BALSAM LAKE, Wis. — Nearly 40 years after prosecutors say she killed a rival to end a three-way love triangle, Mary Jo Bailey will pay with her freedom.
Bailey, now 81 years old, will be sentenced on July 2 after a Polk County jury found her guilty of first-degree murder in the killing, which took place in the stairwell of a St. Croix Falls apartment building back in December of 1985.
Prosecutors say the murder occurred after 45-year-old Yvonne Menke told Jack Owen - a man both she and Bailey had been seeing - that he was not to see her anymore. Investigators working the case immediately focused on Bailey, who trained horses with Owen, but were unable to build a case strong enough to charge her.
That changed in November of 2023, when fresh eyes took another look at the cold case. Where there was no new evidence or conclusive DNA matches involved, the Polk County attorney went over old interviews, and combined them with a matching footprint from a snowmobile boot, motive, and other circumstances to charge Bailey with murder.
The defendant was arrested at her home in Maricopa County, Arizona and returned to Wisconsin, where her trial began on May 20, 2024. DA Jeff Kemp told jurors Menke's ultimatum to Owen, and him choosing her over Bailey was the trigger.
"Be with her exclusively or not at all, which meant no more Mary Jo, romantically or training horses together," Kemp said in his opening statement.
Prosecutors believe that put Bailey, now 81, over the edge. They say she waited in the stairwell of Yvonne's apartment on a cold December morning and shot her three times when Yvonne came down.
Bailey's defense team told the jury there was no DNA, and no smoking gun to prove she was the killer. "Often, cold cases get charged after such as DNA is finally matched to somebody. That isn’t what happened in this case. That’s not why we're here today," said attorney Donna Burger. "There is no DNA evidence. There is no direct evidence in this case."
Ten days after the trial began, the case went to the jury, and it took them just over two hours to convict Mary Jo Bailey of first-degree murder. She will be back in the Polk County Courthouse on July 2 for sentencing.
Jack Owen, the man in the middle of the alleged love triangle, was interviewed several times by police but did not give them information that incriminated Mary Jo in the murder. Owen died in 2021.
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