Leann Fletcher Dies Amid a Love Triangle
(“Naked Justice,” Forensic Files)
“Naked Justice” is one of those Forensic Files episodes that make you equally perturbed about a) the murder itself and b) the way the killer insults your intelligence with his cover story.
The case also stands out for the specs on the other woman. Michael “Mick” Fletcher wanted to trade in his wife not for an exotic dancer or a fawning administrative assistant — but rather for a district court judge named Susan Chrzanowski. She made $104,000 a year, was respected for her work helping juvenile offenders, and even got a mention in Time magazine.
Love at First Sight. But instead of starting a new life with his great catch of a girlfriend, the 29-year-old lawyer ended up beginning a life sentence in a Michigan state prison less than a year after he shot Leann Fletcher, also 29.
For this week, I searched to find out whether Fletcher’s legal training has won him any leniency.
So let’s get started on a recap of “Naked Justice” along with additional information drawn from internet research:
Wife the main wage earner. Leann Misener was working in sales and dreaming of finding her Mr. Wonderful when she fell in love with Michigan State University undergrad Michael “Mick” Fletcher at a Halloween party.
They married in 1993. She supported him financially through law school and looked forward to becoming a stay-at-home mom. They moved to Hazel Park, a suburb of Detroit, and had a daughter in 1996.
He went to work as a criminal defense attorney.
It’s not clear which came first, but Judge Susan Chrzanowski started steering a lot of valuable case work his way and the two began having a torrid affair. They worked at the same court complex building in Warren, Michigan, and Fletcher had been a research clerk for her.
Near divorce. Forensic Files maintains that Chrzanowski, then 33 and recently divorced, believed Mick’s classic cheating-husband line about having a platonic relationship with his wife.
At some point, he filed for divorce from Leann, but they reconciled, and he impregnated her again.
He spread some devoted-husband gloss over his infidelity by giving Leann a sweet card about his happiness over their upcoming second child.
It was one of a number of gestures he began making in the months leading up to the shooting, according to Leann’s father, Jack Misener.
“He was sucking up to her and making her all kinds or promises,” Misener said during an American Justice interview from 2004.
Oh, shoot. Surely, no one would suspect a sweet husband like him of plotting to kill his wife, Fletcher must have reasoned.
He even tried to make the murder part of a date night, albeit an unorthodox one. On August, 16, 1999, he left his daughter, Hannah, age 3, with his in-laws, then took Leann to the shooting range to teach her how to use a gun.
They returned home and had sex. He then capped off the evening by calling 911 and, in a performance that redefines sniveling fake spouse-hysterics, pleaded for help after his wife accidentally shot herself while he was out of the room. He claimed she was reloading a gun when it happened.
Odds against him. That part alone strained credibility. How often do you hear of a woman shooting herself by mistake?
According to a CDC study, 86 percent of the 582 people who die of unintentional self-inflicted gun wounds annually are men.
It gets more implausible.
Investigators determined the bullet originated at a distance of at least 12 inches from Leann’s head, entered through her ear, and traveled a straight horizontal line from there. A person would need monkey arms to create that kind of wound, the police maintained.
Cache prize. Oh, and instead of putting some clothes on his wife before the EMT’s got there that night, Mr. Husband of the Year left her half-undressed on the floor.
The police theorized that Fletcher planned the shooting range trip so there would be an explanation for any gunpowder residue on his skin or attire.
But he couldn’t explain away the high-velocity blood splatter on his clothing
Investigators subsequently discovered a trove of steamy notes exchanged between Mick Fletcher and Susan Chrzanowski via both e-mail and good old greeting cards. They even found at least one picture of the judge “disrobed,” if you will.
Small fall from grace. Although the salacious headlines about the case undoubtedly embarrassed the judge, she “tried to put on a brave face” and continued to work and show up at community functions, according to a Detroit Free Press account from October 22, 1999.
Nonetheless, by February 2001, Chrzanowski’s stumble had found its way into a Time story called “Dial M for Misconduct”:
“[She] journeyed from pillar of the community to key witness at her married lover’s murder trial and then to focal point of public rancor over the deceit and misconduct produced by the desires that lurk beneath black robes.
By this time, her former flame Fletcher had been convicted of second-degree murder and gotten a life sentence plus two years on a felony firearms charge on July 28, 2000.
Career continues. Chrzanowski received a six-month suspension in December 2001 for steering cases — which she presided over as a judge — to Fletcher and initially lying about her relationship with him. The authorities never implicated her in the murder, however.
She resumed her position as a judge and stayed in the job until 2003, according to her LinkedIn profile.
Her work history leaves a gap for the three-year period afterward. In 2006, she started her own practice specializing in criminal and family law in Mount Clemens, Michigan. Her LinkedIn profile lists her current job as president of Susan Chrzanowski PLLC.
Former boyfriend Mick Fletcher hasn’t caught any breaks. He lives behind 12-foot-high razor-ribbon fences at the Thumb Correctional Facility in Lapeer, Michigan. It’s a Level II prison, which in Michigan means low to medium security.
Food for thought. He has remained tattoo-free, according to his profile, but prison meals appear to have added around 40 pounds to his once-slender 5-foot-10-inch frame.
Michigan prisons recently ended their contract with food providers Aramark Correctional Services and Trinity Services Group, and Fletcher will have plenty of time to savor the new cuisine.
His request for another trial, based on the claim that reenactments of the crime unfairly influenced the jury, was rejected in 2004.
And the Michigan Department of Corrections lists his minimum sentence as “Life.”
That’s all for this week. Until next time, cheers. — RR
Watch the Forensic Files episode on YouTube or Amazon Prime
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