A Madison police commander bristled Thursday at a news story in a weekly paper that accused the department of failing in March to catch a person who looked like the suspect in the Joel Marino murder.

The witness, in a story published in Thursday's Isthmus, alleged Madison police did not take his sighting of the suspect — who he had last seen on Jan. 28, minutes after Marino was killed — seriously enough and let him get away by not responding quickly enough.

He declined to be interviewed Thursday and told the State Journal that he fears for his family's safety if he is identified.

Lou Marino, father of Joel Marino, called the police response to the call "inexcusible."

"There should have been twelve cop cars there in a New York minute," he said.

Capt. Jim Wheeler, who leads the police department's South District, which is conducting the Marino investigation, said the criticism is another example of complaints about the case being taken to the media, rather his department.

"This is becoming nothing but a spectacle," Wheeler said. "The detectives are committed to the case, then you have people saying we're not doing our job."

Wheeler said so far police have contacted more than 800 people, developed a list of more than 80 suspects and cleared them all, at least for now.

Leads have been followed as far as Houston, Wheeler said. Police have also worked closely with the state Crime Laboratory and the FBI. More than 2,000 pages of reports have been generated, he said.

"It comes to a point of, what is the complaint?" Wheeler said. "We hear allegations, but what exactly is the complaint?

Also on Thursday, Lou and Debbie Marino met with Gary Hamblin at the state Department of Justice for about two hours and were told DOJ doesn't have legal jurisdiction to get involved in the case.

"The Madison Police Department has to ask the Justice Department for help, but the police are never going to ask," Marino said. Hamblin suggested the Marino's next step should be talking to Police Chief Noble Wray.

The witness told Isthmus he saw the suspect on Jan. 28, minutes after Marino was stabbed to death in his home. On March 21, he said, the suspect was one of two men who walked past his home as he shoveled snow. He said he was certain it was the same man.

Wheeler said the dispatcher's call notes indicated the caller saw two suspicious men, one wearing a tan jacket, related to the homicide investigation.

He said a Madison police non-emergency dispatcher received the man's call at 4:58 p.m. that day and sent two squad cars at 4:59 p.m. They arrived in the area at 5:02 p.m. Call notes indicate they did not find anyone matching the suspect's description.

Wheeler said that before he can decide whether the call was properly handled he needs to speak with the witness, with officers and the detectives, and he said he will listen to tapes of the dispatch phone call and radio transmissions.