48 Hours - Did The Doctor Kill The Doctor?

Episode Date: February 26, 2026

When Dr. Linda Goudey was found strangled to death in October 1993, the main suspect was her boyfriend, Timothy Stryker, who was also a doctor. Nothing police found at the scene pointed directly to Stryker, and it took years for him to plead guilty, but it wasn't to murder charges. “48 Hours" Correspondent Richard Schlesinger reports. This classic "48 Hours" episode last aired on 6/13/2009. Watch all-new episodes of “48 Hours” on Saturdays, and stream on demand on Paramount+. To learn more about listener data and our privacy practices visit: https://www.audacyinc.com/privacy-policy Learn more about your ad choices. Visit https://podcastchoices.com/adchoices

I want you The Hyundai-A-Lontra hybrid inspires a special type of love, the type that makes you slow down and enjoy the ride. With best-in-class fuel efficiency and a best-in-class new car warranty, it's made for the long run, wherever the road takes you next. Because some relationships are built to go the distance. It's that Hyundai-A-Lantra type of love. I always knew that I was going to be a doctor.

I always knew that I was going to be a doctor. My father's a doctor, mother's a nurse. So it was always in my blood to be a doctor. I never questioned it. One of my attractions to Lynn was that she was in a similar situation of being a very dynamic person, the very busy practice. Linda was a passionate advocate.

First and foremost, it was a dedication to her patients and especially high-risk OB-GYN patients. She knew her stuff. She was dynamic, but she had this wonderful friend with her patients. I respected so much how she went that extra mile to really take care of her patients and do everything that needed to be done,

help a mother have a healthy baby. In 1993, Dr. Stryker and Dr. Gowdy had a relationship that lasted approximately four and a half to five years. We would go jogging together and we had dinners together. We had so much to share and so much compatibility. Our office was notified on October 4, 1993, It was in 1993, it was a Monday, that there was a body found in a gray sob. In Lot A, which is on the Wengland Medical Hospital,

investigation ensued. We realized very quickly who it was, that it was Dr. Linda Gowdy. That was kind of the wave that went through the hospital. Oh my God, it can't be true. We did speak on the phone that evening that she died, because she stayed at the hospital, she had phoned me to tell me she wasn't coming over for dinner that night. The cause of death being manual strangulation, in combination with, a lot of other factors lead us to believe that Linda knew her killer.

There was that kind of stunned, shut down. Everything else sort of seemed a little bit more like a twilight zone around me. We thought it's a matter of time. Certainly they're going to find who did this. So we were just amazed as time went on and time went on and they still didn't know. How could they not know? There was a development that I could consider in a case which has gone unsolved for now 15 years. They started going to this good cop, bad cop routine.

And I knew at that point I was clearly being played. With the evidentiary trail that we developed over the last 15 years, Timothy Striker remains a suspect. How could I be blamed for something as terrible as this? Oh, we can solve this case. I intend to solve this case. I know that I'm innocent here. Did the doctor kill the doctor? Tonight's 48 hours mystery.

Dr. Lynn Gowdy was found strangled to death in the back of her car. Dr. Striker has been named as a suspect in Gally's death. Depending on whom you believe, Dr. Timothy Stryker is either a calculating murderer, or he is an innocent man desperately trying to clear his name. I've spent hours just sitting and thinking, you know, how could people think? that I could be guilty of something like this. Ask if they do that. To look at him today at age 56,

you'd never know Dr. Stryker has spent 15 years dogged by such terrible suspicions. It just makes me sad that people could think this way about me. Because otherwise, you know, you have to start looking for excess cortisol, excess aldostrom. He built a successful endocrinology practice. Who's the heart are you on, Mom?

and a family in a quiet Boston suburb. He's the epitome of stability. Stryker's wife of 14 years, Mikhail says her husband has shown no signs of violence. He's not a guy who loses it or somehow has an altered persona that shows up. And she'd probably know what to look for. She's a psychotherapist. He does present this very cool exterior, very flat, very, very, very, very, very, very, you know, unemotional, very in control, which makes you wonder what's going on behind the front, behind the facade.

Do you think you know? Yes, I absolutely know. I think it's very simple with him. I think he's just a very sincere, extremely gentle and even delicate person. He at all times looks to do good to the people around him. That might be one reason he decided. one reason he decided to become a doctor. I just knew it from a very young age.

That's what I wanted to do. You know, because it's my nature to want to help people. It was one thing he had in common with Lynn Gowdy. She had so much dynamic energy. And she was, by all accounts, driven. She earned top honors in high school and eventually went to medical school while working as a medical technician. She was a successful OBGYN, specializing and high-risk

pregnancies. She loved what she did. She was very good at it. Paula Dennett is a nutritionist who worked closely with Dr. Gowdy. She was new to the field, but you never thought she was just a rookie. You know, she knew what she was doing. And I'd say she was one of the more respected physicians there in terms of if you're having a problem or a complex pregnancy, Dr. Gowdy's the one to go to. Lisa Zolot was one of Dr. Lynn Gowdy's patients who noticed right away right away that there was something special about her.

Lynn was very good at six cents knowing what things were wrong. On a routine visit, Dr. Gowdy had a sense that Lisa's unborn baby was in danger. She decided that I have the C-section right away because something was wrong. And after she made the incision, there was bleeding everywhere. She just had a six sense that something was wrong. And she was right. And without her, my daughter wouldn't be here. My daughter's name is Lindsay. Basically we named her after Lynn.

From that day forward, Lisa and Lynn became good friends. We just clicked. It was just one of those things. So we just became friends. It was easy. Dr. Lynn Gowdy made a lot of friends around the hospital, including Dr. Timothy Stryker. So we met over lunches at the hospital and we started to share patients because I would refer patients to her as a gynecologist. It became apparent that they were friendly first. He was attractive. She was pretty. It could have just naturally evolved into something.

Before along, their work relationship did evolve into something more. We would sit and read together at night and do movies, and she got me into skiing, and then I got her into scuba diving in the Caribbean trips that we took together. And it was just a lovely way to see how they interacted with each other. You know, that they would have fun together. Gene Stryker is Tim's sister and used to work for Lynn. They would often share the cooking responsibilities and the cleanup, but I always saw them interacting very positively toward each other.

By 1993, four years after they started dating, things really seemed to be going well for the couple. Lynn Gowdy and Tim Stryker were both at the peak of their careers. And their relationship seems steady. Were you in love with her? Yes, I was. Lynn and Stryker kept spending time together and had even planned a vacation together

to the Caribbean for some scuba diving. I was looking very much forward to her. Was she? Yes, and she was actually the one that made the reservations for the trip, and it was her idea. She was very happy about it. But Lynn Gowdy never took the trip,

Because just weeks before they were to leave, she had a dream. In this dream, she had this vision of being in a car, I think it was, on the side of a mountain and driving around, and then seeing a plane go crashing to the side of the mountain. And she took this to some possible bad omen that perhaps, you know, we might have a plane crash. And I don't know if that, her sixth sense kicked in at that point, which wouldn't surprise me, that she had a premonition,

whether it was precognitive, that something bad was going to happen on that trip. So what did Lynn plan to do about her dream? She wasn't going on that vacation. She had thought that it wasn't a good idea and that she was not going to go. But that's not what Tim Stryker says. Well, was she going to go on that trip? Yes. She never said that she wasn't going.

Lynn's dream, her plans, and premonitions were about to become more important than anyone could have imagined. No one should have been surprised when Dr. Lynn Gowdy and Dr. Tim Stryker became an item. They were both successful physicians, active, adventurous, and with a lot in common. But after four years together, they were starting to drift apart. I guess towards the end of the relationship, you know, there may have been some stagnation because she was getting a little burned out from how hard she was working. But Lynn's friend, Lisa Zollat, says it wasn't just Lynn's work that was burning her out. It was also Stryker, who Lisa says was controlling and self-centered.

He was very rigid and very predictable in his lifestyle. He picked what time you ate, where you went, when you left. You know, he always controlled her totally. It was no changing him. It was that way of the highway. Stryker says Lynn's friends and family have been making up things about him ever since she died. Are you a flexible man? I have to be flexible to be available when a patient has chest pain or to be available when somebody's traumatized.

What about in your personal life? Again, I have to be flexible with my kids. with my wife. And, you know, so it's, it's, again, this is a story they tried to tell. Whatever the cause, Lynn's friends believed she was getting ready to break up, even as she and Stryker were getting ready to go on that Caribbean vacation. She was fed up with, I think, probably the rigid schedule. It was getting old, and she just couldn't handle it anymore.

Less than two weeks before that planned scuba vacation, the one Lynn Gowdy had a premonition about, Witnesses say they heard Stryker and Lynn arguing about whether to go on the trip. Colleagues remember, Lynn Gowdy was not herself later that evening. Her hair was messed up. She seemed upset. One person saw her slamming medical charts around and stomping down this hospital hallway. It was September 30th, 1993.

The last time anyone has reported seeing her alive. She was going Friday to get a massage. and on Saturday she was going to her reunion. But she never made it. Lynn was supposed to be out of town for the weekend, so her absence didn't worry anyone for a few days. I didn't really start to get concerned until Saturday night because she would go a day without calling me.

But to go two days without calling me didn't feel right. And then four days. After days after she had last been seen at the hospital, Stryker got a phone call. Lynn had been found. They had located her car, and then after I got up to the hospital, one of the midwives, actually at the hospital,

one in the hall with me, say, well, you know, they found her body, she's dead. Dr. Lynn Gowdy was found face down, wrapped in a blanket in the back of her car, parked in a remote corner of the hospital parking lot. Her colleague, Paula Denny, Paula Dennett was at work in the hospital. Someone came up and knocked on the door, my door, and said,

oh my God, they just found Lindaudi in her car, and she's dead. And I just said, that's crazy. That's crazy, you know. She can't be. Lisa Zolot went to the scene and bumped into Tim Stryker. He had his own theory about what happened. I will never forget him coming over the hill. the hill, gave me this big hug and told me I didn't really know Lynn, and that it was suicide,

and she probably took her own life. I'm like, you know, I didn't even, couldn't even respond to that. I was so upset at that point. But Stryker says Lynn had struggled with depression and talked about suicide. Just a few months before her body was found, he says Lynn left him a note that said, I want to be dead. But it took the medical examiner. Dr. Stanton Kessler, just moments to determine this was no suicide. When I saw her in the backseat of the car, literally tucked in in a very tightly wedged space, I said, nobody can do that to themselves.

You can't even move your arms. The location of the car, so far away from the hospital entrance, told investigators something as well. It just was out of character first. You never would have parked there. You know, it was sort of away from everything. So now finding this car in a different space says, hmm, something's going on or maybe somebody else is driving that car and putting it there.

There was no apparent sign of sexual assault, Lynn's purse and its contents were still in the car. Kessler also thought it was odd that Lynn's shoes were so neatly placed on the floor by the front seat, and she was barefoot. The foot was clean, and it had rained, it was grease and dirt. What do you think it proves? It tells me that I think somebody murdered her somewhere, probably somewhere else, and placed her in there as an afterthought.

They would not discuss any motives or suspects in the case. The official cause of death has been ruled homicide by means of manual strangulation. And when Dr. Kessler did the autopsy, he discovered it was a particularly violent homicide. She was grabbed by the net, like this, and strangled, suffocated. The attack on Lynn was so brutal that Dr. Kessler found injuries at 24 separate places on her body. How much do you think Dr. Gowdy suffered? I think she suffered a good bit. She was so full of life, why would this happen?

That was the question was why. And then how could it happen? And then I think the who came after. You know, when she died was initially I was stunned. But then after that, for me, it was just sadness. He may have been stunned. He may have been sad. But police were still eager to talk to Dr. Tim Stryker

immediately after they discovered the body of his girlfriend, Dr. Lynn Gowdy. I was actually called in to speak with the detective right there on the spot. and they asked me, you know, who do you think could have killed her? Of course, it didn't take long at all for police to start focusing on the man they thought did it. The usual suspect, the boyfriend, Dr. Stryker himself. The cause of death being manual strangulation, in combination with a lot of other factors and evidence that we've developed, led us to believe and continues to lead us to believe that Linda knew her killer. District Attorney Jerry Leone says detectives quickly learned,

about the problems Lynn and Stryker were having, even that argument witnesses reported about the scuba trip. The relationship had been described as sometimes rocky, sometimes volatile. In plain English, I mean, was he violent to her? I don't want to characterize Timothy Stryker, you know, in that way. What we know to be true is that Dr. Stryker and Dr. Gowdy during the course of their relationship had some physical conference, and at times it resulted in some injury to Linda.

Stryker says he and Lynn had the kind of problems many couples have. And there was a time where she got very angry in my kitchen because I called her a pea brain. And she had a temper tantrum. There was a cup of peas and a cup of potatoes and a cup of corn. And here she was just throwing these at the walls at my paintings.

I grabbed her to pull her away from picking up the next thing to hurdle at the wall, and that's when she fell down and hit the floor, and she bruised her ribs that time. Lynn never filed a complaint, and Stryker says she was the aggressor, that he was just protecting his property. I was never in any way verbally, physically abusive to her, and I would like for people to talk to my wife or talk to the girlfriend that I had from 15 years ago before I started going out with Lynn, that, you know, that has never been me.

Stryker's wife, Mikhail, was eager to talk. Have you ever been afraid of your husband? No, I've never ever been afraid. You ever seen a temper? Never. Never. Never. Never.

Uh-huh. But it took a lot of anger for somebody to do what was done to Lynn Gowdy, strangling her and stuffing her body in the backseat of her car. Nothing police found here at the crime scene pointed directly to Tim Stryker. It was more what they didn't find. Lynn's tote bag witnesses saw her carrying when she left the hospital wasn't in the car, neither was the jacket she was last seen wearing, or her briefcase, which some said she never left behind. Police couldn't find anything until they visited Dr. Stryker.

I cooper with him by giving them, you know, the briefings, that was in my house. He not only had the briefcase, he had the tote bag, and he had a jacket that he says was his, but was the same color and style as the one witnesses saw Lynn wearing. I gave them that jacket to facilitate them looking for her jacket, so they knew what they were supposed to be looking for. I was trying to help them,

and they looked at it for blood stains and all that kind of stuff, and obviously that wasn't there. Stryker was helping the police just as he said he was, but he was helping them confirm their suspicions of him, and he didn't help himself any when just one week after the murder, he went on that Caribbean vacation alone. He was down there on the day of Lynn's memorial service. It actually became an opportunity to actually have some time away

and for me to sit in a quiet space and start to deal with the emotion that I had to kind of shut down right after her death. In retrospect, I wish I hadn't gone, even though at the time it was therapeutic for me to do that. Stryker's sister Jean agreed it was a bad idea. He did it mainly because my mother told him to. Yeah. My mother told him to go on vacation because he was talking with her, you know, about all of the harassment he was getting. And she's like, Tim, you need to just go on this vacation. Because I thought it was not such a great idea.

Why did you think it wasn't a good idea? I mean, here's this good-looking, sexy, you know, doctor. And, you know, it's very exciting to think that he could possibly have done this. And they were making a lot of it. It didn't look good. It didn't look good. It didn't look good. And when Stryker got back from the Caribbean, the police were eager to talk to him again.

And they told me that everything about my story was checking out okay. But they just wanted to do a little polygraph so they could rule me out as a suspect. And off you went to the polygraph. And off I went to the polygraph. According to transcripts of the lie detector session, the polygraph examiner asked Stryker, do you know know why I've asked you here? Stryker replies, the boyfriend is usually the number one suspect. Later, Stryker has asked, did you cause the death of Lynn Gowdy? And Stryker replies, no. When he's asked, do you think she was murdered? Stryker says, it's easier to accept suicide.

The police told Stryker the results of the polygraph in their words clearly indicated he was involved. And that's when Tim Stryker said he did not want to continue cooperating. The police say Stryker incriminated himself further after the polygraph when he told them, quote, I just put a noose around my neck. I can see my world crumbling. Did you say after the lie detector test, I just put the noose around my neck? No, I would never say something like that. It would have been more like I think you guys are trying to put a noose around my neck. Because my feeling at the time was that these people were trying to badger me.

Soon after Stryker got an attorney, the investigation into Lynn's death stalled. The polygraph test was inadmissible evidence, and the police didn't have much else against him. Stryker wasn't charged, but he wasn't cleared either, far from it. For more than a decade, he remained the prime suspect, despite his consistent denial. consistent denials. Did you kill Lynn Gowdy? No, I did not. Do you know who did kill Lynn Gowdy?

No, I don't. And if I did, I wouldn't be in this situation. The police investigation might have been stalled, but Lynn Gowdy's family would not be stopped. They believe Stryker was getting away with murder, and proving it was now up to them. Welcome to Radio Rental. The scariest stories you've ever heard in your life.

All told by real people. And off we go. This wasn't a human being that I saw. There's something here in this house, something out of this world. There was a woman moving through the hall. I stepped back and I was completely alone. Radio Rental is available now. Listen for free on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or wherever you get your podcasts.

The longer a homicide remains unsolved. That eats at me and it eats at our investigative team because we know that somebody could literally get away with murder. Gowdy's body was found in her car in front of a stone of hospital where she worked with Stryker. In the 90s when he was a young assistant DA, Jerry Leone worked this case before it went cold. How do you solve a case with no witnesses, no witnesses, no physical evidence, no DNA, none of the tools you like. This is and always was a circumstantial case, but we build circumstantial cases all of the time. You take your time.

But after three years' time, nobody had been brought to justice. So Lynn's family stepped in and did the only thing they could. In 1996, Lynn's mother, Marguerite Rayfuse, filed a wrongful death suit against the man. She always believed killed her daughter, Dr. Tim Stryker. The suit charges Dr. Stryker, quote, willfully, wantonly, and maliciously killed Gowdy by strangling her, unquote. It's a scathing accusation against a man who's never been criminally charged with Lynn's murder.

If I think about what I would do if my daughter died and if I suspected that somebody else may have killed her, then I could see how I would have an agenda. you know, to try to bring somebody to justice. But they obviously are blaming the wrong person. It's a civil case, not a criminal case, so it's easier to win. But Lynn's family still wanted the DA's file containing all the evidence against Stryker. And that turned into a long, drawn-out, legal tug-of-war. The DA's office considered this an open case and refused to turn over the file.

Well, I'm very disappointed. this thing happened. The family wanted to prove their case. The prosecutors wanted to protect theirs. It went back and forth for nearly 10 years, but Lynn's family and their attorney, Michael Altman, kept up the pressure to get Stryker in front of a jury. Our feeling was, you do it or will do it. And it should not be, nobody does it.

And finally, in 2006, 13 years after Lynn's murder, her family won the fight. How you doing this point? A court ordered the DA to turn over the criminal file. And armed with that, All right. The refuses were ready to do what prosecutors could not confront Tim Stryker in a court of law. He had a history of abusive behavior. Altman says Stryker and Lynn often argued, argued more violently than Stryker says, argued the last day she was a law.

They were seen arguing in the corridor that evening. There was something that went awry. He lost control. He was a control freak. He killed her. He's raised your right hand. Stryker had to face his accusers from the witness stand. Did you express feelings of anger towards her?

I never screamed at her. I never cursed at her. So I never, you know, expressed anger in any significant. What was going on inside? Did you feel anger towards her? Sometimes. Altman finally got a chance to confront Dr. Stryker with the one question he'd waited 13 years to ask. Did you get angry enough to want to strangle her?

No, sir. Did you kill Lengowdy? No, sir. Throughout the trial, I felt really that there was nothing of substance being brought against him. Stryker's wife, Mikhail sat in court and listened as Lynn's family laid out the case against her husband. It was an angry Tim Stryker that killed her. But once the closing arguments took place, and Altman spoke and wove this amazing fantasy of who this imaginary killer is. Strangling is grotesquely personal.

I really thought, you know, if I were the juror hearing this, this would be very compelling. It requires the hands around the neck and holding the person tight as they gasping for breath and trying to escape. I just burst out. It was just unbelievably painful to listen to. Stryker has always said he didn't even see Lynn the night she was killed. But Altman brought in the briefcase, the tote bag, and that jacket. Where were they? He had them.

The jacket wasn't found in the car. The primron bag wasn't found in the car. They were found in his apartment. He calls them his three silent witnesses that prove Lynn was at Stryker's apartment the night she was killed. It's only one way they could have gotten there. She was carrying them. Stryker says while they were dating,

Lynn often left her belongings at his home. But Lynn left behind some other damaging evidence at her home. We do have her voice. It's in Exhibit 55. Lynn Gowdy left behind notes, revealing notes about her fights with Stryker. Altman says they are written in Lynn's voice.

We could listen to her voice as to what happened. She described a fight where she was injured. Up angry, storms out, threw pearls, flips me into railing, back and foot injuries, shaking, chills, swollen foot. Altman says the note proves Stryker could be violent. Stryker says Lynn was injured when they were practicing a dance step. Does that sound like a dance step? That's Lynn's voice describing what happened. Compare that to his. Where are the witnesses? Stryker's attorney Martin Lepo says the case against his client isn't just weak. He argues

there is no case. Where is one person, one scintiller of evidence, just one person who would one noise of a fight in that house, of a person screaming? Lepo asked the jurors to use common sense and ask themselves one question. Has the plaintiff proved her case that Lynn Gowdy was there that night and that Tim Stryker caused her death? Guys. Special verdict questions. Question one. It took nearly 13 years to get this case to a civil court trial. The defendant, Timothy Stryker, caused the death of Linda Gowdy.

But it took only a day and a half for the jury. to retroverted. Answer, yes. So say you, Mr. Four Person. Yes. Question two, did he act maliciously, willfully, wantonly, or recklessly towards her? Answer, yes.

The jury believes Stryker killed Lynn Gowdy and in an extraordinary move ordered him to pay Lynn's family $15 million. We're thrilled. This is fantastic. Absolutely. And I can't thank my lawyer enough for hanging in with us. It's not a criminal conviction, but for Lynn's mother and brother, Marguerite and John

Refuse, it's one critical victory in their fight to put Stryker behind bars. I think this was based upon a lot of emotion, and so we'll definitely be appealing. Nobody was surprised that Stryker said he would appeal, but everyone was surprised when nine months later, he and his lawyers announced they had found a brand new witness who could make this a brand new. new case. What he was swearing to was that on the night of September 30th of 1993, he saw someone in that sob with Linda Gowdy who looked nothing like Stryker.

Dr. Timothy Stryker was suddenly facing the possibility of losing everything. His home, his money, his reputation. It's been obviously very difficult because I'm sitting here with this potential financial disaster over my head. After a civil court found him responsible for the death of Dr. Lynn Gowdy, he was ordered to pay her family $15 million. But that could all change and quickly because Stryker says from out of the blue came a phone call from this man, who, according to Stryker, was in the parking lot the night Lynn was

killed. He called me on the phone at my office and apparently he had seen all this publicity and he realized when he saw my face on the screen, that I wasn't the person that he saw with Lynn Gowdy that night. Craig Pisano was 18 at the time of the murder, and Stryker says Pizano told him one heck of a story. He told me that he just went to a bar, out drink with his friends, picked up a girl,

took her over to this parking lot, over at the hospital. Pizano said when he arrived at the hospital parking lot around 1 a.m. There was only one other car there. Lynn Gowdy sob. He happened to pull up next to their car and things started to get hot and heavy between him and this girl he picked up and he walked over to their car to actually ask for a condom. He saw them engaged in sexual activity. According to this deposition obtained by 48 hours, Pisano said when he knocked on the car window to ask for a condom, he got a good look at who was inside. But,

But he said that he clearly saw Lynn. Yes. And he clearly saw the man she was with. Correct. And how did he describe the man she was with to you? Over six foot tall, over 200 pounds, you know, a big man with blonde hair. In other words, Pisano said, the man looked nothing at all like Tim Stryker. It's a wacky story, to put it politely.

Yes. No, and that's why I asked him a number of questions at the time to see if I could verify his story. And he also seemed to have information that clearly he wouldn't have had if, uh, just from reading the newspapers. Pisano's story was just the break striker had been hoping for. And it was also a break for district attorney Jerry Leone. When someone comes forward for the first time, 15 years after an incident which was as very public as this one was, and provides what on the face would be significant information, information, which relates to a homicide, if true, caused us to look at this in a very meaningful way.

As soon as he could, Stryker asked for a new trial in an attempt to clear his name and get out from under the crushing $15 million court order. Let me ask you, because skeptics will ask. I mean, did you know this guy? No. You'd never met him before. Never met him. Have you given this fellow any money at all? I have not given Craig Bezano any money or anything else that would any way encourage him to come forward. Were you involved in him coming forward at all? In no way.

And that is an outright, bald-faced lie, according to the prosecutors here. In fact, they say Pizzano was never in this parking lot that night, never saw Lynn Gowdy, never saw a tall blonde man, even though he said he did in a sworn affidavit. So now there's a whole new choice. chapter in this case. The affidavit is another incomplete lie. It's a story. It's a story that was created by Tim Stryker.

Leone says investigators began pulling apart Pizano's statement soon after they read it, and they discovered cell phone records that showed the two men had started talking months earlier. When prosecutors confronted Pizano, he admitted he lied. He refused to talk to us, but told Lione, Stryker put him up to it. Pisano got immunity from prosecution, Stryker was not so lucky. He was arrested and hauled into court. In case of the Commonwealth versus Timothy Stryker.

He was charged with perjury. It's not murder, but it is a felony. He could get more than 20 years. Charging conspiracy to convince some of the nation of perjury. And this time it wasn't civil court. It was criminal court. How do you please, sir? Leone says Stryker made up the story and recruited Pizzano through a middleman, one of his patients, named Richard Chambers.

All the facts of this story were provided by Stryker through Chambers. Chambers was also arrested, and at a pretrial hearing, Leone laid out the details of an elaborate scheme. Chambers continuously met and talked with Pizzano. During these meetings, he would show them maps and diagrams. and diagrams, which would show how he supposedly went from a bar drinking the night of September 30th to the parking lot. And in return, Pisano and Chambers get what? The initial promise is that Chambers and Pisano will receive several thousands of dollars.

However, that comes with a pretty tight caveat. And that is, Stryker tells them, you'll get your money, but only when I'm out from under the civil judgment, because my money is tied. up in the civil judgment and the civil suit. Leone charges Pisano and Chambers also got prescription pain pills and antidepressants in return for their help. Pisano has provided those drugs to authorities, and the lot numbers on those drugs attract from a salesman to the pharmaceutical company to Dr. Timothy Stryker.

Stryker says the DA threatened Pisano with a lengthy prison sentence to get him to change his story. Leonie denies that and says Pisano volunteered to tell him what prosecutors now believe is the truth. How do you know when the guy's lying? Well, ultimately, Craig will swear to tell the truth and he'll tell the truth, but he'll also, in swearing to tell the truth, tell the fact that he lied as well. But Pisano never took the stand. On April 16, 2009, Timothy Stryker pleaded guilty to multiple counts of police. perjury and was sentenced to four years in prison.

For the Reifuse family, justice for Lynn's death could now be within reach. We are hopeful that Dr. Stryker will spend the rest of his life in jail, not just four years, and that an indictment for homicide will be forthcoming sometime in the future. Whatever happens to him, Stryker will face the future without the one person who, stood by him and believed in him. His wife of 14 years, Mikhail, she has filed for divorce. Jerry Leone made a promise to Lynn Gowdy's family 16 years ago when he was the young assistant district attorney.

He promised he would get the person who killed her, and he still stands by that promise. This plea today by Tim Stryker may close a chapter, but the book remains open in this case, and I will continue to handle the homicide investigation personally. In 2011, Timothy Stryker died of pancreatic cancer while serving his four-year sentence.