Leo Schofield prosecutor Jerry Hill made "obvious" and "emotional" false statements to parole commissioners

I am grateful to Chief Assistant State Attorney Jacob Orr, whose prodding led me to discover the full scope of Hill's misconduct and strengthened my Florida Bar complaint against Hill.

Former 10th Circuit State Attorney Jerry Hill should thank the Bone Valley podcasters. They played only a brief snippet of Hill’s much longer, 9-minute statement at Leo Schofield’s Jan. 8, 2020 parole hearing before the Florida Commission on Offender Review (FCOR).

As a result, Bone Valley does not fully convey the breathtaking scope of Hill’s dishonesty, incompetence, and bad faith in his performance at that hearing. This includes three blatantly false, still uncorrected statements to the FCOR. One of those statements is: “In September, the defendant sends a letter to counsel admitting to the murder of Mrs. Schofield.”

Hill’s statement is completely false. Leo Schofield has never wavered in maintaining his innocence in the killing of his wife — not in more than 35 years.

Until his retirement in 2016, elected state attorney Jerry Hill oversaw his office’s efforts to prosecute Schofield, deny him a new trial with overwhelming exculpatory evidence, and sustain his obviously wrongful murder conviction even though somebody else admitted the crime.

As a private attorney, Hill continued to work against Schofield’s release and exoneration. He was representing the 10th Circuit State Attorney’s Office as a client when he made his uncorrected false statements to the FCOR in 2020.

Hill’s morally, ethically, and professionally abysmal performance on Jan. 8, 2020 clearly violated the plain language of multiple Florida Bar rules.

Hill’s most “obvious” material false statement to FCOR is just the start

Jerry Hill has not responded to any of my emails about his full statement.

But his 2020 client, Chief Assistant State Attorney Jacob Orr, acknowledges that Hill’s material statement of Schofield’s confessed guilt is false, while also dismissing it: “It is obvious that he was referring to “defendant” Jeremy Scott that wrote a letter admitting to a murder and was later found to be not credible.”  

Jeremy Scott is obviously not the “defendant” in the Leo Schofield case, although he should be.

Scott is the convicted murderer who has confessed multiple times, in escalating detail, to Michelle Schofield’s murder — and who left physical evidence on Michelle Schofield’s car the night she was killed.

Moreover, in his FCOR statement, Jerry Hill referred to Leo Schofield as “defendant” 18 times before he declared: “In September, the defendant sends a letter to counsel admitting to the murder of Mrs. Schofield.”

If Hill meant to switch to Scott as “defendant” on the 19th reference, it was the first and only time — just one of 19 examples — in which Hill referred to Scott as “defendant.” It allowed Hill to declare Leo Schofield a confessed murderer, by supposed, uncorrected accident.

Indeed, Hill’s 2020 statement is full of uncorrected or unclarified errors and misstatements and word play that just so happen to support the state’s laughable theory of Leo Schofield’s guilt. Every Hill falsehood, error, or obfuscation breaks in one direction — against Schofield. You can judge for yourself in the full transcript that I’ve included below.

Neither Hill nor the State Attorney’s Office have taken any step to formally correct the “obvious” mistake in calling Scott “the defendant,” if that’s what it was. They have corrected nothing from Hill’s 2020 blizzard of bullshit before the FCOR.

In failing to do so, they have clearly violated Florida Bar rules. The SAO is likely immune from Florida Bar action because it is a government agency headed by an elected official. But Jerry Hill, who acted as private lawyer representing the SAO at the 2020 hearing, is squarely under Bar jurisdiction and oversight.

So I have written a thorough and detailed Florida Bar complaint against Hill concerning his FCOR dishonesty and refusal to correct the record. I accuse him of violating three Florida Bar rules concerning: “Candor toward the tribunal,” “Misconduct,” and “Truthfulness in statements to others.”

The “candor toward the tribunal” rule explicitly states that a lawyer shall not: “fail to correct a false statement of material fact or law previously made to the tribunal by the lawyer.” That is precisely what Jerry Hill has done and continues to do, right up until the time of this writing.

Florida Bar rules require Jerry Hill to correct his “obvious” false statements

The narrative portion of my complaint is roughly 20 pages, plus exhibits and transcripts. I will mail it and publish it on Public Enemy Number 1 as reference in the next few days. I’m making some final edits and reviews.

But I don’t want to overwhelm readers with it in this article.

Here is a key excerpt from my complaint in which I suggest a remedy and course of action for the Florida Bar to take. And I point out how Chief Assistant State Attorney Jacob Orr implicitly rejected Hill’s falsehoods in 2023 without actually correcting the record.

I don’t know what penalties Hill’s behavior exposes him to. But at the very least, Hill and his client should be compelled to publicly submit an amended statement to the FCOR. That statement should:

• Strike all false statements, especially the false assertion to Schofield admitted guilt and that Leo Schofield Jr. and Sr. were “always” together.  

• Refer to Leo Schofield Sr. only as “Leo Schofield Sr.” and Leo Schofield Jr. only as “Leo Schofield Jr.”

• Strike all unsupported references to Leo Schofield’s character – whether direct attacks or sarcastic sneers 

The best evidence of Hill’s malfeasance and bad faith comes from his own client

In effect, the 10th Circuit State Attorney’s Office attempted to do something like this at the recent FCOR hearing for Schofield on May 3, 2023 – without acknowledging it.

This time, the SAO did not use Jerry Hill as its private lawyer. It represented itself, in the form of Jacob Orr, Chief Assistant State Attorney and office spokesman. Orr, while forced to defend the indefensible, did so in a legally and ethically honorable fashion.

Orr made zero reference to [Leo Schofield’s father] Leo Schofield Sr. And Orr did not falsely declare that Leo Schofield Jr. admitted to killing his wife.

Orr did not repeat factual falsehoods about the case and its history. He essentially amended and edited Hill’s assertions down to nothing – and even contradicted Hill’s assertions about Leo Schofield Jr.’s character and attacks on his right to claim innocence.

How could Hill have argued his case ethically and honorably?

It is difficult for a lawyer — or anyone — to ethically and honorably defend an indefensible injustice on the truly massive scale of the Leo Schofield case. But I think Jacob Orr skillfully managed to do that on behalf of his institution at Leo Schofield’s more recent 2023 FCOR hearing.

Orr’s statement — and the Bar requirement that lawyers correct falsehoods for the record — got me to thinking about how Hill could have argued honorably in 2020 in defense of his wrongful conviction of Leo Schofield.

So I have published Hill’s full, 9-minute statement from 2020 below, while bolding and crossing out the content that should be struck because it is:

• Openly false in its specifics. [I’ve inserted the word “False” in that case.]

• Generally dishonest or misleading as a passage in totality — or missing vital context.

• Unsupported emotional attacks on Schofield’s character and right to assert his innocence.

• Highly confusing because of Hill’s conflation of names and identities. By my count, Hill referred to Leo Schofield Sr. 25 times in his testimony/argument using seven different ways of identifying him. Hill referred to Leo Schofield Jr., the actual defendant, 52 times using 12 different ways of identifying him.

I’ve let certain fact assertions made by Hill stand. That does not mean I endorse them as true. I just can’t yet clearly vouch for or refute them through my ongoing review of the case record. In those instances, I’ve allowed Hill to speak at face value.

Even allowing that latitude, I’ve struck roughly 55 percent of Jerry Hill’s content as false, unethical, or fatally unclear. Make sure to read the strike-through parts to see how egregious they are:

Morning commissioners, Jerry Hill on behalf of Brian Haas, State Attorney for the 10^th circuit.

I listened to that presentation, and how this individual has taken advantage of a lot of opportunities. But folks, I gotta point out an absolute glaring hole in that presentation. I didn't hear one word about regret, sorrow, wish I hadn't done it, I was a different person then. This guy is an unrepentant, jury convicted, first degree murderer, proven beyond and to the exclusion of every reasonable doubt. Rather than uh talk about autopsies, allow me to share with you, ‘cause it's worth a thousand words, the following.

They talked about how he's done, let's talk about what had got him there, and this is from an appellate record that cites the trial transcripts, so it was all evidence in a courtroom. This individual was murdered February, 24th, 1987, an 18 year old wife. The defendant and his wife had a violent relationship, including fights in which the defendant would drag her by the hair. The defendant was known to become especially angry when Mrs. Schofield was late meeting him and he would become physically violent with her on those occasions. The night she was murdered, she was late meeting the defendant at a home of a friend and the defendant was quote at his wits end. That morning an eyewitness saw the defendant and Ms. Schofield getting out of Ms. Schofield's car at their home between 1 a.m. and 1:30. The witness was positive that she had witnessed the defendant and Ms. Schofield together. 

The defendant uh… ‘scuse me.

The witness heard sounds of a fight once they had entered the house, arguing and screaming, and sounds as if the defendant was pushing uh the wife against the walls of the trailer. The defendant exited the home alone and drove away in his car. Shortly after he returned, opened the hatchback, went in the house, and carried out a heavy object, which he put in the back of the car. The next morning, the defendant uses a carpet cleaner in the residence. That day at work, and I'm not going to read too much, but he told his employer that he had a feeling Mrs. Schofield was dead, made similar statements to the boss's wife, saying that uh, he hoped she would help him retain an attorney.

The defendant's car and his wife's car was abandoned on I-4. It was discovered by the father and Leo before law enforcement could find it. Mrs. Schofield’s body was discovered in a canal located in a heavily wooded area on the morning of February 27th, 87, by Leo Schofield, Senior. Mr. Schofield claimed at various times that God’s voice, or a premonition, led him to her body. Or that an inner force had driven him to that location. And the reason I’m going over this is that he’s never admitted his guilt!

During the investigation, Mr. Schofield Senior interfered with law enforcement when they attempted to survey the master bedroom in the trailer, a possible crime scene. It was in disarray, dresser drawer broken, missing sheets from the bed. Mr. Schofield became angry, and barred law enforcement from entering the trailer the day the victim was discovered. The defendant was with him at that time, side by side. Immediately following Mrs. Schofield’s funeral, the defendant was out to clubs and dating other women. He did not assist in planning the funeral. 

Very quickly, some law enforcement notes, too. Very quickly. 

Again, how was the body found? Leo said he was driven by an inner force to go back to the pit area again, and on Friday he started searching along State Road 33. Leo said he felt drawn to that area and felt that Michelle was calling out to him. He said he had told Detective Russell that his daughter-in-law was within a certain distance.

Leo said uh he began to search, the closer he got to Michelle, the worse his head hurt. He saw an opening in some bushes along where a pit was, and as he searched along the sides of the pit looking for her shoes, and stepped up into this opening, he looked in the water and saw a white arm from under the board. He said he continued to look and saw that it was Michelle. He then flagged down the car. Found it by some… super intervention.

I think this is worthy of note. On 16 March 87, at about 14:50 hours, Leo Schofield Senior and Junior, dad’s always with him, [False] arrived at the C.I.S. Central Operations Building where Leo was to take a polygraph. FDLE Agent Wayne Porter arrived, and conducted the polygraph; upon completion of the polygraph, Porter advised Ryder that Schofield Junior had flunked the polygraph. This man has never… he can’t express any remorse, ’cause he says he didn’t do it. And these circumstances are as strong a chain as you could ever ask for.

Lastly, let’s bring it current. This good man. Year and a half ago, we’re in courtrooms in Bartow, where he produces a fella by the name of Jeremy Scott [False], who he says has confessed to the crime.

He calls it newly discovered evidence. Now, we know Jeremy Scott broke into that car and took the radio, that was his M.O. during that particular time. After the defendant’s trial in 89, fingerprints were found in the car, they belonged to uh Jeremy Scott. Uh, and then the defendant starts filing motions on newly discovered evidence, it wasn’t newly discovered, and Scott testified he stole the equipment. Now this is the man that our good defendant is going to put on the stand to help him out. This is the quality individual that we’re dealing with. This is the character that we’re talking about. In September 2015, counsel for the defendant sends a letter to Scott, asking if he has any information that might be helpful in the defendant’s case. Some ten months later, Scott answers the letter and says, “What’s in it for me helping him?” In January, by the way, 2017, investigators for the State interviewed Mr. Scott; he denied killing Mrs. Schofield. Scott then says he needs money and indicated that he would admit to the murder for one thousand dollars. This is the man that they’re saying is new evidence. He’s the one that really committed the crime… for a thousand dollars.

In September, the defendant sends a letter to counsel admitting to the murder of Mrs. Schofield. [False]

Several days later, he sends a letter to the Court admitting to all the murders in Polk County in 87 and 88, and asking that all the inmates be set free. At the evidentiary hearing, Mr. S…  uh… the Court observes Mr. Scott’s demeanor while testifying, basically, the bottom line is, finds him completely untruthful. And it says, of course, everything was accompanied by, “what’s in it for me.”

They can talk about all they want. There’s no remorse, there’s no sorrow; how do you put a man in a program, getting him ready to be released into society, when he can’t say, “I’m sorry.” When he can’t say, “I did it.” I know this is a subsequent and I’m sorry I’m so emotional about it. I just feel very strongly that this is a cold, calculating first degree murderer. He’s a manipulator, and he’s exactly where he ought to be.

I hope you’ll deny him the opportunity for F.I.U.

Laying out Hill’s material falsehoods

One notices, even without the strike-throughs, that Jerry Hill could not cite a single piece of physical or eyewitness evidence connecting Leo Schofield Jr., who maintains his innocence, to his wife’s murder.

By contrast, Jeremy Scott, a convicted murderer, has confessed multiple times in escalating detail to killing Michelle Schofield. He also left a fingerprint on her car.

This overwhelming imbalance of the evidence — a ton against Jeremy Scott, none against Leo Schofield — makes Hill’s most significant and obviously false statement all the more material and important.

“The defendant” Leo Schofield Jr. has never confessed to killing his wife, as the SAO acknowledges. Thus Hill, facing a total vacuum of evidence against Schofield, invented evidence against Schofield — a confession — that does not exist. That’s an awfully powerful way of closing the imbalance in evidence.

It remains an uncorrected part of the record as of this writing.

The two other clear material falsehoods are as follows:

Year and a half ago, we’re in courtrooms in Bartow, where he produces a fella by the name of Jeremy Scott…”

To say Leo Schofield, in 2018, “produces a fella by the name of Jeremy Scott” is blatantly false. Jeremy Scott was produced as someone who cold exonerate Leo Schofield 14 years earlier in 2004. That’s when a finger/palm print found on Michelle Schofield’s car was finally checked against criminal databases, which was not done for trial in 1989. An evidentiary hearing built around Jeremy Scott and the evidence against Scott occurred in 2010.

Hill’s statement is prejudicial in that it seeks to diminish the seriousness and durability of Schofield’s claims of innocence by pretending he just produced Scott out of some sense of 11^th hour desperation. It belies the fact that Leo Schofield has always maintained his innocence and always maintained that the evidence against Scott points to him as the actual killer – for roughly 20 years now.

Dad’s always with him

Hill’s “dad’s always with him” statement is very important to his testimony because it clearly asserts that Leo Jr. and Leo Sr. found Michelle’s body together. That’s what “always” means. They were “always” together, in Hill’s telling. That is false. Leo Jr. was not with Leo Sr. when Leo Sr. found the body.

Moreover, Leo Schofield Sr.’s so-called “premonition” that supposedly led him to find Michelle Schofield’s body is very important to the state’s case. The state has often used Leo Schofield Sr.’s “premonition” to incriminate Leo Schofield Jr. by inference — to suggest Leo Jr. must have known where Michelle’s body was because Leo Schofield Sr. claimed to have a premonition from God.

“Dad’s always with him” goes even further. It puts the Leos together in that context. This is false and prejudicial.

If Leo Schofield Jr. was present when his father found Michelle’s body, it could somewhat bolster the state’s case, which is based entirely on strained inference and innuendo. But Leo Schofield Jr. was not “always” with his father and was not present when Michelle Schofield was found.

Moreover, Leo Schofield Sr. was never charged or implicated in any way in Michelle Schofield’s killing. He has no business appearing in Hill’s statement at all — much less a twisted form of evidence made worse with false statements.

The SAO tries to distance itself from Hill in 2023 without formally correcting his 2020 statement

The best evidence of Hill’s malfeasance and bad faith comes from his own client, the 10th Circuit State Attorney’s Office. Chief Assistant State Attorney Jacob Orr said this to the FCOR in Schofield’s most recent, partially successful, parole hearing, on May 3, 2023.

Notice all the false statements and bad faith arguments Hill made that are missing from Orr’s reserved and administrative defense of the indefensible. There’s nothing dishonorable or ethically broken about this argument. It does not violate any Bar rules that I can see.

I became a prosecutor 15 years ago and in that time I have learned that you cannot pursue justice unless you first pursue truth. In this case, that’s what the court systems have been doing for many, many years.

I’ve told others I think this is the most reviewed case in this history of Polk County. I really don’t know if that’s true, but I think it might be. Because we’ve looked at this; we’ve litigated this. And every time we go to court we re-litigate and we re-review the case based on the actual transcripts and the actual available evidence. And every one of those reviews results in the same outcome.

That there’s overwhelming evidence in support of the guilty verdict that was handed down many years ago. But that’s not really why ya’ll are here today.

You’re here today to decide if this inmate is gonna get out of jail. And I won’t go too much in detail into the facts of the case because I know you’ve heard some of them before and you know there was a heinous murder committed.

But you’ve got to compare that with what has been a long time of being a very good inmate. I’m telling you about truth and I think we need to recognize the fact that he’s been a very good inmate.

If Jerry Hill, who did not attend the 2023 hearing, used Orr’s ethical, professional approach in 2020, I wouldn’t be filing a complaint against him. And Leo Schofield might already be out of prison.

Jerry Hill’s uncontrolled emotion may destroy current State Attorney Brian Haas and the 10th Circuit

Jerry Hill made it clear in his 2020 statement that he harbors powerful negative, personal emotion toward Leo Schofield Jr. He even apologized for the effect of that emotion on his testimony in real time at the hearing. Note the bold:

I know this is a subsequent and I’m sorry I’m so emotional about it. I just feel very strongly that this is a cold, calculating first degree murderer. He’s a manipulator, and he’s exactly where he ought to be.

Perhaps Hill’s emotional desperation to impeach Leo Schofield’s consistent claim of innocence led to his reprehensible performance. He showed the same ferocious, unprofessional, out-of-control emotion three years later when he responded to my question about his 2020 statement with: “Fuck you.”

You don’t say “Fuck you” to a legitimate question if you really believe in your conviction. That’s the voice of emotional insecurity exploding in rage. Weak people are always at their angriest and most abusive when they know they’re wrong. Jerry Hill is a weak person.

Hill’s out-of-control emotional insecurity is cascading down to current State Attorney Brian Haas and his leadership team. It blinds them to what literally everyone else sees in any dispassionate review of the case.

Most of the Schofield prosecutors and judges owe their careers to Jerry Hill. And they are the reason former prosecutor and current conservative Republican State Sen. Jonathan Martin, R-Fort Myers, said this to the FCOR, of which he has legislative oversight, at the May 3, 2023 hearing:

Everything that I’ve seen about this case turns my stomach. I don’t know why Leo Schofield wasn’t released years ago when he went before this board. …

… I stand by the criminal justice system here in the state of Florida. We’re one of the best on the planet. But there’s a whole lot of doubt right now about how good we are. You guys have the chance today to restore credibility to a system that thousands of people know an injustice happened and is continuing every single second that Leo Schofield is behind bars.

Even America’s Tough Guy Sheriff Grady Judd won’t publicly defend this conviction. Does anyone think if Grady Judd believed a brutal murderer his office arrested was actually guilty that he would benignly participate in a podcast hoping to free that murderer? And then silently let Jerry Hill and Brian Haas and Victoria Avalon and Keith Spoto and Kevin Abdoney twist in the wind to defend the conviction with no law enforcement backing?

Prosecutors as bumbling defense lawyers for themselves

This raw, defensive emotion has forced the 10th Circuit prosecutors into full defense lawyer mode for themselves, arguing endless technicalities and loopholes and passive voices and strained legalistic nuances to defend Jerry Hill, John Aguero, and the Schofield conviction.

But emotion can lead defense lawyers to make mistakes that hurt their client.

For instance, I probably would not have listened to and sought transcription for Hill’s full, 9-minute 2020 FCOR statement if Jacob Orr had not aggressively prodded me to.

Using his own edited clip, Orr argued to me that Bone Valley had nefariously edited Hill’s incoherent and unethical statement to make Hill sound bad. The opposite is true, although none of it is nefarious, including Orr’s clip. A podcast, like a news article or documentary, must operate within constraints of time and storytelling flow.

Because I try not to let emotion interfere with my understanding of the merits of any situation, I told Jacob he had a valid point about the record I was using. I had, in fact, leaned too much on Bone Valley for source material. So I withdrew my earlier Bar complaint against Hill and closely reviewed Hill’s entire statement.

Doing so has greatly strengthened my new Florida Bar complaint. I assure you this was not Jacob Orr’s intention when he criticized my earlier work; but I am grateful to him nonetheless. Irony often emerges from emotion.

Today, my ongoing review of the vast Schofield case record is focused on the source documents available on Clerk of Court’s website and elsewhere. (Next I’m coming for the 2010 ruling former Jerry Hill employee Judge Keith Spoto made denying Schofield a new trial.)

Is it possible for any Florida institution to consider any issue simply on its merits?

Of course, there is no guarantee the Florida Bar will take any action against Hill or acknowledge my complaint has merit.

Florida’s governing and legal and moral institutions are giving a very poor account of themselves today — with the 10th Circuit State Attorney’s Office as a prime example.

In addition to the Schofield debacle, anyone who has followed the James Dunn, Rick Nolte, and FlyingBouncyPantyGate cases can see that the 10th Circuit, in high profile situations, tends to first find the political or personal outcomes it wants (or is afraid not to deliver.) Then it backfills the legal and professional reasoning to justify it, in laughably inconsistent and inequitable ways.

The merits of any situation — the consistent, dispassionate pursuit of honorable justice — are really the last thing considered.

This is typical of human institutions. It has always been a problem — and always will be.

But I think Florida is in a particular moment of institutional cowardice, failure, and indifference to merits. We’ll see if the Bar is one of those failing institutions — or if it can put aside its emotional reactions to Jerry Hill’s history and prominence to act dispassionately on the merits of his performance in the Schofield case.

And what about Orr and Haas and the rest of the 10th Circuit … ?

I would just urge them all to stop. Stop.

Stop calculating everything by your fear of its consequences — both for the sake of justice and your own sake. Even if you never face a direct professional or personal consequence for any of this, defending the indefensible with toxic emotion is corrosive to your souls.

You should embrace the merits of situations that confront you — even when that’s hard and comes with risk. I think your oaths are supposed to demand it. Restore some moral dignity and honor to your vital roles and institution before it’s too late, if it’s not already — like it is for Jerry Hill.