Spaziano asks Chiles, Cabinet for clemency hearing
Dublin Core
Title
Spaziano asks Chiles, Cabinet for clemency hearing
Subject
Torture murder and rape case
Spaziano, Joe
Chiles, Lawton, 1930-1998
Description
Joe Spaziano was convicted of torture murder of an Orlando woman and raping another. But he was freed by a Florida Cabinet.
Creator
Griffin, Michael
Source
“Spaziano asks Chiles, Cabinet for clemency hearing,” HIST298, accessed February 8, 2017, https://hist299.umwhistory.org/items/show/180.
Publisher
HIST 298, University of Mary Washington
Date
1995-06-29
Rights
The materials in this online collection are held by Special Collections, Simpson Library, University of Mary Washington and are available for educational use. For this purpose only, you may reproduce materials without prior permission on the condition that you provide attribution of the source.
Format
2 JPGs
300 DPI
Language
English
Coverage
Orlando, FL
Text Item Type Metadata
Text
TALLAHASSEE - Joseph "Crazy Joe" Spaziano, convicted of the torture-murder of an Orlando woman and the rape of another, asked Florida's Cabinet Wednesday to set him free. Spaziano's lawyer faxed a request for a clemency hearing to Gov. Lawton Chiles, arguing that a key witness in the 2-decade-old cases now doubts his own hypnosis-enhanced testimony.
The request comes the same week that Spaziano had been scheduled to die for the murder of 18-year old hospital clerk Laura Harberts. Chiles stayed the execution two weeks ago, after newspaper reported that Anthony Dilisio now doubts whether his testimony at the 1976 trial was true.
Chiles ordered the Florida Department of Law Enforcement to investigate Dilisio's claims. What began as an interview with the Pensacola man has expanded into a full-scale investigation involving dozens of witnesses. A report is scheduled to be released next week, but sources said Chiles could be briefed as soon as Friday.
The Challenge facing Chiles is which Dilisio to believe - the would-be biker who testified at age 18 that Spaziano showed him Harberts' mutilated body, or the 37-year-old lay minister with a history of substance abuse who says he can't remember the body and doubts Spaziano is a killer.
Dilisio also was an important witness tying Spaziano to the 1974 rape, for which the Outlaws motorcycle club member is serving a life sentence. Dilisio testified in a 1975 trials that Spaziano bragged about raping the 16-year-old Orange County girl, slashing neck and eyes, choking her and leaving her for dead in woods. "I don't want to remember any of this," he told The Orlando Sentinel. "It was through the grace of God that this memory has been crased from my mind."
Michael Mello, who represents Spaziano, said Wednesday that Chiles and the Cabinet should free Spaziano because Dilisio was the strongest element in the two cases.
A spokeswoman in the governor's general counsel office said there would be no comment until the hearing request is reviewed. FDLE investigators and Chiles' advisers have said previously, however, that Dilisio stopped short of recanting when questioned by investigators recently.
Spaziano last requested clemency in March, but officials refused to grant a hearing. In preparing that request, Spaziano's state-appointed attorneys interviewed Dilisio, but he told them he could shed no new light on the case.
Four months later, Dilisio said the hypnosis police used to coax memories from him was "witchcraft that poisoned a young, impression able teen-ager's mind."
But one officer who helped build the cases against Spaziano disputes the claim. Court files show Dilisio told rape investigators on Oct. 10. 1974 - seven months before he was hypnotized - that Spaziano took him to where he had left mutilated bodies.
Retired Altamonte Springs police investigator James Martindale said Spaziano already was a suspect in the Orange County rape case when Seminole County detectives began looking at links to Harberts' killing and the dumping of her body at an Altamonte Springs dump. He remembers Dilisio as a scared teen who seemed to know more about the crimes than he let on.
Martindale said he thinks Dilisio pretended that detectives had to draw the information out of him.
"It was a game to him," Martindale said, "The hypnosis, in my opinion, did not solve the case. He [Dilisio] was just covering his tail."
A transcript of a May 13, 1975, interview - Dilisio's last interview before hypnosis - shows he told investigators Spaziano had bragged about the Outlaws gang-raping hitchhikers he had picked up. He said Spaziano told him he killed the women, cut off their breasts and dumped them in an orange grove.
When investigators pressed Dilisio, he said he could not remember and agreed to be hypnotized.
"I never did," Dilisio said after being asked if he was involved in the killings, "That's why I'm saying, 'I go under hypnosis and you find out what I used to know that I don't know now.'"
Dilisio said that's week that he did not remember the interview and would not read the transcript, which his lawyer has reviewed.
"I believe the Lord didn't want me to read the transcript," Dilisio said. "That's not who I am now."
Dilisio said he was a troubled teen with a terrible home life, including a bad relationship with his father and stepmother. The detectives were nice to him and he wanted to please them.
"They treated me like I was special," Dilisio said.
Mello also hopes to raise problems with the rape case.
Prosecutors had little physical evidence, such as the knife or sperm. Their case relied heavily on Dilisio and the victim, whose testimony was troublesome.
She had lied, first claiming Spaziano and another man kidnapped her at knifepoint. Later she said she willingly went into their vehicle to smoke marijuana.
She also failed at first to identify Spaziano in a police lineup. First she told investigators she wasn't sure then said she really did recognize her attacker but was afraid to identify him.
She told detectives she could never forget his "evil" eyes but never mentioned that her attacker had tattoos.
Despite the troubles, the victim told jurors at the trial that she was absolutely sure Spaziano was the attacker. To this day, the woman, who lost vision in one eye, is positive Spaziano raped her.
Chiles or a member of the Cabinet - the attorney general, secretary of state and commissioners of education, insurance and agriculture - could schedule a clemency hearing. The Cabinet could uphold the death sentence, commute it to life or pardon Spaziano all together.
Spaziano has had six appeals of his murder case rejected by the state Supreme Court and the U.S. Supreme Court. Appeals in the rape case have also been rejected.
Debbie Salamone, Sharon McBreen, Beth Taylor and Christopher Quinn of the Sentinel staff contributed to this report.
The request comes the same week that Spaziano had been scheduled to die for the murder of 18-year old hospital clerk Laura Harberts. Chiles stayed the execution two weeks ago, after newspaper reported that Anthony Dilisio now doubts whether his testimony at the 1976 trial was true.
Chiles ordered the Florida Department of Law Enforcement to investigate Dilisio's claims. What began as an interview with the Pensacola man has expanded into a full-scale investigation involving dozens of witnesses. A report is scheduled to be released next week, but sources said Chiles could be briefed as soon as Friday.
The Challenge facing Chiles is which Dilisio to believe - the would-be biker who testified at age 18 that Spaziano showed him Harberts' mutilated body, or the 37-year-old lay minister with a history of substance abuse who says he can't remember the body and doubts Spaziano is a killer.
Dilisio also was an important witness tying Spaziano to the 1974 rape, for which the Outlaws motorcycle club member is serving a life sentence. Dilisio testified in a 1975 trials that Spaziano bragged about raping the 16-year-old Orange County girl, slashing neck and eyes, choking her and leaving her for dead in woods. "I don't want to remember any of this," he told The Orlando Sentinel. "It was through the grace of God that this memory has been crased from my mind."
Michael Mello, who represents Spaziano, said Wednesday that Chiles and the Cabinet should free Spaziano because Dilisio was the strongest element in the two cases.
A spokeswoman in the governor's general counsel office said there would be no comment until the hearing request is reviewed. FDLE investigators and Chiles' advisers have said previously, however, that Dilisio stopped short of recanting when questioned by investigators recently.
Spaziano last requested clemency in March, but officials refused to grant a hearing. In preparing that request, Spaziano's state-appointed attorneys interviewed Dilisio, but he told them he could shed no new light on the case.
Four months later, Dilisio said the hypnosis police used to coax memories from him was "witchcraft that poisoned a young, impression able teen-ager's mind."
But one officer who helped build the cases against Spaziano disputes the claim. Court files show Dilisio told rape investigators on Oct. 10. 1974 - seven months before he was hypnotized - that Spaziano took him to where he had left mutilated bodies.
Retired Altamonte Springs police investigator James Martindale said Spaziano already was a suspect in the Orange County rape case when Seminole County detectives began looking at links to Harberts' killing and the dumping of her body at an Altamonte Springs dump. He remembers Dilisio as a scared teen who seemed to know more about the crimes than he let on.
Martindale said he thinks Dilisio pretended that detectives had to draw the information out of him.
"It was a game to him," Martindale said, "The hypnosis, in my opinion, did not solve the case. He [Dilisio] was just covering his tail."
A transcript of a May 13, 1975, interview - Dilisio's last interview before hypnosis - shows he told investigators Spaziano had bragged about the Outlaws gang-raping hitchhikers he had picked up. He said Spaziano told him he killed the women, cut off their breasts and dumped them in an orange grove.
When investigators pressed Dilisio, he said he could not remember and agreed to be hypnotized.
"I never did," Dilisio said after being asked if he was involved in the killings, "That's why I'm saying, 'I go under hypnosis and you find out what I used to know that I don't know now.'"
Dilisio said that's week that he did not remember the interview and would not read the transcript, which his lawyer has reviewed.
"I believe the Lord didn't want me to read the transcript," Dilisio said. "That's not who I am now."
Dilisio said he was a troubled teen with a terrible home life, including a bad relationship with his father and stepmother. The detectives were nice to him and he wanted to please them.
"They treated me like I was special," Dilisio said.
Mello also hopes to raise problems with the rape case.
Prosecutors had little physical evidence, such as the knife or sperm. Their case relied heavily on Dilisio and the victim, whose testimony was troublesome.
She had lied, first claiming Spaziano and another man kidnapped her at knifepoint. Later she said she willingly went into their vehicle to smoke marijuana.
She also failed at first to identify Spaziano in a police lineup. First she told investigators she wasn't sure then said she really did recognize her attacker but was afraid to identify him.
She told detectives she could never forget his "evil" eyes but never mentioned that her attacker had tattoos.
Despite the troubles, the victim told jurors at the trial that she was absolutely sure Spaziano was the attacker. To this day, the woman, who lost vision in one eye, is positive Spaziano raped her.
Chiles or a member of the Cabinet - the attorney general, secretary of state and commissioners of education, insurance and agriculture - could schedule a clemency hearing. The Cabinet could uphold the death sentence, commute it to life or pardon Spaziano all together.
Spaziano has had six appeals of his murder case rejected by the state Supreme Court and the U.S. Supreme Court. Appeals in the rape case have also been rejected.
Debbie Salamone, Sharon McBreen, Beth Taylor and Christopher Quinn of the Sentinel staff contributed to this report.
Original Format
Newspaper
Contributor of the Digital Item
Murray, Daryl
Student Editor of the Digital Item
Dickinson, Terra
Files
Citation
Griffin, Michael, “Spaziano asks Chiles, Cabinet for clemency hearing,” HIST299, accessed March 12, 2026, https://hist299.umwhistory.org/items/show/180.