Jennifer Lynn Maynard Myers, a 44-year-old White/Caucasian female, was killed on October 20, 1997, inside the Spring Grove, Pennsylvania art gallery where she worked. The killing came just two days before she was expected to appear in court against Kevin Brian Dowling, the man she had identified as the person who previously robbed, tied up, and sexually assaulted her at her art gallery. Myers had survived that earlier attack and was preparing to testify, but before she could take the stand, she was found dead on the floor of her gallery after witnesses outside heard three rapid bangs around 1:00 p.m.
The investigation quickly turned back toward Dowling because of the pending case against him. Myers had not known her attacker during the earlier assault, but later saw Dowling working at a Sheetz convenience store near her gallery and recognized him. When police searched his vehicle, they found a loaded gun, rope, a newspaper article about the robbery at Myers’ gallery, and sunglasses similar to those she said the attacker had worn. Dowling had been charged with robbery, indecent assault, and attempted rape, then released on bail while awaiting trial.
On the day Myers was murdered, Dowling claimed he had been fishing at Muddy Run Lake, roughly an hour from the gallery. He produced home video footage that appeared to show him there around the time of the shooting, but investigators concluded the timestamp had been manipulated in an attempt to create an alibi. Police also learned from the boat-rental operator that Dowling rented a boat around 10:20 a.m. and spent only about 30 to 45 minutes on the lake, leaving enough time, according to prosecutors, for him to reach Spring Grove before the shooting.
Myers was shot three times, in the chest, shoulder, and eye. The prosecution argued that the killing was not random but calculated: Dowling wanted to silence the key witness in the robbery and attempted rape case against him. Investigators later found a letter Dowling had written to Myers asking for forgiveness and admitting that he was the person who had robbed and attacked her. At trial, prosecutors also presented evidence that clothing Dowling wore on the day of the murder tested positive for gunshot residue.
Several witnesses reported seeing a strange man wearing a black wig near the gallery around the time Myers was killed. One witness, Sandra Eller, told police she saw Dowling in the nearby Spring Grove Shopping Center parking lot, though later court proceedings focused heavily on problems with the timing of her receipt from Kennie’s Market and whether she could have seen him when she said she did. A jailhouse witness, Joseph Leuw, also testified that Dowling said he had been near the gallery on the day of the murder, admitted owning a. 357 caliber weapon like the one used in the killing, and had a wig in his car that belonged to his daughter.
Dowling was arrested and charged with homicide. By the time his capital murder trial began, he had already been convicted in connection with the earlier break-in, robbery, and sexual assault and sentenced to nine to eighteen years in prison for those crimes. In 1998, a jury convicted him of first-degree murder in Myers’ death. During the penalty phase, jurors found that he killed her because she was scheduled to testify against him, and he was sentenced to death.
The case continued for decades through appeals and post-conviction litigation. In 2022, a judge granted Dowling a new trial after finding that evidence related to the Kennie’s Market register records could have undermined the eyewitness timeline and that trial counsel had not adequately pursued that issue. But on May 31, 2024, the Pennsylvania Supreme Court reversed that ruling, concluding that the disputed receipt evidence did not create a reasonable probability of a different verdict when weighed against the other evidence presented at trial. The court reinstated the conviction and death sentence, leaving Dowling as the convicted killer in Myers’ murder while remaining post-conviction issues continued through the courts.
