On the evening of October 19, 1974, Anne Isabel Kahrn Dowling, a 58-year-old White female, and her husband, Thomas, were customers at the Donna Lee Bakery in New Britain, Connecticut. What should have been a routine stop turned into a scene of unimaginable horror. Along with four other individuals, including the bakery's owner and another customer, the Dowlings became victims in what was at the time the worst mass murder in Connecticut's history.
The victims were all forced into a back
room of the bakery, where they were made to lie face down on the floor. Each was then shot in the back of the head. The motive for the brutal slayings was initially believed to be a robbery, as approximately $300 was taken from the cash register and the victims' wallets. However, investigators later theorized that the violence escalated because one of the perpetrators, Gary B. Schrager, was recognized by one of the victims, his uncle by marriage, Michael P. Kron. To eliminate any witnesses, all six people in the bakery were killed.
The investigation led to the arrests of two local men: Ronald F. "Tiny" Piskorski, a 25-year-old former bar bouncer, and Gary B. Schrager, a 31-year-old drifter. Piskorski was found guilty of the murders in December 1975 and was sentenced to 150 years to life in prison. Schrager's trial began in late 1976, but he soon pleaded guilty to four of the six murders. While he admitted to being present during the robbery, he claimed he did not shoot anyone and refused to name the killer. Schrager was sentenced to 20 years to life for being an accessory to murder. Both men died in prison within weeks of the 50th anniversary of the murders.
