The 200-page document was released by brother of Michelle Lodzinski, who is accused of committing son's murder in 1991.
A trove of FBI documents obtained by the brother of Michelle Lodzinski -- charged in the 1991 murder of her 5-year-old son -- reveals startling new details into the decades-long investigation that led to her arrest last year, painting the former South Amboy woman as a sometimes detached mother whose erratic behavior included faking her own kidnapping in order to avoid an appearance before a grand jury considering evidence in the case.
Michael Lodzinski, who has long stood by his sister as she proclaimed her innocence, provided NJ Advance Media with a more than 200-page Federal Bureau of Investigation redacted report he obtained years ago through a public records request, saying he believed the public had a right to know what was in the FBI files and the timing was right.
"I've been wrestling with what to do with these files for years," said Michael Lodzinski, who lives in Michigan. "But Timmy belongs to everybody. I think people have a right to know and this provides some good insight into the goings on of the investigation."
Attorneys for Lodzinski are seeking a dismissal of the charges, with the case due to go to trial in January.
The FBI files shows the extraordinary lengths the federal agency went through to investigate the case, including planting surveillance equipment in Lodzinski's car and poring through her financial records to find evidence that she may have profited from her son's death.
Lodzinski reported Wiltsey missing on May 25, 1991, from a local carnival, and the subsequent search for him drew nationwide attention. Portions.of his skeletal remains were found in the marshes of Raritan Center in April 1992. Lodzinski was always a suspect in her son's murder, according to authorities, but she was never formally charged until last year.
Lodzinski was arrested and charged with the murder of Wiltsey in August of 2014, more than two decades after the case went cold.
The 211-page report reveals previously undisclosed details of the investigation. They include:
- Authorities did an exhaustive search of welfare records in an attempt to corroborate one of Lodzinski's explanations of her son's alleged abduction. Lodzinski told Sayreville Police she encountered a woman named Ellen at the carnival whom she knew from her job as a teller at Amboy-Madison Bank where "Ellen" used to cash her welfare checks. Lodzinski said the woman confronted her with a knife and abducted Timothy. A records search found no one named Ellen in the welfare records whom Lodzinski could identify by photo as the woman who took her son.
- An unidentified man "wired" his car on June 8, 1991, and tried to get Lodzinski to talk about what happened to Timothy. "He told her that he now had trouble believing her new story, and if he did not believe it, what did she think the police would think,according to the report. Angry, she said nothing and stormed out of the car.
- Authorities searched Lodzinski's financial records in June 1991 to determine whether it might be plausible that she sold her son and received some financial gain. Nothing was found.
- In April 1992, the owner of a mail order business offered to place Timothy's photo on items he published to aid the search. He asked Lodzinski, "who seemed interested on the telephone and promised to send" a photo, but "it never arrived and he thought that was odd, he said, according to the report.
- In April 1992, Sayreville police received an anonymous letter detailing an explanation of Timothy's death: "In the case of Timothy Wiltsey the man you are looking for is (redacted)...He had a grudge against Michele and wanted to get back at her. I know this for a fact because last February 1991 he wanted me to help him kill Michele or her little boy. His plan was to use a 22 pistol and put her body in a steel drum weighted with rocks and filled with holes and sink it in the Raritan River. DNA tests at that time were not able to link the letter to Lodzinski.
A trial is expected to commence in January, but a Middlesex County judge will first rule on a motion by Lodzinski's attorney to dismiss the indictment next Wednesday.
The documents were released by her brother, Michael, who obtained them in 2000 from the FBI through a public records request.
"Since Timmy's murder I have been seeking answers," he said in a statement. "I never released the file as I did not want to interfere with any investigation that may be going on, I just wanted answers for myself. I have only shared this file with my wife and no one else. I am now releasing this file to the public."
Michelle Lodzinski has remained in Middlesex County Jail since her arrest.
Michael Lodzinski has always maintained his sister's innocence, but told The Star-Ledger last summer that the family is open to being proven wrong by prosecutors. More than anything, he said the family wants closure.
"I hope people understand that when it's somebody in your own family and they tell you they're innocent and they had nothing to do with it, then you believe them. (It's) the prosecutors, (it's) their thing to prove it otherwise and we accept that," Michael Lodzinski said at the time.
Her attorney, Gerald Krovatin, said he was unaware of the release of the documents.
"I know Michael loves his sister and cares about her, but this disclosure was not authorized by her or me and it is not our intention to try this case in the newspapers," he said. "At the appropriate time we will address everything in the FBI's files on this as well as the state's."
The Middlesex County Prosecutor's office could not be reached for comment.
NJ Advance Media Reporter Ted Sherman contributed to this article. Stephen Stirling may be reached at sstirling@njadvancemedia.com. Follow him on Twitter @sstirling. Find him on Facebook.