Forty Two Years Later, The Same Questions

Tim Botos: “Did you commit this robbery?” the attorney asked her client.

Emil Jaroszyk (pronounced Ja-ross-ik) had answered that question many times over the years. First, as a young man when he was arrested for the crime. Then later, on a polygraph test. He told friends and relatives his truth before he went to prison and after he got out. Here he was again this month, as a much older man, answering that same question inside the same Carroll County Courthouse where he stood trial for the crime 42 years ago.

Dressed in a brown sport coat, his patterned burgundy and gray tie furled up as he leaned forward in the witness stand. The 66-year-old, with brownish-red hair and a grayish goatee, often stutters when he talks. Not this time. His answer was simple, clean and to the point. It matched what he has maintained for the past four decades.

“No, I did not,” Jaroszyk said in his Ukrainian accent.