A woman who for years has challenged the official suicide ruling in her brother’s shooting death nine years ago debuted the first installment of a multi-part documentary to about 100 people in Columbus, hoping to pressure authorities to reopen a case she calls a coverup of a possible homicide.
“Who Killed Cary Owsley?: A Mission for Justice” was screened Thursday evening at the Columbus Learning Center at IUPUC by Owsley’s sister and Columbus native Cheryl Owsley Jackson. Joining her was documentarian Andrea Morehead, a longtime Indianapolis television journalist whose company, Clover Lane Media, produced the short film.
“She has been ignored, she has been disrespected, she’s been threatened, and she’s been told to just let it go,” Morehead said of Owsley Jackson. “Well she’s here, she didn’t, and she won’t.”
Owsley Jackson, herself a longtime journalist who now is an adjunct instructor at the Indiana University Media School, spoke through tears before the screening. “I’m just so thankful to have a team of people who are alongside me, helping me,” she said, thanking supporters. “… I think that this documentary, as we go through the evidence, nine episodes, it could be 10, it could be 11, there’s so much to dig through. … It’s full of surprises. Some things surprised me when we were shooting it.”
Police say Cary Owsley, 49, was found by his wife, Lisa, in their Zephyr Village home outside Columbus in April 2013 with a chest wound from a bullet fired from a handgun. The death was ruled a suicide by then-county Coroner Larry Fisher, although Owsley’s son, Logan Owsley, believes that his father was murdered, according to allegations in court documents. Logan Owsley also appears in the documentary.
Logan Owsley filed a federal lawsuit against numerous county officials about seven years ago. That suit was dismissed for the second time in November, and the dismissal is being appealed for a second time to the 7th Circuit Court of Appeals in Chicago.
The suit that was was previously dismissed on different grounds but reinstated on appeal, alleges, among other things, that Bartholomew County sheriff’s deputies lost or destroyed evidence that would have helped Logan pursue legal claims related to his father’s death.
Nearly four months after Cary Owsley’s death, three sheriff’s department deputies — E. DeWayne Janes, Dean Johnson and Christie Nunemaker — were disciplined for errors in judgment during the investigation. Logan Owsley’s suit names them, along with then-county sheriff Mark Gorbett, Fisher, and current and former sheriff’s deputies Brent E. Worman, William R. Kinman Jr. and Christopher Roberts.
Among the errors that resulted in discipline was allowing Janes, who was formerly married to Cary Owsley’s wife, Lisa, to enter the death scene and remove Cary Owsley’s body from the home and allowing him to touch and secure the handgun, according to the lawsuit. Janes helped cut out a section of the rug that was blood-soaked and bagged it for disposal, according to allegations in the lawsuit. The chair in which Owsley was found dead also was burned outside the home, the lawsuit states.
“Nobody works this hard to cover up a suicide,” Owsley Jackson said after the screening.
The documentary attempts to cast doubt on the integrity of the investigation and place suspicion on Owsley’s wife’s relatives. An independent expert featured in the film disputes the suicide ruling and said he believes the scene of Owsley’s death appeared staged. He also asserts the trajectory of the gunshot wound and other evidence cast doubt on the suicide ruling. Another person who appears in the film asserts that a relative of Owsley’s wife had given incriminating statements about Owsley’s shooting. Others who appear in the film say they suspect a relative of Owsley’s wife may have been connected to another shooting death that was ruled a suicide.
During a Q&A session after the screening, Owsley Jackson said she hoped the documentary would spur a new investigation after an earlier federal investigation failed to overturn any official findings in the case.
“I have spent my entire 50s fighting for justice for my brother,” she said. “If feel like … this documentary is a chance for this to go on the world stage, and I am prepared to fight another, how many ever years it takes. … My mother kept saying, ‘The truth is in the grave,’ and she believed that.”
Owsley Jackson called out officials from Gorbett to former Gov. Mike Pence, whom Owsley said she has known since their Columbus childhoods. She said as governor, Pence ignored her numerous appeals to him to intervene to help get the case reopened.
Bartholomew County Sheriff Matt Myers said Friday, “Unfortunately, I am not able at this time to give a statement regarding anything to do with the Owsley case pending the current litigation we are in. I am not in a position to respond to any questions about the case pending the outcome of the lawsuit.”
Jackson, who worked for The Republic in Columbus for about 10 years early in her career, also criticized local media coverage of the case. “It’s just like there’s all this spin in this community, and it’s toxic. It’s rough. The Republic has just dragged us,” she said.
Finding no relief in the courts so far, Owsley Jackson’s documentary turns to the court of public opinion. She said the producers intend to pitch the documentary to internet streaming services.
“We’re going to just keep getting a bigger and bigger audience until somebody goes to jail,” she said. She also alleged that attorneys representing defendants in Logan Owsley’s case had discussed a possible settlement of the case. “Logan and I are like, you know what? Unless the death certificate is changed, unless there’s somebody charged, unless somebody apologizes, we don’t want your money. … We’re not going to live with Cary Owsley’s death certificate saying suicide. We aren’t doing this for money.
“… I’m not angry at Columbus,” Jackson Owsley said. “I’m angry at a few people in leadership.”
Morehead, who knew Owsley Jackson from their days working as competing broadcast journalists in Indianapolis, said she was compelled to make the documentary because she saw a troubling chain of events in the investigation of Owsley’s death and those that followed.
“As a journalist, just as a reasonable person, you go, ‘how can this happen?” she said. “… I got into the journalism field and profession to speak truth to power, to tell stories of inspiration, to hold people accountable.
“There’s no bigger story, I believe, over the course of my career, than this story,” Morehead said.
“… We’re trying to go to the Department of Justice, we’re trying to get this case reopened, trying to get Attorney General Merrick Garland to look into this. We will go there. I’m in it for the long haul. I’m not in it for any other reason than to see this woman find justice.
“… Someone needs to be held accountable,” she said. “… I believe somebody’s going to break.”
