VIERA, Fla. (Court TV) — An attorney representing a teenager accused of gunning down their mother and their mother’s boyfriend argued that the entire case should be tossed after recordings of the suspect’s interview with police were released to the media.
Jasper Egler appears in court for a motions hearing on May 8, 2026. (Court TV)
Jasper Egler, 17, is charged with two counts of first-degree premeditated murder in the deaths of their mother, Kelley McCollum, 42, and McCollum’s boyfriend, Matthew Szejnrok, 22. In filings reviewed by Court TV, investigators said that Egler called 911 to report an intruder had broken into their home, but never mentioned the bodies of the two victims in the home. While charging documents refer to Egler as a female named Julia, he revealed in an interview with detectives that his preferred name is Jasper. He cited his transition as a source of tension in the household before the murders.
Egler’s attorney filed a motion asking for the charges against his client to be dismissed after the Palm Bay Police Department released video of police interviews with his client. In those interviews, Egler told investigators the same story about an intruder breaking into the home and running to hide with his dogs in a bedroom. When the videos were released, multiple media outlets published stories on them — it’s that publicity that Egler’s defense objects to and called inappropriate. “Respectfully, Judge, it shocks the conscience that a child is put on TV and then all over the media, all over social media, all over podcasts, and the public is told of something that’s extremely private and their personal life, like whether they’re transgender or not,” Egler’s attorney, Michael Pirolo, said at Friday’s hearing.
Pirolo argued that under Florida law, the recordings should never have been released because a suspect’s confession is exempt from public disclosure. He argued the only possible remedies to the harm suffered by his client were to dismiss the case or remand it back to the juvenile system.
Assistant State Attorney Kerri Fowler maintained there had been no error in releasing the recordings because there had been no motion filed to seal any evidence in the case. “Once you’re in adult court, you’re treated as an adult,” she said.
Jasper Egler is seen in a police interview after his mother’s murder. (Palm Bay Police Department)
The recording is redacted and audio muted for a portion of the interview that contains Egler’s alleged confession. In an affidavit of probable cause in the case, detectives wrote that Egler told them that after the victims walked through the front door of the home, the defendant told them, ‘welcome home,'” before shooting his mother several times. Egler then allegedly shot Szejnrok multiple times as he begged for the violence to stop. Egler is accused of following Szejnrok to the bathroom, where he was stabbed repeatedly, before returning to reload a gun and shooting the victim in the head.
As part of his motion, Pirolo cited a number of published media reports focusing on the release of the interrogation video, including an episode of On the Case with Chris Stewart, but Judge Michelle Naberhaus said she was uncomfortable scrolling through videos on her own. “I don’t feel that it’s best practice for me to just jump on social media and start watching through whatever is posted there,” she said. “It needs to be something that’s presented to me through the courtroom.”
While Pirolo said he was prepared to show clips of the media coverage, he demurred from doing so because the media was present at the hearing. “The last thing I want is for them to be playing portions of this hearing with me playing portions of her statements to law enforcement. I really don’t want to go down that path,” Pirolo said. “I’m not going to be in the position of publicly, in this public courtroom, airing out things like that when they can be played on the 5 o’clock news. So I refuse to do that.”
Naberhaus said Pirolo could prepare a supplement to be submitted to the court within the next couple of weeks.
Naberhaus denied a separate defense motion to remand the case back to the juvenile system. Pirolo agreed to submit it by May 26.
