The Michigan Supreme Court agreed Wednesday, Sept. 9, to hear part of Wayne County prosecutors' appeal in the 2023 killing of prominent Detroit Jewish leader Samantha Woll.
The court will take up whether Michael Jackson-Bolanos can be retried on a first-degree home invasion charge.
What remains untouched is the dismissal of a felony murder count against him. That charge remains dead.
It's the latest development in a case that became one of the region's most closely-watched trials — to this day, people remain split on whether Jackson-Bolanos was the killer.
Woll, who led the Isaac Agree Downtown Detroit Synagogue — now renamed in her honor — was found stabbed to death outside her Lafayette Park home in October 2023. Jackson-Bolanos was arrested that
December and went to trial in the summer of 2024.
After a five-week trial and five days of deliberation, the jury split three ways. It acquitted him of first-degree premeditated murder and of the lesser option of second-degree murder. It convicted him of lying to police. And it deadlocked on two counts — first-degree felony murder and first-degree home invasion — reaching no verdict at all.
Wayne County Circuit Judge Margaret Van Houten dismissed the deadlocked charges, citing U.S. Supreme Court precedent from Yeager v. United States in 2009. That case generally bars, via law on double jeopardy, retrying deadlocked charges that share an element with a charge on which a jury has acquitted.
So the Wayne County prosecutor's office appealed to the Michigan Supreme Court that winter.
For the felony murder charge, the prosecution acknowledged the law and conceded to the court that they lost, but prosecutors wrote in a court filing that they still believed dismissal was wrong and said they intended to make their case at the highest level, the U.S. Supreme Court. As for home invasion, the prosecution argued that if the wording of the home invasion charge is what ties it to the murder, they should be allowed to rewrite it and try the case again.
Wednesday's ruling means the court agrees to take a look at the prosecution's appeal regarding only the home invasion charge. Still, Jon Wojtala, the chief of appeals for the prosecutor's office, said they are "encouraged." A decision will come after oral arguments are heard.
Meanwhile, the prosecution is also fighting the releaseof Jackson-Bolanos from prison after he was granted parole in April 2026. He received an 18-month to 15-year sentence as a habitual offender and has served about two years and nine months since December 2023.
Andrea Sahouri covers criminal justice for the Detroit Free Press. Contact her at asahouri@freepress.com.
This article originally appeared on Detroit Free Press: Michigan Supreme Court will hear Samantha Woll case appeal for home invasion charge
