THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1994, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Friday, November 25, 1994 TAG: 9411250064
SECTION: LOCAL PAGE: B3 EDITION: FINAL
SOURCE: ASSOCIATED PRESS
DATELINE: FAIRFAX LENGTH: Medium: 67 lines
A $9,000 cash deposit, telephone charge-card bills and a purchase of a night scope for a gun will be key evidence next week in a murder-for-hire trial.
Builder John Kowalczyk, 38, of Fairfax, was shot to death June 10, 1993, in a Vienna parking lot where he returned his son to his former wife after a scheduled visit.
Commonwealth's Attorney Robert F. Horan Jr. said in a hearing Wednesday that he believes the defendant, Ralph Shambaugh Jr., pulled the trigger and that his friend and co-worker, James Alting, drove the getaway car. Alting was found dead five months ago in a West Virginia well.
``We're dealing here with a circumstantial evidence case,'' Horan said during the pretrial hearing in Fairfax County Circuit Court. ``We're dealing here with murder, and we're dealing with conspiracy.''
In a capital murder trial scheduled to start Monday, Horan said he will use circumstantial evidence to show that Shambaugh, 34, killed Kowalczyk in a scheme financed by Stanley Hyman, Kowalczyk's former father-in-law. Among the evidence to be used, Horan said, are the $9,000 cash deposit by Shambaugh, numerous phone calls between Shambaugh and Hyman, and Shambaugh's purchase of the night scope.
Vienna police believe Hyman, who lived in McLean, hired Shambaugh, a maintenance worker at a West Virginia resort Hyman frequented, to kill his former son-in-law, who was involved in a bitter custody battle with his ex-wife. Shambaugh's attorney said police have the wrong man.
``Mr. Shambaugh absolutely denies that he killed John Kowalczyk,'' defense attorney Peter D. Greenspun said. ``We're just working hard to get to the bottom of who killed John Kowalczyk. . . . There remains a whole pool of suspects who had reason and opportunity to kill (him).''
During the trial, likely to last two to three weeks, as many as 50 witnesses are expected to testify, including Kowalczyk's son, Nicholas, and his former wife, Katherine.
Kowalczyk had pulled into the parking lot about 8 p.m. to drop off 12-year-old Nicholas. While the boy tossed trash into a nearby bin, his father was fatally shot in his pickup truck.
Not long after Kowalczyk was killed, Alting, 38, was reported missing by his family in Berkeley Springs, W.Va. Hyman's phone number and matches from a motel near the slaying scene were found among Alting's belongings. Then last June, Alting's body was discovered in a well on property owned by Shambaugh's family, and a separate homicide investigation was begun.
``If Alting is involved, Alting is the shooter, not the wheelman,'' Greenspun told Judge Richard J. Jamborsky. ``They have now said that Alting is a co-conspirator for the first time.''
Jamborsky said he would rule later on whether Alting, who is not named in the indictment, can be brought up during next week's trial.
Two months after Kowalczyk was killed, Hyman, who is named in the indictment, fatally shot his wife and himself in a murder-suicide at a Florida condominium, according to police. In a suicide note, Hyman denied having any role in the slaying of Kowalczyk.
But Horan said he will prove that Hyman not only hired Shambaugh but provided the Thompson/Center Contender gun that killed him. The same type of gun was seized from the Hymans' home, but tests showed that it was not the murder weapon.
KEYWORDS: MURDER MURDER FOR HIRE by CNB