A former plastic surgeon who defended himself at trial was found guilty of murdering a lawyer. Now he faces the death penalty

Tomasz Kosowski sat each day alone at the defense table, wearing orange jail garb and rubber sandals with socks.

In a rare and largely unprecedented move for a death penalty case, Kosowski represented himself, waiving his right to a jury trial and allowing a judge in Pinellas County, Florida, to decide his fate.

Prosecutors presented the state’s case over six days, laying out for the judge how the former plastic surgeon accosted Steven Cozzi in the bathroom of his law office on a Tuesday morning, and Cozzi was never seen again.

Kosowski, 47, did not present a case in his own defense, but spoke directly to the judge in his closing argument to suggest prosecutors did not prove the statutory elements of first-degree murder. In a soft voice, leaning into the microphone, Kosowski spoke for about 20 minutes.

He pointed to the lack of a body or death certificate ruling Cozzi deceased. He mocked the prosecution’s theory of the murder and disposal of Cozzi’s body, speaking in the first person.

“ Now, I committed this murder in a common area, in the bathroom, in the middle of a busy office complex,” Kosowski said. “No one heard a thing. No one saw anything, despite there being people literally 10 to 20 feet within that bathroom. I proceed to clean that bathroom. I load Steven Cozzi’s body onto a cart. I roll it out, and I load the cart with Steven Cozzi’s body in it, with superhuman strength, onto that truck, and then I drive off.”

“Not only is it impossible physically to do what the state asserts is required of anybody, let alone me, it makes no sense in time,” Kosowski told the judge.

After Kosowski’s closing argument, Judge Joseph Bulone noted that typically “the jurors go back and deliberate … and they reach a verdict and they check the appropriate box, and we’re done.”

But in this case, it’s up to him.

“I don’t anticipate me disagreeing with myself that much,” Bulone said. “So, we’ll take a 15-minute break, and I’ll be back.”

Bulone as the lone fact finder considered surveillance video, DNA findings, and evidence of Kosowski’s growing fixation with Cozzi to swiftly determine the defendant’s guilt. The case now moves on to the penalty phase. The judge will rule whether Kosowski gets life in prison or is put to death.

Self-representation in capital cases is very rare and never advisable because it typically doesn’t end in a favorable outcome for the defendant, Death Penalty Information Center executive director Robin Maher told CNN.

“Most examples of pro se representation in capital cases have ended with convictions and death sentences,” Maher said.

This is not the first time Kosowski, who holds several advanced degrees including a medical degree from Dartmouth College, opted to litigate on his own behalf. In 2019, he sued former colleagues over a billing dispute, and in 2022 Kosowski started representing himself, putting him in direct dealings with the doctors’ attorneys – including Cozzi.

Kosowski expressed animus for Cozzi as the civil proceedings stretched over years and plotted his murder for months before Cozzi disappeared in March 2023, prosecutors say.

On March 21, 2023, Cozzi went to the restroom down the hall from his office, leaving an email draft open and music playing from his phone.

Cozzi never returned to his desk, and his colleagues reported him missing hours later.

Prosecutors allege Kosowski waited there for the lawyer and killed him in in the bathroom before dragging Cozzi’s body out of the building in a cart.

Surveillance footage shows a man enter the building and hours later – wearing different clothes – drag a cart toward the parking lot.

Kosowski joined a 10:30 a.m. virtual hearing for their mutual case from the law firm parking lot, minutes after getting Cozzi’s body out of the building, according to prosecutors.

The doctor moved for sanctions against Cozzi, seeking to remove the lawyer from the case, but Cozzi wasn’t on the call, prompting other firm members to look for him.

A Supreme Court skeptical of death row appeals has recently sided with three inmates

Cozzi’s colleague eventually checked the office bathroom, which overwhelmingly smelled of cleaning products and alcohol. There was blood on the walls, the toilet seat, and the floor, Jake Blanchard, a friend and mentor, testified.

After a stop at his waterfront home, Kosowski took Cozzi’s body to a dumpster on a remote road nearly four hours away, prosecutors allege, and continued to Miami where he performed scheduled surgeries the next day.

The dumpster was emptied at a landfill two days later. Investigators were too late to recover any evidence of Cozzi. Cozzi’s remains nor any other evidence were ever recovered, but the garbage truck driver who emptied the dumpster that day testified he still recalls the “vile” smell he couldn’t shake after stopping at the dumpster.

Kosowski was arrested four days after the killing with nearly $300,000 in cash, two passports and a “murder bag” in his trunk, Assistant State Attorney Alexandra Spadaro said in opening statements.

The duffel bag had masks, brass knuckles, a taser, crowbar, and a syringe with succinylcholine, Spadaro said. The paralytic can be lethal at the right dose, but at a lower dose affects a person’s ability to resist – weakening the body so they can’t fight back but still feel everything that happens to them, trial evidence showed.

Video of the arrest shown in court captured the doctor in the back of a squad car sucking meticulously on each of his fingers after he wriggled his cuffed wrists from behind his body underneath his feet into his lap . He also had several bruises and scrapes all over his body, photos shown in court revealed.

Cozzi’s blood was found in the bed of Kosowski’s pickup truck and on a ballistic vest in the trunk of Kosowski’s second car, DNA results submitted at trial confirmed.

Cozzi’s husband and colleagues testified about his loving demeanor and upstanding professional ethics. Kosowski was the only person known to have a problem with Cozzi, they all told law enforcement at the time, quickly making the surgeon a person of interest in Cozzi’s disappearance.

Kosowski allegedly confronted Cozzi in the law office bathroom months earlier, on a break during a tense deposition for the civil case.

“He just called me a scumbag like the clients I represent,” Cozzi wrote in an email to his colleague immediately after the January incident.

Cozzi’s husband testified he was afraid of Kosowski after hearing about the aggressive confrontation. He got Cozzi pepper spray and fixed their home security camera.

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Death Penalty Fast Facts

“Practicing law is adversarial, but this did not feel the same as other cases that he was working. It felt like it had gone outside of that normal scope so… I started becoming afraid,” Michael Montgomery testified.

Trial evidence suggests Kosowski had already been planning the murder before that incident.

Cozzi became an “obsession” for Kosowski, Assistant State Attorney Nathan Vonderheide said during closing arguments.

Kosowski was researching Cozzi online and drove to his personal home in January, the evidence showed.

Before Cozzi disappeared, Kosowski also surveilled the law firm’s office several times, trial evidence suggests.

One employee called the police after finding a man believed to be Kosowski in an electrical closet wearing a surgical mask and hat.

The man claimed he was addressing a building power outage and apologized for startling her, the woman testified at trial. Kosowski’s fingerprint was later recovered from the utility closet, according to trial evidence.

Kosowski occasionally questioned trial witnesses on cross examination during the bench trial and complained about poor access to the state’s evidence in jail, but he declined to give an opening statement.

At one point, the surgeon asked a prosecutor to climb into a trash bag to demonstrate whether it could fit an adult-sized body. Kosowski similarly asked a medical examiner during their testimony to climb into a cart – like the one thought to have carried Cozzi’s body – for a prosecutor to drag across the courtroom and attempt to lift.

The judge quashed those requests, though Kosowski said it would show it’s not possible for an average person to do that alone.

After issuing the verdict, Bulone asked Kosowski again if he wished to continue without attorneys in the penalty phase of the trial. Kosowski turned down a lawyer and said he declines to present any mitigating evidence to encourage the judge not to order him to death.

In August, after moving to represent himself, Kosowski withdrew his former attorneys’ motions fighting the death penalty. He refused to comply with a psychological evaluation or allow his former counsel to compile mitigating materials typically used in the penalty phase of a death penalty trial.

A special prosecutor, mandated by the court, will present some mitigation on Kosowski’s behalf at an October hearing before the judge issues a sentence. The court-appointed attorney said he will pursue possible witnesses like the surgeon’s mother, who might testify to save Kosowski’s life.

Kosowski, however, has repeatedly said he won’t give any statement on his own.

托马斯·科索夫斯基每天都独自坐在辩护席上，身穿橙色囚服，脚穿橡胶凉鞋，脚上穿着袜子。

在死刑案件中，科索夫斯基采取了一种罕见且史无前例的做法，他选择自行辩护，放弃了陪审团审判的权利，让佛罗里达州皮内拉斯县的一名法官来决定他的命运。

检察官用了六天时间陈述了州政府的案情，向法官详细说明了这位前整形外科医生如何在周二早上在其律师事务所的洗手间里袭击了史蒂文·科齐，而科齐从此再也没有出现过。

47岁的科索夫斯基没有为自己辩护，而是在结案陈词中直接向法官表示，检方未能证明一级谋杀罪的法定构成要件。科索夫斯基声音轻柔，身体前倾，对着麦克风说了大约20分钟。

他指出，没有找到尸体，也没有死亡证明可以证明科齐已经死亡。他以第一人称嘲讽了检方关于科齐被谋杀和尸体被处理的说法。

“我是在一个繁忙的办公楼的公共区域，也就是洗手间里犯下这起谋杀案的，”科索夫斯基说道。“当时洗手间里人来人往，离我只有10到20英尺远，但没有人听到任何动静，也没有人看到任何东西。我随后清理了洗手间，把史蒂文·科齐的尸体放到一辆手推车上。我用超人的力量把装有史蒂文·科齐尸体的手推车推到卡车上，然后开车离开了。”

科索夫斯基告诉法官：“州政府声称任何人，更不用说我，都不可能做到他们所要求的，而且从时间上看，这也没有意义。”

在科索夫斯基的结案陈词之后，法官约瑟夫·布洛内指出，通常情况下，“陪审员们会回去商议……然后达成裁决，并在相应的方框中打勾，事情就结束了。”

但这件事，就看他自己的选择了。

“我预计我不会对自己的观点产生太多分歧，”布洛内说。“所以，我们休息15分钟，我马上回来。”

作为唯一的案件事实认定者，布洛内法官审阅了监控录像、DNA检测结果以及科索夫斯基对科齐日益增长的迷恋等证据，迅速认定被告有罪。案件现在进入量刑阶段。法官将裁定科索夫斯基是被判处终身监禁还是死刑。

死刑信息中心执行主任罗宾·马赫告诉 CNN，在死刑案件中，被告人自行辩护的情况非常罕见，而且从来都不建议这样做，因为这通常不会给被告人带来有利的结果。

“大多数死刑案件中当事人自行辩护的案例最终都以定罪和死刑判决告终，”马赫说。

这并非科索夫斯基第一次选择自行诉讼。他拥有包括达特茅斯学院医学学位在内的多个高级学位。2019年，他曾因账单纠纷起诉前同事；2022年，科索夫斯基开始自行代理诉讼，直接与包括科齐在内的医生律师交涉。

检察官称，在长达数年的民事诉讼过程中，科索夫斯基对科齐怀有敌意，并在科齐于 2023 年 3 月失踪前的几个月里策划谋杀了他。

2023 年 3 月 21 日，科齐去办公室走廊尽头的洗手间，离开时，他的手机上还开着一封电子邮件草稿，播放着音乐。

科齐再也没有回到办公桌前，几个小时后，他的同事们报告他失踪了。

检方指控科索夫斯基在那里等候律师，并在浴室里将其杀害，然后用手推车将科齐的尸体拖出大楼。

监控录像显示，一名男子进入大楼，几个小时后，他换了身衣服，拖着一辆手推车走向停车场。

据检察官称，科索夫斯基在将科齐的尸体从大楼里抬出来几分钟后，便在律师事务所的停车场参加了上午 10:30 举行的关于他们共同案件的线上听证会。

医生提出对科齐进行制裁，试图将这位律师从案件中除名，但科齐没有参加电话会议，这促使事务所的其他成员开始寻找他。

最高法院一向对死刑上诉持怀疑态度，但最近却支持了三名死刑犯的上诉。

科齐的同事最终检查了办公室的洗手间，那里弥漫着浓烈的清洁剂和酒精气味。科齐的朋友兼导师杰克·布兰查德作证说，墙上、马桶座圈上和地板上都有血迹。

检察官称，科索夫斯基在海滨住宅稍作停留后，将科齐的尸体运到近四个小时车程外的一条偏僻道路上的垃圾箱，然后继续前往迈阿密，并在那里于第二天进行了预定的手术。

两天后，垃圾箱被运到垃圾填埋场清空。调查人员来晚了，没能找到任何关于科齐的证据。科齐的遗骸和其他任何证据都未能找到，但当天清空垃圾箱的垃圾车司机作证说，他至今仍记得在垃圾箱旁停车后，那股挥之不去的“恶臭”。

助理州检察官亚历山德拉·斯帕达罗在开庭陈述中表示，科索夫斯基在谋杀案发生四天后被捕，警方在他的后备箱里发现了近 30 万美元现金、两本护照和一个“凶器袋”。

斯帕达罗说，行李袋里装着面罩、指节铜套、电击枪、撬棍和装有琥珀酰胆碱的注射器。庭审证据显示，这种麻痹剂剂量合适时可致命，但低剂量会影响人的抵抗能力——削弱身体机能，使人无法反抗，但仍能感受到发生在自己身上的一切。

法庭播放的逮捕视频显示，这名医生被押上警车后座，他费力地将戴着手铐的手腕从身后、脚下抽出，放到腿上，然后仔细地吮吸着自己的手指。法庭播放的照片还显示，他身上有多处瘀伤和擦伤。

庭审中提交的 DNA 检测结果证实，在科索夫斯基的皮卡车厢里以及科索夫斯基第二辆车的后备箱里的防弹背心上发现了科齐的血迹。

科齐的丈夫和同事作证说，他为人友善，职业道德高尚。他们当时都告诉执法部门，科索夫斯基是唯一一个与科齐有过节的人，这使得这位外科医生很快成为科齐失踪案的嫌疑人。

据称，几个月前，在民事案件紧张的取证过程中，科索夫斯基在律师事务所的洗手间里与科齐发生了冲突。

“他就像我代理的客户一样，骂我是人渣，”科齐在1月份事件发生后立即在给同事的电子邮件中写道。

科齐的丈夫作证说，在听说那场激烈的冲突后，他很害怕科索夫斯基。他给科齐买了防狼喷雾，还修好了家里的监控摄像头。

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死刑速览

“律师工作是对抗性的，但这起案件给我的感觉与其他他经手的案件不同。感觉它已经超出了正常的范畴，所以……我开始感到害怕，”迈克尔·蒙哥马利作证说。

庭审证据表明，科索夫斯基在事发之前就已经计划了这起谋杀案。

助理州检察官内森·冯德海德在结案陈词中表示，科齐成了科索夫斯基的“执念”。

证据显示，科索夫斯基曾在网上搜索科齐的信息，并于一月份开车前往科齐的住所。

庭审证据表明，在科齐失踪之前，科索夫斯基也曾多次监视该律师事务所的办公室。

一名员工在配电室里发现一名戴着外科口罩和帽子的男子，据信是科索夫斯基，随后报警。

据该女子在庭审中作证，该男子声称自己当时正在处理大楼停电问题，并为吓到她而道歉。庭审证据显示，科索夫斯基的指纹后来在杂物间里被找到。

科索夫斯基在法官审判期间偶尔会对审判证人进行交叉询问，并抱怨在监狱里难以获取州政府的证据，但他拒绝发表开庭陈述。

庭审中，外科医生曾要求一名检察官钻进一个垃圾袋，以演示垃圾袋是否能装下成年人的尸体。科索夫斯基也曾类似地要求一名法医在作证时钻进一辆手推车——据信就是用来运送科齐尸体的那辆——让一名检察官拖着手推车穿过法庭，并试图将其抬起。

法官驳回了这些请求，但科索夫斯基表示，这将表明普通人不可能独自完成这件事。

宣判后，布洛内法官再次询问科索夫斯基是否希望在量刑阶段不聘请律师。科索夫斯基拒绝了律师，并表示他不会提供任何减轻罪责的证据来劝说法官不要判处他死刑。

8月，科索夫斯基决定自行辩护，并撤回了其前任律师为反对死刑而提出的动议。他拒绝接受心理评估，也不允许其前任律师收集通常在死刑审判量刑阶段使用的减刑材料。

法院指定的特别检察官将在10月份的听证会上为科索夫斯基提出一些减刑理由，之后法官将宣判。这位法院指定的律师表示，他将寻找可能的证人，例如这位外科医生的母亲，她或许能出庭作证，挽救科索夫斯基的生命。

然而，科索夫斯基多次表示，他不会主动发表任何声明。