The Donna Horwitz case is the Florida prosecution of a Jupiter woman who shot her ex-husband Lanny Horwitz nine times in the shower of their Admiral’s Cove home on September 30, 2011, was convicted of first-degree murder in 2013, won a reversal from the Florida Supreme Court over the use of her silence at the scene as evidence of guilt, and was reconvicted of second-degree murder at a 2017 retrial and sentenced to 32 years in prison.
The Killing at Admiral’s Cove
Lanny Horwitz, 66, was showering on the morning of September 30, 2011, when he was shot nine times, including once in the mouth. A bullet hole through a towel draped over the shower door and gunpowder burns on the towel’s outside face showed the first shots were fired from outside the shower. A phone receiver lay near his head, its cord pinned between his arms, but no call went through.1CBS News. Who Murdered Lanny Horwitz
Only three people were in the house: Lanny, his ex-wife Donna, and their adult son Radley. There was no sign of forced entry, and the alarm company confirmed no doors had opened or closed that morning. Police recovered two revolvers with bullet fragments from the shooting, along with 24 other weapons and thousands of rounds of ammunition stored in military-style boxes.1CBS News. Who Murdered Lanny Horwitz A suitcase bearing Donna’s name held ammunition matching the type used in the killing.2FindLaw. State v. Horwitz, Fourth District Court of Appeal
Radley told police he was awakened by gunfire and by the empty clicks of a gun still being pulled. He found his mother screaming and his father unresponsive; she told him, “He was so horrible.”3Florida State University College of Law. State v. Horwitz, Answer Brief on the Merits When officers arrived, Donna refused to answer their questions. She was arrested six days later, on October 6, 2011.4Oxygen. Donna Horwitz’s Diary Helps Expose Her as Husband’s Killer
The Diary and the Motive
Prosecutors built their theory around a day planner Donna used as a diary. In the nine months before the shooting, she had written the name “Fran” more than 60 times, tracking what she believed was Lanny’s affair with a neighbor and business partner, Francine Tice. Entries called Lanny “Mr. Meanie” and described him as having a “very sick mind.” The last entry, from September 5, 2011, read: “Another long day of lies, of being Mr. Meany. I stayed home all day. Very tired.”5FindLaw. State v. Horwitz, Florida Supreme Court
On the morning he was killed, Lanny was packing for a trip to his Asheville, North Carolina, home with Tice, and he had told Donna to move out by the time he returned.6Palm Beach Post. Son Looks On as Donna Horwitz Blames Him for Ex-Husband’s Murder He had also told Donna that if he had known how Francine felt about him, he never would have asked Donna to move back in.4Oxygen. Donna Horwitz’s Diary Helps Expose Her as Husband’s Killer Prosecutors also told jurors Donna was an accomplished target shooter.
The First Conviction
Donna Horwitz’s first trial began January 11, 2013, in Palm Beach County. She was charged with first-degree murder with a firearm. Assistant State Attorney Aleathea McRoberts leaned on the diary, the physical evidence, and Radley’s account of that morning.1CBS News. Who Murdered Lanny Horwitz
Prosecutors also drew the jury’s attention to Donna’s refusal to answer officers’ questions at the scene, and McRoberts told jurors they could treat that silence as “consciousness of guilt.”7CBS News. Lanny Horwitz Murder: Love, Hate, Obsession
Defense attorney Grey Tesh argued there was no DNA linking Donna to the weapons or scene, pointed to an unidentified DNA profile in a bloody smudge on the home’s gate that police never ran through a database,8Palm Beach Post. Crime Scene Investigator Testifies and argued the real killer was Radley or someone he hired. Radley was a convicted felon who had served five months in federal prison for selling a handgun to a felon and buying an illegal gun part at his father’s urging, stood to collect $500,000 from Lanny’s life insurance, owned a book titled “Hit Man,” and had a key to the home’s gun safe in his room despite being barred from firearms.3Florida State University College of Law. State v. Horwitz, Answer Brief on the Merits A hearing specialist testified Donna had lost 48 percent of her hearing in each ear, offering an explanation for why she may not have responded to officers.5FindLaw. State v. Horwitz, Florida Supreme Court
On January 17, 2013, after about two hours of deliberation, the jury convicted her of first-degree murder with a firearm. She was sentenced to life without parole.9WPBF. Donna Horwitz Found Guilty of Killing Ex-Husband
The Florida Supreme Court Reversal
The Fourth District Court of Appeal reversed, holding that the trial court committed harmful error by allowing prosecutors to introduce and comment on Donna’s pre-arrest, pre-Miranda silence as substantive evidence of guilt. Because she did not testify, the court held, her silence at the scene had no probative value and was inadmissible under State v. Hoggins (1998), which allows such silence only to impeach a defendant’s own testimony.10CaseMine. State v. Horwitz, Fourth District Court of Appeal
The Fourth District certified the question to the Florida Supreme Court, which in 2016 answered that Florida law bars the state from using a non-testifying defendant’s pre-arrest, pre-Miranda silence as evidence of guilt. The court grounded that rule in Article I, Section 9 of the Florida Constitution, found the probative value of pre-arrest silence “substantially outweighed by the danger of unfair prejudice,” and declined to follow the U.S. Supreme Court’s 2013 decision in Salinas v. Texas, noting that Florida’s constitution provides greater protection against self-incrimination than the Fifth Amendment.5FindLaw. State v. Horwitz, Florida Supreme Court The conviction was vacated and the case sent back for retrial.
The Retrial and Second-Degree Conviction
The retrial ran in May and June 2017 before Palm Beach County Circuit Judge Krista Marx. Donna Horwitz, then 70, again faced first-degree murder, but this time prosecutors could not reference her silence at the scene.
McRoberts, now joined by Reid Scott, put more weight on the diary, reading entries aloud and calling the shooting “the emotional deliberate elimination of this man who ruined her life.”11Palm Beach Post. Jury Deadlocked 6-6 in Horwitz Murder Trial Francine Tice testified that she and Lanny had been only “platonic friends.” Jurors did not accept that characterization, but they also rejected the defense’s suggestion that Tice could have been the killer.12Sun Sentinel. Horwitz Jury Foreman: I Caved In Convicting Jupiter Woman
Tesh, joined by Joseph Walsh, again told jurors Radley or someone connected to him was the real killer, pointing to the absence of Donna’s fingerprints on the weapons, inconclusive DNA on the guns, and Radley’s resentment over the federal firearms conviction that ended his gun business.7CBS News. Lanny Horwitz Murder: Love, Hate, Obsession Radley testified he was “just a bystander” that night and described his mother as “absolutely hysterical.”13WPTV. Radley Horwitz Takes the Stand in Murder Retrial
Jurors initially deadlocked 6-6, and McRoberts told Judge Marx the split might reflect disagreement over the degree of homicide rather than doubt about guilt.11Palm Beach Post. Jury Deadlocked 6-6 in Horwitz Murder Trial On June 6, 2017, after further deliberations, the jury returned a verdict of guilty on second-degree murder rather than first.14CBS 12. Verdict Reached in Horwitz Murder Trial
Sentencing and What Followed
On October 12, 2017, Judge Marx sentenced Donna Horwitz, then 71, to 32 years in prison, with credit for six years already served.15WPBF. Woman Convicted of Killing Ex-Husband Sentenced to 32 Years Prosecutors and Lanny’s family had asked for life. His sister, Marcia VanCreveld, told the court, “My brother was murdered like Caesar. Surrounded by his enemies. His ex-wife and his son.”16WPTV. Donna Horwitz Sentenced for Husband’s Murder
McRoberts criticized Donna for spending six years publicly blaming her son: “A woman who supposedly was loving, by all accounts, and caring, has chosen for six years to perpetuate to the community and the media that her only child did this crime.”17CBS 12. 32-Year Sentence for 71-Year-Old Woman Convicted of Killing Husband Radley, who had testified against his mother at both trials while she pointed the finger at him, attended the sentencing and said he felt “bad for everybody,” noting the 32-year term was likely a life sentence given her age: “It’s pretty much the only family that’s left.”18Palm Beach Post. Donna Horwitz Gets 32 Years
Tesh announced an appeal, saying, “We lost the battle, but hopefully not the war.”17CBS 12. 32-Year Sentence for 71-Year-Old Woman Convicted of Killing Husband The defense also raised juror misconduct claims, alleging that juror William Collins had tried to bring outside information into deliberations; jury foreman Kenneth Rudin said he stopped Collins and could not recall exactly what he said.19Palm Beach Post. Donna Horwitz’s Lawyers Seek Juror Interviews Judge Marx rejected the misconduct claims.18Palm Beach Post. Donna Horwitz Gets 32 Years The available reporting does not show the outcome of any further appeal of the 32-year sentence.