Dead Men Talking Read online

  I am enclosing information that tells you what can and cannot be sent in… actually it’s a list of don’ts. Look good at the information about photos’ ‘sexually obscene material or nudity’. Yes, I want you to send pictures but they have to get past the censors so use your head.

  I’m also enclosing you information about how you can help out financially. I live in solitary confinement, I don’t work (they won’t allow it) and I have very limited funds. If you want to help out with postage and supplies you need to follow the directions.

  You say you have two degrees, in what, from where and when?

  How involved do you want to get? Are you interested in helping if I need typing complete, computer searches, light investigation? Tell me about your computer literacy, etc. I will give you the opportunity to tell me all about yourself and I want you to be very frank about what you’re looking for! I need someone who will be committed to helping me. If I’m ever going to prove my innocence I need a person on the outside I can really trust.

  So, there you have it. The beginning, where we go from here is up to you! You know all about me, I need to learn everything about you…. I mean everything!!!

  ‘What kind of animals do you have? How long a sub in the lifestyle? Are you willing to take this to whatever level?’

  There may come a time when I need to ask a favor, are you willing to help?

  ‘Thanks for the letter and the picture. I hope it’s just the first….. Oh, last rule – if we’re going to do that you have to commit to write at least once a week!

  JR

  P.S If you have experience is setting up websites or blogs, let me know!

  From here on, Robinson didn’t waste any time in returning to his controlling ways. He said that he was in a ‘foul’ mood because someone was ‘attempting to sell an envelope’ supposedly written by him on the internet for $40. ‘I hate that kind of crap, and that’s why I’m careful about writing to people,’ he whinged. ‘They use me and I hate it!! Your first assignment is to go online and see if you can find out who it is for me.’

  Despite being told by Annabel that she wasn’t interested in his case, JR then wrote that his, ‘conviction was more than a miscarriage’.

  I was framed, and that is what I have to prove. My appeal, when filed, will result in a new trial. But, when that happens I have to have everything necessary to prove my innocence. Your degree might come in handy if you are to work with me…help me investigate what needs to be done, etc. In time I will reveal what has to be done…I do have attorneys provided by the state for my appeal. One is a young woman who I trust. She tells me I will get some relief either a new trial or convictions reversed. If not, there are more appeals and whatever the case it will require heavy investigative efforts. This is not a game!!! We believe we know who set me up, why it was done and how. Now we have to prove it.

  Ever the authority on BDSM – although he categorically denied it to me – JR goes on to say, ‘Submission has to be a total commitment without reservation.’ Then, completely contradicting himself, he adds, ‘Obedience is voluntary and must be given, accepting the Dom as her master, following his instructions. Tell me about any fantasies you have, how, why, what. I also need to know what you think I can offer you.’

  Returning to funding and empire building. JR, he asks:

  Check out how difficult it is to set up a web site. I’ve had an idea… for a long time now to set up a non-profit organization specifically to help death row inmates with $s for investigators, lawyers, etc. Yes, there are a lot of anti-death groups out there, but none actually help the inmates. They protect, hold vigils and raise fund to pay big salaries. Hell, with your smarts we might just do…Of course you would probably have to move here [to Kansas from California] when it really got going. So, the web site would have to be really professional, able to accept donations, tax free, etc. I’ve been working up the idea for awhile. Interested?

  Then, in the same paragraph, he hit’s overdrive, changing direction in a heartbeat, with: ‘I like my submissive shaved and able to complete simple tasks…like masturbation. I want her to be able to begin, get just to the point of release and stop. Wait a moment, begin just until she is ready and stop again, repeating this four times, it takes practice, then on the fifth time feeling the massive release…Do it. Write about it. How did it make you feel?’

  Reading down through JR’s correspondence to Annabel, one gets the idea that he is about to break into song and dance. ‘You say you like poetry. Do you write it? What kind?’ he asks. ‘Send me something you have written. I too like poetry and would like to do a book of it but not identify the author of a book of poetry and short stories from an anonymous death row inmate. Hell, with self-publishing it should be easy! Just need someone to type up my poems, locate pictures on the internet to go with them and go. You must type it out for me.’

  Changing tack again, he boasts: ‘I just finished a two-year project and wrote a disertation [sic] on the history of the death penalty in Kansas. From territorial days to today. A reference librarian at the Kansas Historical Society got me the research information. It’s pretty good…needs to be typed also, so you can do it as well! Can’t send it out, no money!’

  And, almost immediately, and without drawing breath, he suggests: ‘One letter a week, photos that will please me. Now, in your next letter at the end of it under your name, I want you to put something make-up color on your erect left nipple and make a print of it. A nice, small, round print, and you’ll enjoy it.’

  As far as I can ascertain, John’s only hobby, other than fleecing and murdering people, was fishing in the pond on his rented La Cygne property, however, it seems that he does have a passing interest in golf, as he suggests: ‘Also next time you’re out shopping, pick up a package of golf balls. 3 balls in a package, and locate some very small tiny rubber bands. Insert them into your vagina when you next go dancing. You will find that I am demanding but reasonable. I want you to be all you can be and still commit. You’ll understand more about that later.’

  No doubt there are some golfers who will have something to say about that!

  With him being a self-professed pioneer in hydroponics, we should not be surprised that John then moved on to horticulture, not that he’ll be doing any of it for some time to come: ‘I am into gardening and growing things,’ he claims, then instantly changing the subject:

  As we progress I will of course ask you to help with things. Looking up people on the internet, locating them, perhaps even doing some investigative work, Nothing dangerous, but it will be important…I don’t have much support. In fact, sometimes I think I can count the number of people in the world who think I’m innocent on my penis!!! I need some help to keep going. I want you to figure out if you can afford something each month…I am seeking at least $400,000. You tell me! Can’t promise a return, but if together we can prove my innocence it will be one hell of a story.

  Dream on, John! But hard on the heels of that letter came one where he explained, most astutely in fact, that he was, ‘not the most popular person in the world’, and that he lives in a 6x10ft concrete cell 24-hours a day. ‘This is called “segregation,”’ he informed Annabel, ‘a kind word for solitary confinement.’

  Always the most charitable of guys, John says that he draws sarcastic cartoons about politics, his case and prison. ‘My attorney keeps the originals but I have sent some signed copies to certain individuals. One [copy] was sold with my permission by a local battered women’s shelter for $750. When I found out that a guard’s ex-wife bought it I had a great laugh. I do hate it when people write to me and con me and then sell envelopes, etc, for personal gain.’

  When I asked the Kansas Department of Corrections to confirm whether Mr Robinson was, indeed, such a popular and accomplished cartoonist, a spokesperson eventually replied:

  ‘It is a policy of the KDOC not to comment on an inmate’s specific custodial details, so I am afraid I cannot answer your question. I can tell you that this inmate doe
s not attend any art-related activity because of his security status combined with his inability to draw a straight line.’

  So, ever the pushy bullshitter, JR finishes off another letter, with:

  I AM expecting one letter a week from you. I want to know everything about you and your body measurements. How it reacts to my directions to what turns you on, how intense your reactions and release. What kind of experiences have you had, your most memorable that left you completely quaking and exhausted. Do you enjoy prolonged play, multiple responses…explain your oral technique…do you enjoy doing it and why? How complete do you envision your submission to be? Where did you grow up. What kind of brothers, sisters…what was your first experience with sex? Were you abused? Do you really understand what total commitment means and are you ready? Now that I guess that you’re a bit moist you may have some work to do! You might look for some padded tapestry hangers…PS: Perhaps the ‘imprints’ [nipple] should be in something light…now do the right one…Lemon juice?

  So, John Robinson, you have become unstuck. The padded tapestry hangers, what the hell is all that about, you old rascal? Perhaps we will never know. As John Steinbeck wrote: ‘There are some of us who live in rooms of experience that we can never enter or understand,’ and I suggest that the room inside John E Robinson’s head is one of them!

  CHAPTER 2

  MELANIE LYN MCGUIR

  THE ICE QUEEN

  How do you do that? A beautiful young mother of two adorable kids shoots her husband, chops him into three large pieces, stuffs the remains into suitcases, then slings them into the Chesapeake Bay. And these are the actions of a highly educated and attractive lady.

  ‘Motive’ is always the buzz word in domestic crimes such as this. Double-indemnity insurance pay-out, jealousy, greed salted with a bucket-full of avarice, even. But try as I could, one will never find the motive in Mel McGuire.

  The jury had her ‘bang-to-rights’. She was ‘the Scarlet Woman’ and ‘the Ice Queen’ all rolled into one, who ‘iced’ her husband, after shooting him. But where did she commit the crime…where did she power-saw his body up? Not a speck of flesh, not a drop of blood was ever found, and no one has ever figured out how this petite little nurse managed to haul her grim baggage to a high bridge across a busy highway and heave the load into the swirling waters beneath.

  This is what fascinated me, and I set out to try and find out, ‘How did she do that?’ I am still as puzzled as I was from the outset, and I leave it to the reader to figure out.

  Where does discontent start? You are warm enough, but you shiver. You are fed, yet hunger knaws you. You have been loved, but your yearning wanders into new fields. And to prod all these there’s time, the Bastard Time.

  John Steinbeck.

  As a brown-eyed, brown-haired nurse, she was known for her kind and generous nature. As a wife and mother she seemed to have a perfect life. In fact she and her husband had just realised their perfect dream – buying their own home. But behind that perfect picture were secrets and soon they would surface, revealing a murder, chilling in its calculation and its cruelty:

  1 count of murder – life

  1 count of disturbing/desecrating human remains – ten years

  1 count of perjury: false statement – five years

  1 count possession of firearm for unlawful purposes – life

  Millions of years ago a melting ice age carved itself into the memory of Virginia. Early Americans called the area Chesapeake, or ‘Great Water’. Even today the vast area is still a haven for wild life, and where, on occasions, the broken come to rest.

  It all started in the spring of 2004, the season in the Chesapeakes for trophy fishing for bluefish, perch and striped bass. Chris Hankle and Don Conner thought they might get lucky with a catch or two in the bay that early May, then they spotted a black fabric suitcase, bobbing in the water near the bridge tunnel of a road bridge.

  ‘It was right there, so I’m thinking immediately that it probably had blown off somebody’s luggage rack of a car coming down the road,’ said Conner, ‘or, something like that.’

  The men and the very excited 12-year-old son of Conner’s pulled the suitcase onto the boat, thinking it was a real life treasure chest, and quickly opened it to find crumpled black, plastic garbage bags and a pair of decomposing legs severed at the knees. The lad recoiled in horror. His father comforted him and the police were called.

  A week later, another gruesome find turned up in the bay. Virginia Beach crime scene supervisor Beth Dutton was already processing the first suitcase when police hauled in the second case. It contained a 5lb weight, black trash bags and more human remains – this time a man’s head and torso.

  Gunshot wounds told the cause of death, but when and where the man had been killed was still a mystery. ‘He had some hair slippage, some decomposition – much greater than the legs,’ reported Beth Dutton.

  The third and final suitcase surfaced on 16 May, this time holding the man’s hips and thighs, but who was the man? Virginia Beach PD launched an intensive investigation to identify the victim.

  Events led to the corpse being 34-year-old William T. McGuire, a computer programmer at the New Jersey Institute of Technology, in Newark. The killer, his younger wife, a fertility nurse and a real-life femme fatale.

  Melanie McGuire’s own fate was settled in 2007 after more than thirteen hours of deliberation by the nine-woman, three-man jury. They had listened wide-eyed to 76 witnesses and had patiently reviewed over 1,200 exhibits during the course of the seven-week trial. When the verdict was announced, by Superior Court Judge Frederick De Vesa, Melanie burst into tears – she would stay in prison for the rest of her life.

  Followers of this, one of the most notorious trials in New Jersey’s history, referred to the 5ft 3in, 121lb woman as an ‘Ice Queen’, because she was so cold and emotionless through the entire proceedings. Perhaps if she had expressed her feelings to the jury, even though she refused to testify, they may have been more likely to acquit.

  During deliberation the jury asked to view footage from a parking lot surveillance camera that formed part of the evidence. The jury also requested to view emails that were sent between Melanie McGuire and her friend from nursing school, James Finn. There were also wire-tapped conversations between these two submitted into evidence. It was sordid stuff, indeed!

  Perhaps the saddest part of this tragic story is, that by murdering her husband the couple’s two sons are left without any parents to raise them.

  This is a defendant who puts on a face and shows the people before her whatever it is she wants to show. I don’t know who the real Melanie McGuire is.

  Assistant State’s Attorney Patricia Prezioso at Melanie McGuire’s trial.

  With a younger brother, Christopher, Melanie was born a Libra, Sunday, 8 October 1972, at Ridgewood, New Jersey, to Robert and Linda Slate. Her parents divorced when she was just five years old. Today, she is serving a natural life sentence at the Edna Mahan Correctional Facility, Hunterdon County, Clinton, New Jersey (the Garden State) for murdering her husband William ‘Bill’ McGuire.

  Bill McGuire was last seen alive on Thursday, 29 April 2004, the day the couple had closed the sale on a $500,000 up market house in Ashbury, Warren County, New Jersey.

  Shortly after Bill disappeared, over a period of days three black suitcases bobbed up in Chesapeake Bay. They contained his dismembered remains which were wrapped in black plastic garbage bags.

  In a case, built entirely on circumstantial evidence, prosecutors theorised that Melanie McGuire served her husband a celebratory glass of wine spiked with a sedative then shot him to death. Investigators found the murder weapon, and in a phone conversation with a friend she claimed that she had purchased the gun just two days before her husband disappeared.

  Police claimed that Melanie cut Bill up into four pieces in the shower using a saw, though investigators were unable – using all the forensic techniques available to modern law enforcement – to link the man�
��s death to his home, or his wife to his remains.

  Lawyers for Melanie McGuire would later aggressively contest these allegations, arguing that their client had no motive to kill her husband, whom they claimed was, like Melanie, also involved in an extramarital relationship.

  Melanie told police that the last she saw of her husband was on the morning of 29 April after an argument over their new home. She said he drove off in his car and was never seen again. Indeed, at her subsequent trial, it was suggested that his death may have been related to gambling debts; a letter, from an unknown but alleged mobster from a major organised crime family in New Jersey, surfaced. The writer claimed that Bill McGuire owed a $90,000 debt to a Mafia family and this is why he was fed to the fishes, in true Cosa Nostra style.

  * * *

  Beauty is only skin deep, and Melanie McGuire is undeniably pretty when the camera catches her right: with her lustrous dark hair, pixie-like profile, almost vulnerable features, she is certainly not unattractive. However, in her prison mug-shot she appears all washed out. When one views her all made-up she is confident and self-assured, a real femme fatale; when otherwise, a self-serving and manipulative woman playing upon the heartbreak that has been ‘forced’ upon her.

  When I put it to her that she must have lots of people writing to her, and that she was a femme fatale, she responded: ‘Lots of guys write me, but, femme fatale, REALLY?’

  That singular statement from Melanie McGuire says everything about the woman who has been convicted of murdering her husband, who was claimed by the defence to be a hard-drinking, womanising, gambling, wife-beating man who threatened to take his wife’s doting children away from her – or so she claims.