‘Jerry Springer,’ Revelations--and Homicide

As humiliations go, it doesn’t get much worse--or more public--than this one. Say you’re still in love with your ex-husband. You want him back. He assures you that a reconciliation is in the offing. He wants the reunion so much, he says the whole world should know about it. Let’s do “Jerry Springer.”

You agree, because sometimes love makes you do strange things. Stupid things.

Of course agreeing to appear on “The Jerry Springer Show” means anything can happen. So instead of kissing and making up with your man, here’s your ex and his--surprise!--new wife telling you to stop stalking us and leave us alone, for God’s sake.

You’re 52; the new wife is 45. Your ex-husband is 40. A point the new wife is driving home again and again as she screams at you that you’re old, you’re fat, nobody wants you. And Jerry’s telling you, “He doesn’t want to be with you.” You leave in red-faced shame. As you exit the stage, the audience starts applauding. Cheering as your ex and his wife laugh and embrace.

On your birthday.

Humiliations, even televised, usually can be endured. But in this instance, Nancy Campbell-Panitz survived only a few hours after her embarrassment was broadcast Monday. (The show, “Secret Mistresses Confronted,” was taped May 7.)

Monday night, police found her body in the Sarasota, Fla., home that she, her ex-husband and his new wife were arguing over. She was killed just hours after a judge granted her a restraining order against her ex, Ralf Jurgen Panitz.

Police are calling Campbell-Panitz’s death a homicide but won’t say how she was killed. Local papers reported that she was beaten about the head. Both Ralf and his new wife, Eleanor, are wanted for questioning, police said.

In most respects, the Panitz triangle is typical fodder for talk shows ranging from “Jerry Springer” to “Ricki Lake” to “Jenny Jones.” For years these programs have trafficked in on-camera revelations of affairs, sexual peccadilloes and other emotional subjects. The shows frequently invite confrontation and catharsis, and on a few occasions outright violence.

The Panitzes are a “Springer” producer’s dream come true: According to his Web page, “Wolfie’s Home,” Ralf Panitz, a German painting contractor, first met Nancy online, while he was still living in his native country. He was “Plainwell”; she called herself “Cupcakes99.”

After a brief transcontinental courtship, Panitz moved to Michigan to marry his online honey. Shortly thereafter, they moved to Florida. In 1998 Ralf changed his screen name to “Wolfsmile2.”

But things took on the high drama of a daytime soap pretty quickly. According to court records, the two broke up and reconciled again and again. Their confrontations, according to Nancy’s testimony, were frequently violent. According to court records, Ralf took her “life savings,” threatened her, chased her with a knife, “body-slammed” her against walls and furniture, kicked her in the stomach and gave her a concussion.

Still, Nancy confessed, she loved her husband. Even after he married Eleanor, after her humiliation on “Springer,” Nancy moved back in with Ralf.

Police records show that in the past month, the three Panitzes kept the Sarasota County Sheriff’s Office hopping with frequent visits to their home, to which all three claimed legal rights. Both Nancy and Eleanor had court injunctions saying they belonged there.

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Police found Campbell-Panitz’s body after responding to a call that two women were arguing at the house.

Ralf, meanwhile, had testified Nancy was “stalking” him and his bride, “using my telephone line [to] advertise sex for strange people . . . we had to go into hiding.” The “Springer” appearance, he told the judge, was a “way that we gonna tell Nancy on public TV . . . ‘Nancy, why don’t you just leave me alone?’ ”

At the “Springer” taping, Ralf admitted that he’d had sex with his ex-wife just the night before. He slept with her, he told Springer, “to keep her illusioned,” to ensure she would appear on the show.

“I care for Nancy,” Ralf said, “but Nancy destroyed me. Nancy is keeping going destroying me. Nancy is very nice sometimes, but then she changes into Mrs. Jekyll.”

“Are you ready to leave us alone, Nancy?” Eleanor asked her.

“No,” Nancy said. “You don’t want me to. You love the game.”

Eleanor: “He doesn’t want you, Nancy. You’re old. You’re fat.”

Nancy: “That’s fine. Bye.”

The case has echoes of the March 1995 slaying of Scott Amedure, who was killed after revealing a secret crush on another man, Jonathan Schmitz, during the taping of a “Jenny Jones” show.

In a trial last year, a Michigan jury awarded $25 million to Amedure’s family after finding the producers of the Jones program, Warner Bros. and Telepictures Productions, partially negligent in the death. It was the first time a jury held a TV producer liable for the behavior of an interview guest, and sparked debate about the limits of talk-show sensationalism.

Schmitz was convicted of second-degree murder in that case, despite a plea of diminished capacity due to alcoholism, manic depression and childhood mental trauma. His conviction was overturned on a technicality, but he was convicted again in a retrial last September and is serving a term of 20 to 25 years in a Michigan prison.

Warner Bros. has appealed the civil verdict, but James Burdick, Schmitz’s attorney in the criminal trial, said this week that Amedure’s on-camera revelation was “critical” in triggering Schmitz’s behavior.

“He kept telling the producers that he didn’t want to be involved in something weird or cuckoo,” Burdick said. “The producers tried to embarrass him as much as possible. He’s in a terrible circumstance thinking [his family] is going to see all this humiliating stuff.

“The show had everything to do with [his response]. It wasn’t like a history or current-events show, where they were reviewing facts. They were doing it to tear at the fabric of his humanity, to create sensational TV for ratings. . . . It was clear ratings were all that counted.”

Last season, Springer’s ratings took a significant dip--a 40% drop that came in the wake of his pledge to clean up his act. Oprah Winfrey reigns among the talkers; Springer’s show came in second.

A Springer publicist, citing the ongoing investigation, declined comment.