Suspect in nun’s killing may get 30 years
A former monk trainee is expected to be offered a deal today that would send him to prison for 30 years for the 2001 killing of a Holy Cross Academy nun.
One of South Florida’s most sensational murder cases could be resolved today with a plea deal that would send a former Ukrainian monk-in-training to prison for 30 years for the slaying of a nun at a West Kendall school in 2001.
Attorneys have worked for months to come up with a deal that would adequately punish Mykhaylo Kofel for the stabbing and beating death of Michelle Lewis, 39, while making allowances for prosecutors’ belief that he was abused by priests at Holy Cross Academy.
Kofel has repeatedly claimed since the March 25, 2001, killing that two priests at Holy Cross had molested him for the four years he lived at the school. The priests deny the accusations.
Lead prosecutor Gail Levine said Wednesday that the state believes Kofel was abused and that created ”significant mitigation” in the case. She can’t prove that, however, and is not bringing charges against any priests. She said the investigation into the abuse allegations is “ongoing.”
”This is an extremely complicated situation,” Levine said. “This wasn’t a case of a bad man killing someone. This was the case of a victim who turned around and victimized an innocent person.
”That does not make Kofel’s acts tolerable,” she said. “They are intolerable acts. But given the circumstances, a plea of this nature is quite balanced.”
MAKING EXCUSES
Mel Black, an attorney who represents priests at the school, said his clients ”absolutely and categorically” maintain they did not abuse Kofel. He said Levine was making excuses for pleading the case out.
”This man murdered someone,” Black said. “It was premediated; he stole the knife to do it . . . and tried to cover it up. He accused his own father of abusing him. . . . You’re going to give any credibility to what he says?”
Edith Georgi, the assistant public defender who is Kofel’s lead attorney, declined to comment.
Levine said prosecutors will recommend the 30-year sentence in exchange for Kofel’s plea of guilty to second-degree murder. Under the agreement, he would be deported after serving his sentence.
HEARING TODAY
Kofel, 22, is expected to formally accept or reject the deal during a 9 a.m. hearing before Circuit Judge Manny Crespo.
”We won’t be sure until it happens, but we believe this is the best resolution to the case and we believe the defense can accept it,” Levine said.
Kofel had been charged with first-degree murder and could have faced the death penalty or life in prison if convicted.
Georgi was planning to pursue an insanity defense.
Lewis’ death was a violent one. An autopsy showed she had been stabbed 92 times. She had also been severely beaten and her body showed signs of ”six bloody, shoe-imprint-like marks,” the autopsy said.
Kofel was 14 years old when he arrived at Holy Cross in 1996. His parents sent him to the United States after the parish priest in their small Carpathian Mountains village told them about the academy’s scholarship program.
In 1990, Lewis set upon the path that would eventually lead to her intersection with Kofel, according to friends. She was working as an accountant but felt unfulfilled. She had been divorced five years earlier.
Friends say she approached leaders at Holy Cross, saying she wanted to start a religious life at the private school under the jurisdiction of the Byzantine rite of the Catholic Church. Lewis worked as an accountant at the school and was a nun-in-training.
CONFESSION MADE
Investigators said that hours after Lewis’ body was discovered, Kofel confessed to getting drunk and killing her in her living quarters on the academy grounds, 12425 SW 72nd St.
He told detectives Lewis had been mean to him and belittled him. But he offered no other motive for targeting her.
He also told investigators that the priests at the school — which closed in April 2004 because of dwindling enrollment — had abused him.
Levine said prosecution experts who had worked on the case had not given her an ”opinion that contradicted” Kofel’s assertions.
The priests at the academy invoked their right to remain silent in pretrial interviews by defense attorney Georgi.
”They refused to answer the most basic questions — things like what year they became priests,” Levine said. “They stymied and hindered this prosecution. Their refusal to cooperate weighed heavily on the experts we dealt with.”
CLIENTS’ RIGHTS
Black called that absurd.
”Someone is invoking their Fifth Amendment rights and that makes them a criminal?” he said. “Her position has always been that there is an open investigation into these two priests, and I continue to advise my clients to invoke their rights.”
Milt Hirsch, an expert in criminal trial procedure, said he didn’t find it unusual that Levine considered what she believes to be mitigating factors in her decision to allow Kofel to plead to second-degree murder.
”She may just simply believe that this is the right thing to do,” he said. “Prosecutors have a duty to seek justice, not merely go after convictions. And she has a duty to the public to explain what moves her to resolve this very notorious case with a plea deal.
”What’s definitely unusual is that she seems to be at least implying the criminal misconduct of uncharged third parties,” he said.