Man gets 30 years for murder plot

An Owatonna man will spend 30 years in prison, followed by 15 years of supervised release, for producing child pornography and threatening to carry out a graphic murder plot of one of his victims.

Michael Lee Kurkowski, 31, was originally charged with one count of threatening interstate communication.

He pleaded guilty to that count in March, on the first day of his trial in U.S. District court, as well as to one count of production of child pornography.

U.S. District Court Judge Joan N. Ericksen cited “the raw facts of danger” when handing down the sentence, which was at the top of the sentencing guidelines.

Kurkowski first came to the attention of law enforcement in March 2021, when police in Cumberland County, Penn., learned he was exchanging sexually explicit images of a minor.

Kurkowski admitted to traveling to Pennsylvania to find the boy and continuing a “relationship” after the minor tried to end the online communication.

In April 2021, he was charged in Cumberland County Court with multiple felonies and sentenced to 142 days in prison, followed by probation. Terms of Kurkowski’s probation included, among other things, registering as a sex offender, not possessing weapons and refraining from behavior that may present a danger to others.

In December of that year, authorities once again began investigating Kurkowski’s online communications and sexual exploitation of a minor, this time in Illinois.

In January 2022, members of law enforcement reviewed several messages from Kurkowski to the Illinois minor. The messages allegedly described in graphic detail a plan to travel to Pennsylvania, where Kurkowski would murder the parents of his former victim, rape his sister, then kill her in front of the former victim.

On Feb. 4, 2022, Owatonna police learned Kurkowski had bought a bus ticket and was en route to Pennsylvania. The FBI was able to track him to a bus stop in Toledo, Ohio, where he was arrested carrying a bag containing flex cuffs, handcuffs, hooded facemasks, rubber gloves, electrical tape, a taser and a knife.

Kurkowski’s phone contained google search terms including “man kills family of 5,” “countries that don’t extradite us,” “how to subdue a person,” “best knives used to kill,” and the penalties for murder in Pennsylvania.

The investigation revealed Kurkowski was also engaging in the sexual exploitation of a third minor, this one in Cedar Falls, Iowa.

The federal case was prosecuted by Assistant U.S. Attorney Melinda A Williams, and involved authorities with the FBI, the Owatonna Police Department, the Upper Allen Township (Penn.) Police Department, the East Peoria (Ill.) Police Department and the Cedar Falls (Iowa) Police Department.