After Timothy Wiltsey's sneaker was found in a marshy area behind the Raritan Center, investigators failed to launch a thorough search of the site for several more months, when they finally found the missing boy's remains.
NEW BRUNSWICK--The kid-sized sneaker was found by Daniel O'Malley, a teacher at Bound Brook High School, who was walking with a friend through a marshy area behind the Raritan Center in October 1991 when he spotted the mud-encrusted shoe behind some trees.
It was a Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtle sneaker, matching the description of the clothing that had been worn by 5-year-old Timothy Wiltsey when his mother reported him missing from a Sayreville carnival five months earlier.
But it would be another five months before investigators did a thorough search of the site--ultimately discovering the skeletal remains of the missing child in April 1992.
On Wednesday, O'Malley, now retired, recounted his discovery as he testified in the trial of Timothy's mother, Michelle Lodzinski, who is charged with the boy's murder.
"It seemed unbelievable it could be connected, But it did raise a flag," O'Malley said, remembering that he put the sneaker in a plastic bag and took it to the Sayreville Police Department.
Police wired Lodzinski's boyfriend
Three weeks after O'Malley handed over the shoe to police, he called The Home News and reported his discovery, leading to a series of news stories about the discovery and renewed interest by police. But he said he never heard anything more until several months later, when he was contacted by the FBI.
No explanation has ever been given for the failure to conduct a more thorough search when the sneaker was first found, or why police eventually went back. The Middlesex County Prosecutor's office in February 1992 said an FBI forensic report was unable to reach a conclusion because the shoes did not contain detailed markings that were needed to make a positive match. According to press accounts at the time, Lodzinski's mother, Alice Lodzinski, told reporters it was difficult for her daughter to know for sure whether the muddy sneaker was Timothy's.
"There are thousands of sneakers that are the same, so how do you say yes or no? It's like taking a shot in the dark," she told The Star-Ledger then.
In court on Wednesday, retired Sayreville Police Det. Raymond Szkodny testified that Michelle Lodzinski had initially "denied it was his sneaker."
He told the jury that he went with several other investigators went to the location off Olympic Drive where O'Malley found the sneaker and searched the area, but found nothing. Under questioning by defense attorney Gerald Krovatin, Szkodney said Lodzinski brought a pair of Timmy's school shoes in to Sayreville police a few days after claiming she did not recognize the sneaker recovered in Edison.
"She called us," Szkodny said. "She said she was called by a reporter. She wanted to bring in another pair of Timmy's shoes and see if it matched the wear pattern of the sneaker."
He said he turned over the shoes and sneaker to the police department's identification bureau for testing, but did not know the results.
Szkodny said Lodzinski told him "she feels awful about being unsure if its Timmy's sneaker."
Timeline of a murder investigation
Lodzinski by then was a prime suspect in her son's disappearance, according to testimony at the trial, but she was not charged until 2014, after the prosecutor's office reopened and reviewed the case.
The retired detective said he was part of a second search of the area on April 23, 1992, including members of the FBI, the State Police, the Middlesex County Prosecutor's Office and the Sayreville Police Department when they found Timmy's remains in a stream, along with the other sneaker. No cause of death has ever been established because the body had been exposed to the elements for so long.
Szkodny, questioned by Lodzinski's attorney, denied police were investigating the involvement of two men in the abduction of Timothy before Lodzinski told investigators that two men and a woman abducted her son.
In a recording of a conversation between Lodzinski and her then-boyfriend, Fred Bruno on June 7, 1991, she told Bruno that when she told police her son was taken by a woman named Ellen and two men, they (police) were already investigating the possibility that two men took him from the carnival.
"That is not true," Szkodny said.
The trial continues Thursday before Superior Court Judge Dennis Nieves in New Brunswick.
Staff writer Ted Sherman contributed to this report.
Sue Epstein may be reached at sepstein@njadvancemedia.com. Follow her on Twitter @susan_epstein. Find NJ.com on Facebook.