NEWS

Lee County jail inmate up for sentencing kills himself

Michael Braun
MBRAUN@NEWS-PRESS.COM
Michael Spiegel , 72, here shown at his August 2015 trial, threw himself to his death at the Lee County jail facility on Ortiz Avenue on Sunday.

The day before he was to be sentenced in the murders of his ex-wife and her fiance in 2014, Michael Stephen Spiegel, 72, threw himself off the second floor landing of his cell block to his death Sunday.

Michael Spiegel, here shown at his August 2015 trial with his attorney Mark Eiglarsh, threw himself to his death at the Lee County jail facility on Ortiz Avenue on Sunday.

Spiegel, in the Lee County Jail Core Facility on Ortiz Avenue, was scheduled for a 1 p.m. sentencing Monday in Lee County Court.

He was convicted Aug. 21 after a several-day trial in the murders of of Marilyn Spiegel, 70, his ex-wife, and Harry Carlip, 72, her fiance. Marilyn Spiegel and  Carlip had planned to get married in Fort Myers on May 17, 2014.

“Our investigators have thoroughly reviewed the circumstances of his death and it appears Mr. Spiegel sentenced himself the day before he was to be sentenced by the court,"  Lee County Sheriff Mike Scott said in a press release Sunday. "This has been a tragic case from the beginning when he took two lives and it ended today with him taking his own.”

Spiegel had been in jail since he was arrested May 15, 2014, the same day of the murders.

During his August 2015 trial, Spiegel — who held a doctorate in physics — was alert and responsive.

A jury of five men and four women gazed at gory pictures as Circuit Judge Frank Porter kept the trial moving as quickly as he could.

Spiegel kept his eyes affixed on the wooden table in front of him when prosecutors displayed a picture of ex-wife Marilyn's body when she was found on the boat.

Lee County sheriff's deputies arrived at Salty Sam's Marina about 8:25 a.m. on May 15, 2014. In court, Detective Timothy Galloway recalled clearing the boat in his SWAT gear, armed with an AR-15 rifle.

He recalled stealthily meandering the boat filled with smoke by the fire Spiegel lit to destroy evidence. He found Marilyn Spiegel's bloody body and Carlip's corpse, which an autopsy determined had four bullets in it.

Other deputies stopped Michael Spiegel, who was walking away from the boat in a green raincoat holding a briefcase, both covered in blood. Inside the briefcase was a bloody 10-inch filet knife, a modified Ruger SR22 pistol, plastic zip ties, duct tape, male arousal pills, a pinkish sexual vibrator and intimate lubricant.

Stacy Detar, a sheriff's office crime scene technician, searched Michael Spiegel's boat, Rogue Dog, docked at a Fort Myers Yacht Basin slip hours after the murders and found the purchasing paperwork for the Ruger in his name along with documents for several other handguns.

Lee County sheriff's crime scene technician Robert Walker testified more than an hour, explaining crucial forensic elements of the case, such as how the recovered Ruger that Spiegel bought six months before was the one he used to shoot Carlip's back and buttocks.

Deputies got to the scene so quickly because a man at the marina called 911 after seeing Spiegel walk to the boat and hearing gunshots.

The man told investigators Spiegel was at Salty Sam's the day before the murder asking about Carlip's boat, the Bella Mar.

Charles Waddington said Spiegel hired him through Craigslist to repair the Rogue Dog for a trip to the Bahamas about two weeks before the murders. Spiegel asked Waddington to drive him to Salty Sam's to find a slip to keep his boat the day before the murders. As it turned out, he was talking to the man who would later call 911 about the gunshots.

Leaving Salty Sam's, he said Spiegel abruptly told him that they wouldn't be working on the boat that weekend or the next week and asked to be taken home because he was tired.

When Waddington woke up the next morning, he saw Spiegel on TV in an orange jumpsuit.

Spiegel sailed his boat, a shrimp-like trawler, to Fort Myers almost a month earlier, said Sue Dunham, who works at the Fort Myers Yacht Basin where he rented a slip.

"I checked him into his slip," Dunham said shortly after the murders. "There was nothing unusual with our conversation."

Dunham said Spiegel was traveling with his son.

"He seemed a little peculiar, but it was nothing I could put my finger on," Dunham said.

Nick Lebid, who owns Seahorse Marine Yacht Sales, said during the month Spiegel was at the basin he often worked on his boat.

"He was a kind individual," Lebid said.

According to a report by the Lee County Sheriff's Office, Michael Spiegel, 70, was at Salty Sam's Marina on Wednesday and asked someone about the Bella Mar vessel, which was owned by Marilyn Spiegel and Carlip. The person pointed out the boat and asked if he knew the owner. Michael Spiegel told the person that the Carlip, 70, the owner of the boat, would be very surprised to see him.

Michael Spiegel returned to the marina with a briefcase Thursday morning.

During a 911 call just before 8:30 a.m. Marilyn Spiegel, 69, was "frantically yelling at a male she identified as Michael to leave," according to the LCSO report. Marilyn Spiegel went from screaming to asking Michael Spiegel why he was doing this. Moments later the call ended.

A second call from a witness, the same person that had directed Michael Spiegel the day before, alerted authorities of screaming and gunfire at the marina.

Connect with this reporter: MichaelBraunNP (Facebook) @MichaelBraunNP (Twitter). The News-Press reporters Ben Brasch and Melissa Montoya contributed to this report.