A Palm Beach County judge denied a defense request Wednesday to release a Michelin-star chef charged with attempted murder in a brutal assault on a woman in June.
Jacob Bickelhaupt, 42, co-founder of Konro in West Palm Beach, has remained in jail since his June 2 arrest. He is accused of beating the woman for over two hours, leaving her hospitalized in critical condition with bleeding in her brain. Prosecutors have charged him with attempted second-degree murder and false imprisonment, marking the second domestic violence case involving Bickelhaupt since he was convicted of assaulting his ex-wife and business partner in 2017.
The current victim, also a business partner who worked with Bickelhaupt at Konro, is missing part of her skull and has continued to require hospitalizations and risky brain surgeries, according to her social media posts. Konro has since shut down, and Michelin revoked its star due to the closure.
Palm Beach County Judge Cymonie Rowe originally revoked Bickelhaupt’s bond after prosecutors said he violated his pretrial release conditions by leaving the victim voicemails from jail two days after the attack asking her for help paying the $90,000 bond and to drop the no-contact order preventing him from interacting with her. He was charged with two additional counts of witness tampering, later reduced to two counts of violating the no-contact order.
“This is Jacob, if you haven’t given up on me please call the public defender,” Bickelhaupt said in one message, according to a probable cause affidavit, followed by the phone number of the public defender. “I love you so much, I don’t know what to say, I don’t have much time. Again, call the public defender and tell them you don’t want a order of no contact … I have nowhere to stay, nowhere to sleep. I need your help.”
In September, Bickelhaupt’s newly acquired private attorneys, Andrew Newman and Marc Shiner, filed a motion seeking bond. They argued that their client had called Konro’s landline number, not the victim herself, and that the number is shared with a third person who also works at the restaurant.
Newman said Wednesday that imprisoning Bickelhaupt indefinitely was too harsh a consequence for the level of contact, pointing out that he was not stalking or threatening the victim like in other domestic violence cases. He asked for Bickelhaupt to be released with an ankle monitor.
“This is the most thinnest, slender, in my opinion, basis to say there was indirect contact,” Newman said.
Bickelhaupt’s father and his father’s girlfriend also testified on his behalf, saying he was not a violent person and that he needed to be released so he could help take care of his father, who has multiple medical issues, in Wisconsin.
“He’s been a great son,” Jerry Bickelhaupt, the father, said. “He worked hard all of his life. I never ran into problems with him. He’s just a beautiful son.”
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Assistant State Attorney Victoria Thacker argued that nothing in Bickelhaupt’s circumstances had changed since his bond was initially revoked and that he had clearly intended to speak to the victim when he called the restaurant. It is “convenient” that he now wants to take care of his father when he had not done so before, she added.
Judge Rowe sided with the prosecution.
“The Court empathizes with Mr. Bickelhaupt Senior’s medical condition,” she said. “However, the Court finds there’s no change in circumstances to revisit the bond that was revoked.”
Jacob Bickelhaupt had previously been awarded two Michelin stars for his restaurant 42 Grams in Chicago, but moved to South Florida in 2022 after widespread backlash over his assault on his wife and business partner at the time. He later released a self-financed documentary called “86ed” about the experience of getting “canceled” and “his search for redemption,” according to a description of the film.
