On the evening of October 19, 1974, a horrific scene was discovered inside the Donna Lee Bakery in New Britain, Connecticut, marking it as the location of what was then the worst mass murder in the state's history. Among the six victims found was William J. Donohue Jr., a 27-year-old White male. The victims, including the bakery's owner, an employee, and other customers, had been forced to lie face down in a back room before being shot in the head.
The initial investigation into the
brutal slayings pointed towards robbery as a motive. However, a more sinister reason emerged as the case developed. Investigators began to theorize that the killers resorted to such extreme violence to eliminate all witnesses because one of the victims had recognized one of the assailants. This unfortunate victim was Michael P. Kron, who was the uncle by marriage of one of the men later arrested for the crime.
Subsequently, two local men were apprehended in connection with the murders: Ronald F. "Tiny" Piskorski, a 25-year-old former bar bouncer, and Gary B. Schrager, a 31-year-old drifter. In December 1975, Piskorski was found guilty of the murders and received a sentence of 150 years to life in prison. Schrager's trial began in late 1976, during which he pleaded guilty to four of the six murders. While he admitted to being present during the robbery, he maintained that he was not the one who fired the shots and refused to name the shooter. For his role as an accessory to murder, Schrager was sentenced to 20 years to life in prison. Both Piskorski and Schrager died in prison in the fall of 2024, nearly 50 years after the massacre.
