The Pastor's Wife

by Diane Fanning

  Steve Farese said, “We have seen the indictment and gone over it with [Mary]. We enter a plea of not guilty at this time for her.” The defense submitted twenty-five motions to the judge. The first one was a request for bond. McCraw set a hearing on that matter for June 30.

  They filed another motion with the intent of suppressing the statements Mary gave police on the grounds that she wasn’t properly advised of her constitutional rights, and, since the statements weren’t voluntary, they were in violation of her right against self-incrimination.

  They also filed to suppress evidence from the mini-van on the grounds that it was seized illegally and in violation of Mary’s Fourth and Fourteenth Amendment rights. Additionally, the motion alleged that she was illegally arrested because there was no probable cause to detain her.

  Other motions included a plea that the court require the prosecutors to announce whether they intended to seek the death penalty, and a request that a special questionnaire be given potential jurors other than the one that the court usually gave.

  Although defense attorneys described all their motions as routine, Deputy Clerk Nancy McClain disagreed with them on the questionnaire issue. She said it was the first time she’d heard that one in the thirteen years she’d been with the McNairy County court system. Typically, potential jurors provided their home address, age and marital status. The defense wanted to add some additional questions: whether or not the potential members of the panel knew the Winklers, had heard of the case or had formed an opinion about it, along with other questions relating to the planned defense strategy that they were not willing to reveal at that time.

  They also wanted the jurors interviewed outside of the presence of other potential jurors during jury selection. They requested this individual questioning because they planned to ask those in the jury pool about “their familiarity with the crime, the victim or the probability of innocence or guilt.” They believed that the “sensitive and potentially embarrassing questions exploring the prospective jurors’ bias or prejudice” might cause some not to speak openly or honestly if they were in the presence of people they knew in the jury pool.

  The judge did not rule on any of the motions, but set an October 30 date to go to trial. After the hearing, deputies escorted Mary to her jail cell, a short walk down an adjoining hallway to the courtroom.

  Outside of the courtroom, Farese told reporters that he intended to call two or three people to testify about Mary’s character. “We’ll put on proof of whether she’s a threat or danger to herself or the community as a whole, where she will be living, what she will be doing, show a history of her non-violent background.” He complained that Mary wanted to be in contact with her children, who were in the custody of Matthew Winkler’s parents, but he could not get a response from them. “All I’ve asked for is, ‘Could you send a picture of the girls? Could you tell us how they are doing in school?’ We aren’t asking for much.”

  When asked about the police statement that Mary confessed to the murder, he said, “Just because they interpret a statement as being one thing, we don’t necessarily see it as being the same thing.”

  Ballin added, “We’ve seen a copy of the statement. Not a confession to me.” Asked about Mary and Matthew’s ten-year marriage, Ballin said, “Each of those years, each of those months, each of those days of marriage has a history to it. Things that led up to March twenty-second need to be told to this jury.”

  Chapter 27

  On Sunday, June 25, just fifteen minutes before the end of visitation, Mary noticed the arrival of a group not on her visitors’ list. For the first time in three months, she looked into the faces of her three little girls. They arrived with Dan and Diane Winkler and family friend Eddie Thompson.

  Patricia and Allie’s lower lips quivered. Mary said, “It’s okay to cry.” And they did. The most forceful sobs came from Patricia.

  Mary, shocked by the unexpected visit, and embarrassed to be seen by her children with her status as a prisoner so obvious, told them over and over how much she loved them and missed them. It was awkward, unnatural, speaking through handsets behind a barrier to the children she carried in her womb, rocked to sleep, kissed and hugged more times than she could count.

  Dan held up the littlest one to give Mary a good view of the baby. Breanna stared at her for a while, then gave her a big smile. Mary urged them to set her down on the floor and let her see Breanna walk—she missed her daughter’s first steps while in jail.

  Mary commented on Allie’s longer hair. Allie said that she was letting it grow out because she thought long hair was pretty. Patricia told her mother all about her new school. The jailers allowed the visit to run over the scheduled time by thirty minutes. Then, the bittersweet interlude was over and Mary went back to her cell.

  The counselor and grandparents had worked with Patricia and Allie for weeks to prepare them for this day. Nothing, though, could ease the sorrow in their hearts as they walked out, leaving their mother behind. They fell asleep that night on tear-dampened pillows.

  Mary’s first visit to Dr. Zager’s office was plagued with difficulties caused by the complexity of transporting a prisoner. Zager decided it was far less of a hassle for her to go to Mary in Selmer than to have the deputies bring her to Jackson. They had three additional sessions in the McNairy County Justice Center that spring, with Mary opening up more and more each time. During one session, she pulled a photograph of Matthew out of her pocket and showed it to Zager. Mary said that she always carried it with her.

  After the fifth session, on June 27, Zager reached a diagnostic conclusion. Mary, she believed, suffered from post-traumatic stress disorder. Its origin dated back to the death of Mary’s sister, Patricia, when Mary was 13.

  Since then, Mary had experienced numerous dissociative episodes where she lost track of herself and had trouble with impulse control. Mary also had dysthymic disorder, a mild form of depression. Zager believed that Mary was in a dissociative state when she shot Matthew, which explained why she had no memory of the shooting.

  With Assistant District Attorney Walter Freeland by her side, District Attorney General Elizabeth Rice strode into a crowded courtroom on June 30 toting a shotgun. It wasn’t the actual murder weapon—that was still in the lab for analysis—but it was good theater. She wanted to display a clear reminder of the crime committed by Mary Winkler. She wanted the judge to deny bail.

  Leslie Ballin argued first on Mary’s behalf. He pointed out that Mary had the opportunity to post a $25,000 bond when she was arrested on March 24 in Alabama. Since she did not bail out, but waived extradition instead, she’d shown a good faith effort to comply with the law. He surprised Matthew’s parents when he said that the state had not produced any evidence to indicate that Mary—the woman who pulled the trigger and killed their son—was the aggressor in this case.

  Ballin proposed that Mary be released on her own recognizance because of her standing in the community. He reminded the judge that Tennessee law required that suspects be released on the least possible amount of bail. He then cited reports from psychologist Lynne Zager indicating that Mary did not pose a significant risk.

  Rice argued that Mary should not be issued bond because she faced a capital murder charge with the possibility of the death penalty. She chastised the defense attorneys for grandstanding and engaging in theatrics, rather than focusing on facts. To demonstrate the state’s belief that Matthew’s murder was premeditated, she produced the autopsy report. There was no doubt that he was shot in the back when he was lying down. The pellets perforated his ribs, shattered his spine, tore through his stomach and caused numerous internal injuries to other organs and tissues. As the cold hard facts of the autopsy report echoed in the courtroom, Mary bent her head and sobbed.

  The state’s first witness in their battle to keep Mary behind bars prior to trial was Sergeant Roger Rickman, an investigator with the Selmer Police Department. As photos from the crime scene were displayed, he related his observations of th
e victim’s body, pointed out the telephone lying in the middle of the floor with its cord unplugged, and drew attention to the blood spots on the bed in the master bedroom. Rickman verified that the photos correctly demonstrated how Matthew’s body was positioned and the location where he was found. Pointing to a close-up of Matthew’s face, Rickman said that the bloody saliva coming from Matthew Winkler’s mouth was proof that he had kept breathing for a while after he was shot.

  Prosecutors called Special Agent Brent Booth of the Tennessee Bureau of Investigation to the stand. He read the written statement Mary signed the night of her arrest in Alabama, in which she admitted to holding the gun when it blasted Matthew in the back, and then fleeing from the scene without seeking help for her dying husband. Women from Fourth Street Church of Christ, hearing the details for the first time, were visibly shaken. Tissues flew from purses and passed up and down the row to dab wet eyes and runny noses.

  Rice whipped out the shotgun she’d brought into court. Booth testified that a similar shotgun was held two-and a-half to seven-and-a-half feet from Matthew’s body when it was fired.

  The questioning then moved to Mary and Matthew Winkler’s finances. Booth testified about the $17,500 worth of fraudulent checks that Mary deposited in banks in Selmer and Henderson. He alleged that the irregularities in Mary’s banking practices bore all the earmarks of check-kiting, a term used for the illegal transfers from one bank to another to disguise the absence of a shortfall in the account balances. He also noted that Mary made several withdrawals totaling $500 from two different Selmer banks on the day before Matthew’s body was found. On cross-examination, the defense so persistently badgered Booth about the possible differences between the shotgun in the courtroom and the actual murder weapon that Judge McCraw stopped the inquiry, insisting that they move on.

  The first witness called by the defense was Alicia Jones, a professional nanny in Nashville who had known Mary Winkler for seven years. Matthew was the youth minister at Bellevue Church of Christ where Alicia’s family went to church and she took care of the Winkler children for four years. Alicia visited Mary nine to ten times in the jail. Alicia said that although she had not talked to Mary about what happened with Matthew, she did not believe Mary would be a danger to herself or anyone else, and would follow the rules and come to court when ordered.

  Pam Killingsworth, the assistant principal at the local elementary school, took the stand next. She described Mary as very quiet, very patient and a good mother, who was an even-tempered person and slow to get angry. She, too, supported Mary’s request to be out on bail.

  Jimmie Smith, a retired psychiatric nurse and Fourth Street Church member, followed Pam to the stand, saying that Mary was not violent. The attorney showed her a letter written by a staff member at the jail stating that Mary was a good inmate. Jimmie said, “That sounds like the Mary I know.”

  Mary’s sister Shannon Roberts explained that her father would get the money together for bail, but he was not very wealthy. She said Mary would follow all the court’s guidelines, “Even rules that are minor and not that important.”

  Kathy Thomsen from McMinnville said that Mary could live in her home, and two employers—including a dry cleaning business—had already offered Mary Winkler a job in her town. Walt Freeland stepped up to cross-examine the witness. His prematurely white hair made him appear older than his years. He sported a gray moustache and a white beard so closely cropped it looked more like overgrown bristle. His rosy lips provided the only hint of color in his face. He asked Kathy if she knew what Mary had done. “I know she murdered her husband,” Kathy said, “but I do not think Mary would murder anyone in my house.” She admitted to having a gun in her house, but said she would remove it if ordered by the court. “I’ve been thinking about doing that already.”

  In rebuttal of the arguments presented by the defense, the prosecution called Cynthia Gibbs, the jailer who wrote the letter in support of Mary, to the stand. She testified about Mary’s drug infraction while in jail.

  In closing arguments, defense urged the judge to set bail. They argued against flight risk, pointing to Mary’s good character, her obvious lack of planning for the trip to Orange Beach and her unwillingness to jeopardize her father’s home. Additionally, he said, Mary had employment offers and a place to live in McMinnville. She would comply with telephone report schedules, in-person visits to the probation or police offices, an electronic bracelet—whatever the judge deemed necessary. He concluded by requesting that bail be set at the lowest amount possible.

  The state countered that Mary’s freedom should be denied, because this was a capital case. Mary fired a shotgun into the back of Matthew Winkler while children were in that house, and how he later died proved that the killing qualified as capital murder, Freeland contended. She disabled the phone, preventing any possibility of Matthew seeking and receiving help, then left on a beach vacation. Freeland said that she premeditated all of this when she went to the closet, got a gun and fired the shot into the back of Matthew Winkler.

  Judge McCraw stated he’d review all the exhibits and testimony presented, and make his ruling at a later date.

  Chapter 28

  On July 7, Judge Weber McCraw issued a written ruling setting bail for Mary at $750,000. He imposed several conditions on her release. He required that Mary live with Kathy Thomsen at her McMinnville residence in Warren County, with all weapons being removed from that home; that the defendant be supervised by the state probation department, complying with all their rules; and that she would not leave the county except for meetings with her lawyers or visits with her children. Upon receipt of the ruling, Steve Farese said, “I’m just surprised at the amount. For her, that’s tantamount to no bond at all.”

  On July 14, the defense filed a motion requesting that the judge reduce bond to $315,000, allowing Clark Freeman to use his home as collateral. Judge McCraw denied that request on July 31.

  On Wednesday, August 9, when the parties gathered before the bench again, the dynamics of the prosecution shifted. District Attorney General Elizabeth Rice stepped into the background, leaving Walter Freeland in the fore-front. Election Day had come and gone, Rice’s days were numbered. Michael Dunavant defeated Ed Neal McDaniel. He’d take over her position in early September.

  In a hearing that lasted four-and-a-half hours, the defense presented motions to suppress Mary’s statements because they were not voluntary as required under the Fifth Amendment, since police should never have treated her as a suspect in the first place.

  In addition, they argued that Mary’s Fourth Amendment rights had been violated as well, when law enforcement searched her home and vehicle. “We are alleging that the search and seizure of the defendant herself was without probable cause, [without] articulate facts, without good reason. She was simply the subject of an AMBER Alert,” attorney Steve Farese told the court. “If the safety of the family was the only objective of Tennessee, then Alabama overstepped its authority. Alabama had no right to arrest and seize the person of Mary Winkler. They did so illegally.” He added that there was no arrest warrant and no probable cause for one.

  Assistant District Attorney Freeland disputed the defense’s allegations. “Officers at every level acted appropriately and went beyond the bounds of what they were required to do.” He insisted that they read Mary her rights, and Mary’s statements were voluntary.

  “To say there wasn’t an arrest warrant for her at that time, really doesn’t make that much sense,” he continued. “Mr. Farese well knows you don’t have to have a warrant for a felony arrest. There just has to be a reasonable and articulable suspicion.”

  And the reason was there, he said. “Almost immediately upon the stop, not Mrs. Winkler, but one of her children, volunteers the information that ‘Mama’s got a shotgun in the van.’ If Orange Beach police officers hadn’t acted exactly as they did act, this would be the grossest case of negligence on the part of police that I can imagine.”

  Defense Attorne
y Leslie Ballin argued, “What we understand happened is that the Alabama authorities—acting on the request of the Tennessee authorities—immediately put her under arrest. That is a violation of her rights.”

  In argument, prosecutors presented testimony from Orange Beach police officers Jason Whitlock and Travis Long, Jr., Alabama Bureau of Investigation Agent Corporal Stan Stabler and a special agent from the Tennessee Bureau of Investigation.

  Ballin concluded the defense’s arguments by reiterating the allegation that the state lacked probable cause.

  Judge McCraw deferred his decision to another day. Immediately following the proceedings, the defense thought that all was in order for Mary’s release that afternoon. But that day, the court clerk’s office was closed—as it was every Wednesday—and the judge wanted the bond agreement reviewed by that office before he signed off on it.

  Mary’s family stood patiently outside of the courthouse hoping to see Mary walk through the doors. At 6 P.M., Farese delivered the bad news—Mary would not be released that day.

  The next morning at 9:45 A.M, Tyrone Byrd of Alpha Bail Bonds in Somerville delivered documentation to Circuit Court Clerk Ronnie Brooks. Brooks checked to make sure that that company as well as the other business involved, Williams Bonding Company, had certification to write bonds in McNairy County.

  With the paperwork complete, Brooks approved the agreement and faxed it to the judge and the district attorney general for their signatures. Things looked good for Mary’s release. She changed out of her prison uniform and into the street clothes her father provided. Then, McCraw talked to a judge in another county and learned that Williams Bail Bonds was suspended from issuing bonds there in 1999. Thursday and Friday passed while Mary remained behind bars and the courts untangled a bureaucratic jumble of outdated records on Williams Bonding Company, and Williams was cleared to issue the bond the following week.