Dan Markel In-Laws Escape Murder Charge in Killing of Florida Law Professor

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By Andrew Silow-Carroll September 9, 2016

— Florida’s state attorney has dismissed as “speculation” affidavits from Tallahassee police implicating the in-laws of slain law professor Dan Markel in his murder.

On Thursday, the Tallahassee Democrat newspaper obtained the affidavits, in which the Tallahassee Police Department lays out its case for why Markel’s ex-wife’s brother, Charlie Adelson, and her mother, Donna Adelson, should be considered prime suspects in his slaying.

Police say Charlie Adelson looked into hiring a hit man the summer before Markel was killed, in the midst of Markel’s bitter divorce from Wendi Adelson.

Two South Florida men with extensive criminal backgrounds have been charged with the murder of the popular legal scholar in the driveway of his home in July 2014, in what police say was a murder for hire.

State Attorney Willie Meggs said, however, that the speculative nature of the police evidence would make it difficult to secure a conviction or even proceed with a trial for Charlie Adelson and Katherine Magabanua, his former girlfriend. She is the mother of the children of one of the men charged in Markel’s murder.

“My opinion after reading those documents is there is no probable cause here to make an arrest,” Meggs told the Tallahassee Democrat. “We kind of believe they were involved according to the police. But what we believe and what we think doesn’t count. What evidence do we have?”

Andrew Silow-Carroll is editor in chief of the New York Jewish Week and senior editor of the Jewish Telegraphic Agency. He previously served as JTA’s editor in chief and as editor in chief and CEO of the New Jersey Jewish News.

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