil Hawley. The Sanibel police confirmed to the news press that Phil was attempting to collect on the insurance money for Harry's death.
The insurance investigators began looking into the claim, wondering why a person's landlord would be the beneficiary of their life insurance. What they found was an FBI investigation months in the making and a missing person whose true identity was mystifying.
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Insurance company investigators in 1977 didn't know it, but a few months after Harry William Stewart's car sank off of the Sanibel Causeway, the feds had started looking for him too. In June 1976, four months after the Mercury registered to Harry went for a swim in San Carlos Bay, a tall, dark-haired white man using his name and date of birth applied for a passport in Miami.
The FBI flagged the application because they cross-checked the name, Harry William Stewart, and his date of birth with the Bureau of Vital Records and discovered that the information belonged to a baby who was dead. At the time, the FBI didn't know that a Harry William Stewart was supposedly missing from Fort Myers. Agents simply recognized that the name and the information on the passport application was fake.
That discovery of fraud allowed the feds to get an arrest warrant for the man whose photo was taken for the passport. Fast forward a year later, and the FBI just can't seem to find this man posing as Harry William Stewart. At the same time, insurance investigators in Sanibel realized they too were having problems verifying the validity of their sunken car victim.
The feds and the insurance companies eventually realized they were most likely looking for an identity that didn't exist. The one thing that continued to puzzle them, though, was who was the real man who smiled for the passport photo? Who was the real man Phil Hawley claimed to rent an apartment to and was the beneficiary of his life insurance? Who was the name behind the face?
According to a Fort Myers News Press article, to try and get some answers, the insurance investigators looked closely at the life insurance policies made out to the fake man. Two of the policies had been taken out via mail, with no ability to trace them, but the third was prepared by an agent in Cape Coral, Florida. That agent was a close colleague and business associate of Phil Hawley.
When investigators asked the agent if he remembered preparing the life insurance policy for Harry William Stewart, neither he nor Phil could recall. Phil never provided an explanation to the newspaper about the suspicious matter, and the investigation seemed to die there.
As 1976 came to a close, it became glaringly obvious to federal authorities and the insurance companies that the name Harry William Stewart and the real person trying to use it to get a passport in Miami was all a bunch of fraud. Based on vital records, a baby with that name had existed in the 1940s, but then died.
Someone stole the dead baby's name and used that information in February of 1976. That's when they'd registered a car to it, put it as a tenant on an apartment lease, and even had life insurance policies drawn up for it. When the mercury sank in San Carlos Bay, the identity was made to appear as deceased, which allowed Phil Holley to attempt to claim life insurance money.
But after all of that, the identity was later revived in June of 1976 by a man trying to obtain a passport. A real person was photographed for the application process and signed the two-page legal document. When I dug through the Fort Myers News Press archives, I saw there was an article that obtained a copy of that photo from the passport and published it in March of 1978.
And what's incredibly interesting is the man in the image appears to have the same hair color, facial features, and jawline of none other than Bob Pelley. Even Jackie Pelley says the photo is uncanny to her father. What do you think about that passport photo? I don't know what to make of it. It kind of resembles my dad.
Now, I know what you're thinking. There's no way the phony passport photo could be Bob Pelley. That would be too far-fetched, right? Well, bear with me for just a second. Fran Watson, Jeff's post-conviction attorney, obtained a copy of the original passport application from the FBI via FOIA request and sent it to me. A copy is on our website, so make sure you go take a look.
The passport says that the purpose of it is a six-week vacation in Venezuela, Brazil, and the Caribbean islands. Now I ask you, who in 1976 goes on a six-week vacation to South America? And what for? The occupation is said to be a journalist's.
So when we look at the photo, you know, Jackie says, I think that looks like my dad. So when we look at it, what is your take? Well, I certainly see a resemblance, more than a resemblance, between the passport photo, which would have been 1976,
And Mr. Pelly, I see it particularly in the eyes, in the hair, in the chin. The chin is sort of what is convincing, most convincing to me, the shape of the head. In a lot of Mr. Pelly's pictures, he's not smiling. And the man in the passport photo has a big smile. And that can change image, right? But if you just look at the chin on the two photos, you'll shake your head yes. And if you look at the placement of the eyes, you'll shake your head yes.
And then if you look at the way the hair, I've seen a picture, certainly seen a picture of Mr. Pelley where his hair is parting right in the middle, just at the same exact spot as it is in the passport photo. I think what the passport photo shows is that Bob Pelley was tied into what I call the Hawley badness as early as 1976.
Now, again, that's Fran's opinion. It's what her legal argument in defense of Jeff is built on. But here is what I can prove, based on information my investigation has revealed. When Phil Hawley spoke at Jeff's sentencing in 2006, he claimed he'd known Bob Pelley since Jeff was 5 years old, which would have been 1976, because Jeff was born in 1971.
So, Phil admits to knowing Bob Pelley the very same year that the Harry William Stewart identity was used on a bogus passport application. Based on Florida SunBiz records I pulled, I know for a fact that in May of 1976, Bill created a company called American Bureau of Citizenship, which just so happened to aid in passport and visa application services.
That business was one month old when the man claiming to be Harry William Stewart applied for a passport in Miami. My investigation also revealed that the signature on the Harry William Stewart passport closely matches Bob Pelley's signature. I know this because I pulled land records for Bob Pelley when he bought a home in Cape Coral in 1983. He signed his name on the deed.
I compared his signature from that deed to the signature for Harry William Stewart on the passport application, and they're an incredibly close match. Now, I'm not a handwriting expert, but if you don't believe me, take a look at the two signatures for yourself on our website and tell me what you think. Pay close attention to the way Bob loops his lowercase L's, and you'll see what I mean.
I should also mention another interesting piece of information that I found out that definitely ties Phil Hawley to the stolen identity of Harry William Stewart, well before the sunken car and the fake passport incident. I uncovered that in September of 1975, the registered agent for Caribbean Industries Inc., one of Phil Hawley's corporations, was none other than Harry William Stewart.
This is all online and public record if you go to SunBiz. So this means, in 1975, a fictitious person was running one of Phil Hawley's businesses. How that's even possible, I have no idea. My whole point in even bringing any of this up is to show you what so many investigators over the years have been unable to see.
Based on credible evidence, documents, and circumstances, it's more than conceivable that Bob Pelley knew Phil Hawley as early as 1976, and that Phil Hawley knew the identity of Harry William Stewart was bogus as early as 1975. The extent to which Phil used or repurposed the stolen name has never been known to local law enforcement or the FBI.
I can tell you though that it appears Phil never did get the insurance money for the three policies he had on Harry William Stewart. What Fran Watson wants to know in her defense for Jeff is if Bob and Phil were involved in illegal activity together back in the 70s that later followed Bob and maybe even contributed to his murder. I can't answer that question and honestly that's not what I'm here to do.
I'm here to find fact and figure out what the evidence reveals about the life of Bob Pelley. Fran's job is to argue if the information relates to the Pelley murders. Her biggest hurdle is finding physical proof that supports her claim about the Hollies.
I can look at fake passports and raise eyebrows at Phil Hawley all day long, but the fact remains, there is nothing concrete that ties any member of the Hawley family to the Pelley murders. And because there's so much evidence that Indiana police in 1989 didn't investigate, it's hard to know which way is up.
For example, I want to know what happened to the film inside Bob's 35mm camera that police seized as evidence, and what about the locket with the photos of a woman and a man inside of it, and a key that was found in a barrel outside of the Pelley's Parsonage? Those items are literally documented in the police's evidence log in Indiana. Could there have been film in the camera that provides more clues about the crime?
Knowing the identity of the people in the locket's pictures also seems pretty important, all these years later, when alternate theories like Fran's are being seriously entertained. According to the St. Joseph County police file and the trial discovery, none of that evidence was ever investigated. No one, including Jeff's first defense attorney, Alan Baum, questioned what happened to those items.
Fran tells me that the prosecutor's office told her at one point that the film from Bob's camera was developed back in 1989. But police said the images were blurry, so they destroyed the film. She also says the locket and keys are missing from the evidence boxes. I have to believe that's the truth because when I interviewed Craig Whitfield, the cold case investigator, he told me that he never saw those pieces of evidence either.
As you go through this inventory, did you have questions about, well, what's on the roll of film? What is that locket? It has a picture of a white male and a white female.
Any questions for you that you wanted to pursue further? But it doesn't look like those items came into play at trial or in the charges. And I can't even speak to that. I don't remember that piece of the case, honestly. In your discussions with John, did any of that stuff ever come up, like Bob's camera, the film? Not that I can recall. I would about bet that they had whatever film was on there exposed so they could see what was on it. Because that would be important. You know, I would hope that they did that.
Because there's a lot of emphasis put on there was no pictures of Jeff in his tuxedo until he was already at prom. So pictures and proof is in the minds of the investigators in 89. We need to see images throughout that evening to determine sequence of events. But this camera that's found at the parsonage, there's no pictures from it in evidence.
or in the case file, and there's no explanation of what happened to that. And so I just don't know if that struck you as odd or it was just something that couldn't be pursued. It couldn't be pursued. I don't remember there being any film. On top of all the questions I have about the camera film, the locket, the keys, I also want to know why police didn't follow up on a report they took from Ed Hayes, Dawn's father.
Back on May 16th, 1989, detectives from St. Joseph County drove to Michigan and interviewed Ed for the second or third time. According to the police report, during that interview, Ed told the investigators that after the murders, he'd gone into the parsonage and found the family's checkbook. Ed noticed that in the days leading up to Saturday, April 29th, three checks had been issued from the book.
One was for $65 and written in the memo line was "Prom Things for Jeff." The second check was for $45 and written in the memo line was "Weekend Spending Money for Jackie." The third entry was a check written to Cash for $120. Ed told the police that the checks for Jackie and Jeff were in Dawn's handwriting, but the third check wasn't in Dawn's handwriting.
Ed said the third check was suspicious because he found out later that if the check had been cashed, it would have overdrawn the family's account and bounced. He had no idea if the handwriting on the third check was Bob's or not. All he knew was that Don didn't write it and the police needed to investigate if someone had tried to cash it. Everywhere I have looked in the case file, there is zero follow-up from St. Joseph County Police on this report.
I find Ed's information about the checkbook incredibly interesting, though. I have the receipt from Jeff's tuxedo shop. His rental cost was around $65, so the check for his stuff adds up. Then there's the check for Jackie's weekend trip. That $45 makes sense, too, considering she'd need to eat for two days, and it took Bob a tank of gas to drop her off and drive back to Lakeville.
It's the third check, not in Dawn's handwriting, that will always bother me. Who wrote that check? And why? How did the police not think this was important? Detectives never mention in any of their reports that they did a forensic examination of the Pellys' banking records. Nowadays, that's like standard procedure, or at least it should be. As I've dwelt on all of these unanswered questions, there's one that tops them all.
What happened to the Pelley's .22 revolver after it left the parsonage in spring of 1988? Remember, after Jeff threatened to take his own life a year before the murders, both he and Jackie stated that Bob took the revolver out of the parsonage and gave it to somebody. Not to Thomas Kebb, but to somebody else for safekeeping. Here's Jeff explaining it in his May 1st, 1989 interview.
I have a .22 pistol that was a friend of the family's and his father died. It was his father's gun. When his father died it was given to him and he didn't want anything to do with it so he gave it to my dad and my dad gave it to my mom. When my mom died it became mine. We had an incident happen last year where I tried to commit suicide.
and my dad sold all the guns that were in the house and he kept that one and he gave it to somebody. I don't know who it was. It's a H&R, I believe, nine-shot revolver. He gave it to somebody else to keep for me and that when dad decided I was ready, that he would give it back to me, but he didn't want it in the house. He didn't tell me who had it or anything, but he gave that to somebody else to keep.
Throughout my investigation, I've also found a police report that states Bob's sister said the gun went to somebody for safekeeping in spring of 1988. But somehow, shortly before Bob died, he was in possession of it again. At that point is when he gave it to his sister.
So where, or rather to whom, did the .22 revolver go to from April of 1988 until Bob suddenly had it again and asked his sister to keep it right before his death in April of 1989? The question is one Fran Watson has never realized could be very important.
I'm thankful that you're a good journalist and a good investigative journalist and that you've recognized that in the spring of 1988, a gun, a .22 revolver that had belonged to that family was given to someone.
Until now, no one has ever investigated how relevant the Peli's missing .22 revolver might be to the story's big picture, especially when you consider the Florida facts. That's coming up in Picking Up Pace, the season finale of CounterClock. Listen right now.
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