Detective Mike McCann’s arson case was as good as solved until events put the case, his future and his health in doubt. Then along came the Popovich case. by Rachel Green
It was a hot July day in 2003, typical to central Ohio at that time of year, the kind that brings sweat and misery for some. But sitting at his desk at the station, Columbus Homicide Detective Mike McCann couldn’t help but feel relief. Three months into his investigation of the arson that took five Ohio college students’ lives, McCann had nabbed the man he believed had committed the horrible, tragic crime. Robert Patterson was in custody. Finally, McCann thought, he could put the case to bed.
He leaned his 6-foot large frame back into his office chair, thinking of all the ways this weekend would be different. He could spend time with his wife, Bonnie. He might have time to stop by his favorite downtown bar and grill for some lunch. Maybe, just maybe, he could get some sleep.
The ring of a telephone cut his reverie short.
“Mike McCann.”
The voice on the other end was a woman, a reporter he knew from previous media coverage about the case.
“How do you feel about O’Brien’s decision to let Robert Patterson go?” she asked.
What? McCann knew a case, even a good one, could go south unexpectedly. But not this one. No way.
In investigating Patterson, McCann learned this wasn’t the first time he had been suspected of arson. Four years earlier, in fact, Patterson had been investigated for allegedly setting fire to his mother’s trailer, but was never charged with the crime. With the OSU arson, McCann’s suspect had put himself at the scene, admitting that he was stealing car radios that night, in a parking lot right outside the house, according to news reports. He was identified by witnesses as being involved in an altercation that took place when party-goers caught him breaking into cars.
Given alll that, McCann was stunned at the reporter’s question. “Patterson’s not being released,” he said. “Who the hell told you that?”
“Oh,” she paused at the end of the other line, “Well, I don’t want to tell you this,” she paused again, “But O’Brien’s letting Patterson go Monday. He is being released.”
Ron O’Brien, the Franklin County prosecuting attorney. How could he turn on the case so quickly? McCann says he believed he had O’Brien’s blessing to make the arrest. What had changed?
To this day, McCann’s voice takes on an edge at the memory. Patterson was never charged with the arson and his family insists that he had nothing to do with the fatal fire. Patterson, who could not be reached for this story, has consistently maintained his innocence. O’Brien has said he feels strongly that his decision to let him go was in the best interest of the case.
“We base our decisions in any case on what the evidence reflects and what the law says. Any decision in this or any other case is based on the facts we have…it’s the totality of the circumstances,” O’Brien says. “Four prosecutors, who when combined, have over 100 years of prosecutorial experience worked on this case and we all concluded that further investigation needed to be done.”
McCann disagrees. To him, Patterson was, and still is, the primary suspect in the blaze on April 13, 2003 at 64 East 17th Avenue. With O’Brien’s decision, however, McCann was back at square one. And the crime he thought he had solved, the justice he believed he had won for the victim’s family’s, had vanished like smoke.
For weeks after the fire, the burned out shell of the rooming house where the girls died sat as a reminder to all who passed of the tragedy that still haunted the Ohio State campus.
But to arson investigators, the FBI and Columbus police, the remnants revealed something else — clues that the fire was intentionally set.
That’s when McCann was called to take the case. At the time, McCann was a young 50 years old. His blond hair hid any hints of gray, as did his neatly trimmed mustache. His blue eyes still held a twinkle.
His 28 years with the Columbus Police Department, 13 of which were spent in homicide, made him one of the most seasoned detectives the department has. Despite his experience, some cases still shake him. but nothing like this one.
When firemen arrived at the scene that night, they were met with an inferno. The intense heat emanated out from inside the house, as flames engulfed its first floor. The people who escaped the blaze stood outside the house screaming that there were more people trapped on the upper floors. Inside, the thick black smoke filled the first, second and third floors, making it virtually impossible to see. Crawling through the thick smoke, the three first responders were only able to find victims by catching a glimpse of a hand or a foot.
Each man was able to save one person before the fire flashed through the second floor. In an instant, it became apparent to everyone standing outside that the five still inside weren’t going to make it.
The victims were your typical college students celebrating a coming of age with friends. Kyle Raulin and Adam Schlessman were roommates living with 10 other friends at 64 E. 17th Avenue and were celebrating Schlessman’s 21st birthday. Erin DeMarco, Andrea Dennis and Christine Wilson made the 70-mile drive from Ohio University so they too could celebrate Schlessman’s birthday and enjoy time among close friends. The young women expected to return home to their friends, their “Alpha Gam” sorority sisters, and their studies that were waiting for them on O.U.’s campus the very next day, a day they would never get to see.
“These were all good kids, good kids,” McCann says.
The innocence of the victims, McCann says, is what drives him during an investigation. It’s them, he says, that keep you awake at night.
And indeed, sleep was an unobtainable luxury for McCann following Patterson’s release. After he hung up the phone with the reporter that hot August day, he rarely got through the night without the case, and images of the victims, churning in his mind.
Three a.m. So many times, too many times. He would be awake again. The world outside would be dark and silent. His mind would be roaring with thoughts of flames and death.
He couldn’t escape it.
Wherever he went – the store, to lunch, at home, the case stalked him. Some nights, he spend hours pacing in and out of dark moonlit rooms in his home, trying to see the hole the prosecutor was seeing. He might go to the station, look over old notes or make new ones.
“What if I just do it this way . . . what if, what if? If only . . .” he would tell himself over and over again.
But that Monday came and went with no change in the prosecutor’s stance.
For months after Patterson’s release, McCann and his investigative team, including FBI agent Kevin Horan, would discuss how they could persuade O’Brien. “It was pretty much a consuming event, it occupied our entire lives. But it got to a point where we don’t talk about it anymore. It’s too painful,” Horan says.
McCann might have thought he had his man, but Patterson’s brother and father feel differently. Patterson’s brother, Ron Patterson, told newspapers that Robert was treated unfairly in both arson cases and that he wasn’t capable of committing such terrible crimes. Ron Patterson said his brother, who has since left the area, had maintained his innocence to him throughout the entire investigation. (Attempts to reach the Patterson family were unsuccessful.)
Other prosecutors close to the case say they cannot discuss O’Brien’s decision beyond that more evidence against Patterson was needed.
McCann’s frustration erupts to this day. “Goddamn. We were scrambling around trying to get more evidence, but we didn’t have a clue as what he needed nor did he tell us what he needed. We worked our ass off. But there was just nothing we could do to stop that train from coming down those tracks.”
Still, McCann wanted to pursue the case – not for himself, but the victims’ families’. He felt he had let them down, a feeling that still haunts him today.
To go against the county prosecutor comes with a risk. McCann would undoubtedly have to work with O’Brien on other cases and the two men would need to have a working relationship.
But in weighing the possible risks to his career, he also thought of his own children, Michael, Todd and Kelly. At the ages of 20 and 19, some of the female victims were just a year younger than Kelly, his youngest. What would he want for his child?
He decided to fight. He explained to the media why he thought Patterson was guilty. A memo he wrote with his supervisor, Sgt. Wallace Rushin, was made public. According to news reports, the memo blasted O’Brien’s handling of the case.
Shortly afterwards, McCann was removed from the investigation. After 13 months, the Columbus Police Department said the case needed a new set of eyes. McCann says he was told his expertise in homicide was needed for other investigations.
Though he was no longer involved, McCann couldn’t shake the feeling that he had failed the family. And he couldn’t stop thinking about what had happened. Sleep still eluded him. He felt lousy all the time. Why? How? The questions burned in his mind like embers.
The stress he put himself under for the following nine months didn’t just plague his thoughts. It affected his health. “Pressures mount over time. You don’t feel good. Your mind is always at work,” McCann says. You’re always thinking, what can I do different? What interview technique should I use tomorrow? Things start to eat at you. Even at home your head is somewhere else,” McCann says.
Something had to give. And that something occurred in February 2005. McCann had the day off and was out running errands with his wife. They were grabbing a few last minute things before helping his son do some work in his new apartment.
That’s when he felt the pain. He couldn’t ignore the pressure that was building in his chest. He says it felt as though someone was standing on him, making it difficult to breathe.
Suddenly, it seemed his body was giving up on him.
He turned to his wife, “Bonnie, I’m having a heart attack.”
At first Bonnie didn’t believe him. She thought he was just trying to avoid the chores that awaited him. But after taking a good look at him, she realized he wasn’t kidding. Instead of their usual glint, his blue eyes looked frightened and unsure and his normally tan skin was turning pale. It didn’t take her long to decide that she needed to rush him to the nearest hospital.
At the hospital, doctors confirmed McCann’s suspicions. McCann had suffered a heart attack. The main culprit: The stress he had put himself under after losing the arson case.
In the weeks and months that followed, McCann struggled to get back his old life. He began worrying that he would be forced to quit. The stress of the job almost killed him. His brush with death really shook Bonnie. She, along with his children, suggested that maybe he needed to quit. Maybe they’re right, he thought.
After his release from the hospital, he took a four-month leave. Some of it was to rehabilitate, and strengthen his heart and his body before returning to the job. The other part of his leave was spent soul-searching: Did he even want to return?
Could he afford to quit and go on disability? He couldn’t. Officers don’t get paid well; he was already working “special duty” at Bishop-Watterson High School football and basketball games for extra cash to help support the family. Besides, he thought, homicide was where he belonged. This is what he was meant to do, it’s where he could help and do the most good.
“I realized that, hell, I’m lucky to be alive to have this decision to make. You just have to shut up and quit whining and get on with life,” McCann says today of his decision to not only stay with the job, but to stay with homicide.
It was in the summer of 2005, almost two years to the month after the fateful phonecall, that McCann he returned to the job. Shortly thereafter, another case with national notoriety was assigned to him. Like the arson case, this one involved another dead college student and more dead ends.
It started out as a missing person report. Julie Popovich, a 20-year-old OSU student, was last seen dancing at Ledo’s, a campus bar, on August 11. She was talking with a young man, who friends saw her leave with right before the bar closed. None of them recognized the young man, and Popovich wouldn’t be seen again.
Weeks went by with nothing for McCann. He called in Kevin Horan to help. No real leads. No body.
For those few weeks after her disappearance, Popovich’s tired friends, with dark circles around their eyes, canvassed Ohio State’s campus every night, asking bar-goers standing in line in the heavy, humid air if they recognized the pretty girl in the picture. Popovich was an attractive young woman. Her long dark hair and big brown eyes and huge smile allowed her to do some modeling work while she was in school. Most just looked at the picture, shook their heads, and wished the searchers well.
Then a break came for McCann. An ID, her ID, was found near Hoover Reservoir.
The ID would soon lead police to discover the aspiring model’s body in a nearby grassy field. Again, as with the arson, most of the hard evidence was already destroyed, this time from spending weeks decomposing outside in the late August daytime heat.
Again, the media descended. CNN host Larry King wanted to talk to McCann. On Fox News, Hannity and Colmes wanted an interview. Everyone was comparing the case to the disappearance of Natalie Holloway—it was the summer of 2005 and it seemed every network was trying to hype a rise in the kidnapping and murder of our country’s beautiful young college-aged girls.
McCann granted a few interviews, but stayed focused on the case. They had a body, but still no suspect, and the evidence was scant. Would this turn out like the arson? Another high profile case, but no indictment? He shuddered at the thought. Could he go through that again? Could he live through it?
Then, a tip. It was the sexual abuse squad who called about Adam Saleh. The detective who tipped McCann off to Saleh couldn’t put her finger on it, but something about the young man didn’t sit well with her. And although McCann can’t go into specifics, while interviewing Saleh, he says the young man’s story began to unravel to the point that McCann felt confident enough to make the arrest.
Saleh’s cell phone records later showed he was less than four miles away from where Popovich’s body was found, just a few hours after she was seen leaving the bar with him. According to prosecutors, Saleh had no reason that night to be in the remote area that surrounds Hoover Reservoir.
Because he testified in the case, McCann wasn’t allowed to be in the courtroom for the trial. However, he stayed close by the entire time.
“He was probably the most dangerous guy I’ve ever dealt with,” McCann says.
This time prosecutors didn’t hesitate to take the case to trial. No phone calls. No released suspects.
On May 2, after hearing two weeks of testimony, the jury reached its verdict. McCann sat alongside Kevin Horan, the FBI agent who worked with him on both the arson case and the Popovich case. The two sat three feet behind Saleh when the jury announced its verdict:
“Guilty.”
As difficult and tortuous as the arson case was for McCann, the Popovich case was satisfying. Saleh will spend 38 years behind bars for the attempted rape and murder of Julie Popovich.
“The trial is like the culmination of all your hard work. The evidence in this case was the same type of evidence we had in the fire – all of it was circumstantial. And the same feelings and intensity and hard work I felt in the arson I also felt with this case – it was all wrapped up in this trial,” he says.
The arson case that nearly killed him will never leave McCann’s thoughts fully, though he finds some solace in knowing that the families believe he did the best he could.
To this day, Tim Wilson, father of victim Christine Wilson, praises McCann. “We wish Mike was never taken off the case,” he says. “He had a game plan. He was really attacking it.”
Still, through the Popovich verdict, McCann has found a sense of closure — to his career and his constant worry.
In fact, little known to many people close to him, the day of the jury’s verdict McCann had made his own important decision. The trial was going well and he had been getting calls from the public safety director of Ohio. On a hunch that the jury would convict Saleh, McCann turned in his retirement papers that day.
After 28 years with the Columbus Police Department, McCann says he now feels after his success with such a huge case, that he is ready to leave and make his next move as deputy director of the State of Ohio investigations unit.
“The time was right and it is a good position,” McCann says. “I was coming off a good case, and this job promises to be less stressful. There’s no way that I’ll have the pressure from the victims, their families, and the restless nights – not in the same way that you do with homicide.”
With the Popovich’s family seeing justice, McCann sleeps much easier these days
And as for the new job? McCann is ready — He has his own fire back.
