Michael George, daughters maintain his innocence

By Heidi Roman
C & G Staff Writer

MOUNT CLEMENS — First they lost their mother — fatally shot at the hands of their father, Michael George, inside their family’s comic book store 18 years ago. Now Tracie and Michelle George will lose him, too, as he spends the rest of his life in prison with no chance of parole.

“If you want to look at victims, we’re definitely the prime ones,” said Tracie George, now 22 years old. She was only 4 1/2 years old when her father killed her mother, Barbara George. It was in 1990, but the memory of her mother is still strong.

“She’s 50 percent of me, and I’ve never forgotten that,” Tracie George said. “I feel she has always lived in my heart.”

It was the last words she would speak to her father before his life sentence was rendered. George, now 47, was convicted in March of first-degree murder and other related charges.

Assistant Prosecuting Attorney Steve Kaplan presented evidence of George’s infidelity — he was having an affair with an employee of the store whom he later married and raised the children with. Kaplan presented motive and opportunity, and convinced jurors that Michael George had wanted to trade his wife in for a newer model

His daughters still don’t believe it. They stand by his innocence, and are hopeful that an appeal will be successful.

“We will never quit until my dad is free, and they have the right person,” said Michelle George, the younger sister, now 20 years old. “I can not imagine my life any other way.”

Defense attorneys Carl Marlinga and Joseph Kosmala have already filed a motion for a new trial.

“This is an innocent man,” Marlinga told Circuit Judge James Biernat. “We will try with all of our hearts and souls to correct this.”

A sobbing Michael George asked that his family keep faith that he will one day be set free.

“The Lord knows I could never ever do this to anyone, much less my wife,” George told the court.

Barbara George’s brother and sister, Joe Kowynia and Christine Ball, said they’ve known all along that he was the one who pulled the trigger that long-ago day. Michael had wanted to leave Barbara, but she didn’t believe in divorce.

The Georges had spent the morning of the murder arguing, and Michael George returned to the comic store later that evening — as Barbara planned his surprise birthday party — to kill her.

“You should have just walked away, just walked away,” Kowynia said.

George left virtually no evidence of the crime behind, and Clinton Township detectives were stumped until last year, when the department’s cold case unit gave the murder another look.

Jurors were won over by the many pieces of circumstantial evidence presented during trial.  Michael George had told police the murder was a robbery gone sour, but evidence proved the theory wrong. He received $130,000 in insurance money after her death.

Kowynia and Ball said they’re still reeling from the drama of the court proceedings that have taken place since the charges against George were announced last year. The victory was bittersweet for them, they said. They’re happy to see George pay for the murder of their sister, but are also stung by what their nieces have endured. Barbara George’s side of the family has had little contact with Tracie and Michelle George since the sisters moved to Pennsylvania with their father, stepmother and her children. The family has had no contact whatsoever with Michael George — a fact Kowynia has always interpreted as a sign of George’s guilt.

A hearing on Marlinga’s motion for a new trial was set for August. In the meantime, Biernat is allowing George to remain jailed in Macomb County, rather than transferring him to prison. The closer facility will allow his attorneys to contact him while the post-sentencing motions are resolved.

George was ordered to pay court costs in addition to his life sentence in prison without parole. Sentences for charges of felony firearm, insurance fraud and false pretenses will be served consecutively.