Edward Kanieski
Wood
County, Wisconsin
Date of Crime: June 29, 1952
Edward Frank Kanieski was convicted of murdering tavern
owner Clara Bates. Bates, 76, was found strangled and bludgeoned to
death in her living quarters at her bar in Wisconsin Rapids. Kanieski,
then 33, was one of two men who found Bates two days after she was last seen
alive. Kanieski had been been an irregular customer at her bar. He had once told Bates a false story about being an aviator. When
Bates expressed interest in going to Iowa some months in the future,
Kanieski had offered to fly her there. Later he had a fall outside a
funeral home, for which his head was bandaged. Using the bandage as
evidence, he told Bates he had a plane accident and could no longer take
her. Kanieski initially lied about being at Bates's bar the night of
her murder. While Kanieski was there, she left other patrons to speak
with him for about 15 minutes. Kanieski left before closing. Bates subsequently closed her bar early for some unspecified reason,
possibly because she planned to meet with her murderer. Exiting
patrons reportedly saw Kanieski's car by the side of the road and he
admitted he was parked by the side of the road.
Medical opinion was that Bates was murdered within 15 hours of the closing. Bates had once managed the Club Forest, a house of prostitution just across
the county line (in Portage County), until it was sold in the mid-forties. She was found wearing just shoes and stockings, which was reportedly the
style of how prostitutes dressed when the saw their clients. On a
table at the murder scene was a near empty bottle of brandy and two glasses,
one containing a small amount of beer. Bates's dress and under clothes
were folded neatly on a chair. The evidence suggests Bates drank
liquor with a paramour or client shortly before her murder and that she had
willingly undressed for him. This paramour/client then presumably
murdered her. The likelihood of Kanieski being the paramour/client is
discounted somewhat by the age difference between the 76-year-old Bates and
the 33-year-old Kanieski. Bates presumably knew many older men from
her days as a madam. Kanieski had no apparent motive for killing
Bates.
Kanieski's arms were scratched after the murder. He reportedly had
given two different explanations as to why they were scratched. Hair,
fiber, and insulation material found on the trousers Kanieski was wearing
the night of the murder were reportedly consistent with hair, fiber, and
insulation material found at the murder scene. The expert witness who
did the examination stated the material on Kanieski's trousers and that at
the crime scene could have come from a common source. The day prior to
the murder, Kanieski bought new soles for his shoes. He then resoled
his shoes within a day of the murder. It was a Sunday, and he
presumably would not have resoled his shoes on a work day. No
shoeprints were reported as being left at the murder scene. Despite
Kanieski's alleged carefulness in replacing the soles of his shoes, he for
some reason had not washed the trousers. After Kanieski was taken into
custody, his wife told investigators that while ironing she had scorched the
shirt he was wearing the night of the murder. She then said she burned
the shirt because her husband would be mad if he saw that it was scorched.
Kanieski, who always maintained his innocence, served nearly 20 years in
prison before the Wisconsin Supreme Court vacated his conviction on the
grounds that he had been convicted on insufficient evidence. Kanieski
died in 1975. The trial prosecutor, John Potter, later wrote a 1993
book about the case entitled The Tangled Web. Potter named
the book from the saying, “Oh what a tangled web we weave, when we practice
to deceive.” Though Potter maintains he is convinced of Kanieski's
guilt, all of the evidence he presents merely raises suspicion that Kanieski
could have committed the crime. Besides Potter, Kanieski's
daughter-in-law, Colleen Kohler Kanieski wrote a 1995 book about the case
entitled Please Pass the Roses. This book is purportedly more
about the impact of Kanieski's conviction on his family than it is about the
case. [10/08]
________________________________
Reference: The
Tangled Web
Posted in:
Victims of the State,
Wisconsin Cases,
Insufficient Evidence
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