Page 19 of Guess Again
Madison, Wisconsin Monday, July 14, 2025
ETHAN ARRIVED EARLY AND SAT IN THE FRONT ROW, LEGS CROSSED and hands folded calmly on his lap.
The courtroom filled to standing room only as Ethan waited, but he never looked behind him to see who was there.
Parole hearings typically took place at the prison where the incarcerated individual was being held, but due to the high-profile nature of the case, today’s hearing was taking place at a courthouse in Madison.
Ethan focused his attention on the closed door at the side of the courtroom.
Eventually, four parole board members shuffled in and filled the long table that waited for them, organizing their notes as they took their spots.
Nameplates told the courtroom spectators who each of the members were.
The side door opened, and two bailiffs entered.
Ethan sat up a bit straighter and took a deep breath. The bailiffs nodded and then led Francis Bernard, dressed in an orange jumpsuit with wrists and ankles shackled, to the defense table where he sat with his attorney, a mere ten feet away.
Ethan watched as the attorney whispered into the man’s ear.
Francis nodded and then looked over his attorney’s shoulder to take in the crowd.
His gaze momentarily fell on Ethan, and Ethan liked to imagine that with the eye contact came a sense of lost hope.
An icy tingle ran through Ethan’s spine when the corners of Francis’s lips twisted upward in a smile.
His career as a special agent at the DCI lasted ten years, during which Ethan had been responsible for putting many sick individuals behind bars.
But none of those criminals had been imprisoned long enough to be considered for parole.
Therefore, parole hearings were a new experience for him.
Ethan had played no role in putting Francis Bernard in prison.
He was, however, a key factor in keeping him there. Ethan’s testimony had led to the board denying Francis’s first chance at parole two years earlier. And Ethan planned to spoil things again today.
Ethan kept his gaze locked on the man’s eyes, his face expressionless, until Francis finally looked away.
“Good morning,”
the woman sitting at the middle of the table said to get the hearing under way.
The courtroom quieted and everyone settled in.
“My name is Christine Jackson, chairperson of the Wisconsin Parole Commission.
We are gathered in this courtroom on the fourteenth day of July, 2025 for the parole board hearing of Mr.
Francis Bernard.”
She looked down at her notes.
“Mr.
Bernard, you were convicted in 1993 of second-degree homicide of Henry Hall, a detective with the Milwaukee Police Department.
You were sentenced to sixty years in a state penitentiary, with the possibility of parole after thirty years.
This is your second request for parole, the first having been denied in 2023.
Special guests today include Whalen and Earnest Bernard, your parents, as well as your sister, Margaret.
We also have special guests, Clint Dackery, retired police chief of the Milwaukee Police Department, and Ethan Hall, the victim’s son.”
The hearing began with Francis Bernard’s attorney speaking for fifteen minutes about Wisconsin state law that required those sentenced prior to December 31, 1999 to be eligible for mandatory parole after serving two-thirds of their sentence, which for Francis meant that, despite the board’s decision today, he would be a free man in eight years.
The attorney then chronicled what a model inmate his client had been in the last thirty-two years.
Francis had not only avoided citations while in prison, but had also entered into a religious studies program.
The attorney went on about the progress Francis Bernard had made in the last several years with his faith and finding a higher power.
Next up were Francis’s elderly parents, who sobbed at the “loss”
of their son and not being able to spend meaningful time with him for three decades.
Yes, he had done a terrible thing, they admitted, but he was a different man now than he was then.
He has paid his dues, his mother argued, and deserved to be with his family.
Through it all, Ethan sat stoically and waited his turn.
When the parole board asked if Chief Dackery wanted to speak, he deferred to Ethan.
“No, ma’am,”
Dackery said.
“I believe Hank’s son speaks for all of us.”
“Mr. Hall?”
Ethan nodded and stood.
“Thank you.
My name is Ethan Hall.
Henry Hall was my father.
Francis Bernard killed him when I was thirteen years old.
Francis Bernard not only took my father from me, he also took him from my then ten-year-old sister.
When Francis Bernard killed my father, he took my mother’s husband.
He took my grandparents’ child.
He took my aunt’s brother.
So as I stand in this courtroom this morning, I find it amusing that Francis Bernard’s attorney boasts about what a stellar inmate he’s been for the last thirty years, and all the things he’s accomplished during his incarceration—including, we learned this morning, that he’s found Jesus.
But I think it’s worth noting that in those thirty years my father, too, could have done great things.
He could have continued his life’s passion as a detective and helped many more families during his career.
He could have raised his two children.
He could have walked his daughter down the aisle at her wedding.
He could have witnessed the birth of his grandson.
He could have cared for his wife when she fell ill with cancer.
He could have been there to bury his parents when they passed.
So in the thirty years that Mr.
Bernard has supposedly been working to become a better person, those are the same thirty years he took from my father who never had the chance to become more than he was the day he knocked on Francis Bernard’s front door.”
Ethan paused.
The courtroom was eerily silent.
“And, this morning, I think it’s important for the parole board to understand why my father knocked on Francis Bernard’s door that day.
My father, as a detective with the Milwaukee Police Department, went to Mr.
Bernard’s home to question him about a series of murders that had taken place in the Milwaukee area that summer.
My father was the lead detective in the Lake Michigan Massacres, as they were called back then. You see,”
Ethan said, looking at the members of the parole board, “someone was killing women and dumping their bodies on the shores of Lake Michigan during the summer of 1993.
Slicing their throats and tattooing black hearts on their chests.”
“Ms. Jackson,”
Francis’s attorney said as he stood.
“I regret the interruption, but it’s crucial to note that my client was charged and convicted of a single crime, which he has admitted to and has professed his deep regret about.
Francis Bernard was never, and I repeat, never charged or linked to the crimes Mr.
Hall just mentioned.”
“Francis Bernard was never charged, but he was a suspect in those murders,”
Ethan said.
“And that’s why my father went to Mr.
Bernard’s home that day.
To question him about the Lake Michigan murders.
It’s important to note, in the context of potentially granting this man his freedom, that he was a suspect in the deaths of eight women that summer.
And when my father arrived at his home to question him about those murders, Mr. Bernard shot him in the face. And what did Francis do after he shot a Milwaukee PD detective? Did he flee? No. Did he call an ambulance? No. He walked back into his home and burned it to the ground. He started a fire in his basement that ravaged the entire area. The fire department was called only when the flames and smoke grew heavy enough for neighbors to notice. When they arrived, they found my father dead in the front foyer and everything in the basement destroyed. So as the board considers Mr. Bernard’s pleas for release, I ask you this: Why do you think he killed my father? And why do you think the first thing he did afterward was set his basement on fire?”
More ghostly silence as Ethan paused again.
“Francis did those things to hide evidence that would identify him as the Lake Michigan Killer.”
“Again,”
Francis’s attorney said, still standing.
“I urge the board to disregard Mr.
Hall’s conjecture that my client was in any way associated with any crimes other than the one he was convicted of.”
“Yeah,”
Ethan said.
“I urge you to do the same thing.
Disregard my conjecture, by all means.
But I also urge you to ask Francis Bernard, not if he is remorseful about killing my father, but why he killed my father.
Please ask him why he killed a detective who entered his home for the sole purpose of asking him about eight women who had been murdered that summer.
And then ask him why he burned his home to the ground moments later. And then, if he can figure out answers to those questions, please ask him one more.”
A final pause brought back the deafening silence as Ethan turned his gaze from the parole board members to Francis Bernard.
“Ask him why, after he was arrested for killing my father, dead women stopped showing up on the shores of Lake Michigan.”
Ethan sat down and folded his hands again on his lap.
The hearing lasted another thirty minutes and ended with the board unanimously denying Francis Bernard’s request for parole.