The Pastor's Wife

by Diane Fanning

  “I wonder, Mary, how it is you want your children to remember their father? Your daughters loved their daddy and they loved you, Mary. They do not understand.

  “…Your girls have nightmares at night. They dream of someone breaking into their home. They dream of someone with a gun. I don’t know that you truly understand, Mary, the impact you’ve had on your children.

  “…You know, Mary, this is a serious thing. You took another’s life. And you had a choice…And you made it, didn’t you? And it’s a choice that you’ll have to live with the rest of your life…You took his life. You took something from your children: their father. You took a son from us. You took a brother. You took an uncle. You took a best friend. And for there to be no remorse, no remorse ever shown to your girls, never written in a letter to your girls—you never told your girls you’re sorry. Don’t you think you, at least, owe them that?

  “You’ve never told us you’re sorry. I think you, at least, owe us that. I think we are owed the truth.”

  Steve Farese questioned Diane about the filing to terminate Mary’s parental rights. Walt Freeland immediately objected to that line of questioning. Judge McCraw said he didn’t need that kind of information to make his decision. The state closed its case.

  After a short break, Steve Farese called Tabatha Freeman to the stand. Much of what she said was a rehash of her testimony at the trial—including the tearful delivery. In her plea for leniency, she told the court that she still needed her sister in her life—“she is the world to me.”

  She also evoked the children. “She needs them and they need her. She’s not complete without them, and they aren’t without her.”

  Paul Pillow, manager of Cleaners Express spoke highly of Mary as an employee. “She’s done more than she’s been asked to do.” He also talked of his fondness of her as a person. “Mary has a way of making you feel comfortable when you are around her…Mary is merry all the time.”

  Rudy Thomsen said that Mary was “a very compassionate, very loving person.”

  On cross-examination, Freeland asked, “You’re not worried about Mary killing or harming anyone if she gets out?”

  “No, sir.”

  “You didn’t have any concerns that Matthew would be hurt, did you?”

  “No.”

  Donna Dunlap, Mary’s probation officer, spoke once again of Mary’s good behavior. Arlington Church of Christ pulpit minister Wayne Cantrell spoke of her truthfulness, but admitted to the prosecutor that he had not known her long, and his judgment of her honesty was based on the fact that he never caught her in a lie. Dr. Lynne Zager testified that Mary would need more psychological help, but she was not a danger to herself or thers.

  Mary read a statement asking for mercy. She acknowledged the pain she’d caused and hoped her case would encourage others to reach out to those in abusive situations. She said she prayed for the Winkler family every night. She still did not tell them she was sorry for shooting Matthew, but she did say, “Any sentence you give me will not punish me enough.”

  The judge prepared a twenty-four-page document outlining the reasoning behind his sentencing decision. His first words crushed the defense. “The court finds that the defendant is not a suitable candidate for judicial diversion, nor an appropriate candidate for full probation.”

  Their worries lessened, however, when he granted her partial probation. He said he reached his decision by balancing the verdict of guilt on the charge of the lower class-C felony and Mary’s lack of criminal record with the “especially violent, horrifying, offensive” circumstances of the crime.

  He awarded Mary a 3-year sentence, ordering that she spend 210 days of that time in strict confinement. But, even that was softened. He allowed her credit for time served, and gave her the option of spending up to 60 days of that incarceration in a mental health facility approved by the court. When her days behind bars—from the time of her arrest in March 2006 to the day she was released on bond in August of that year—were subtracted from her 210-day sentence, there was a balance of sixty-seven days. The defense team was overjoyed.

  If Mary’s attorneys moved quickly to place her in a psychiatric facility, the most time Mary faced in an actual jail was seven more days—one week and nothing more.

  Chapter 55

  On June 13, Mary’s attorneys withdrew their motion for a new trial. Under the circumstances, facing a new judge and jury extended the ordeal for Mary, and posed an unacceptable risk of a greater sentence. It was better to bring it all to a quick conclusion.

  In Selmer, whether angered or pleased by the verdict, the residents were relieved. The circus had left town. The national spotlight shined down on them no more. Then, just eight days after Mary’s sentencing, another tragedy struck, drawing the media back to the small Southern town.

  During a fundraising race, a driver lost control of his car and veered off the roadway into a crowd of spectators. Six people died—all under the age of 30. Eighteen others, including a 5-year-old, were injured seriously enough to require hospital treatment.

  Photographer Robert King, indicted by a McNairy County Grand Jury for impersonating a licensed professional when he entered the jail to photograph Mary, still awaited final disposition of his case. His lawyers had filed for judicial diversion.

  After nine days in the McNairy County jail, Mary was transferred to an undisclosed, locked-down mental health facility in central Tennessee. She was released from there on August 15, 2007—one year to the day that she walked out of the county lock-up on bond.

  She bounced through the doors of Cleaners Express as soon as she returned to town that morning. Smiling and laughing, she kidded around with manager Paul Pillow. Then she paid a visit to her probation officer, Donna Dunlap. She would be supervised by that office until 2010.

  For reasons Darrell Pillow did not understand, Mary terminated their six-month relationship upon her release. The reasons Mary gave made no sense to him—he thought their involvement was serious.

  Mary continued to make repeated appearances in court over visitation and custody of her children. Every time, she loaded up the three car seats in the optimistic belief that she would come home to McMinnville with her girls.

  She filed for full custody in mid-September. On September 19, she appeared at a hearing before Carroll County Chancellor Ron Harmon.

  Dan and Diane’s custody attorney, James Adams, grilled her. “You have in fact begun another relationship since you got out of prison, haven’t you? Or since you got out of your mental health treatment?”

  “Ah, no, not,” Mary stammered.

  “It’s your testimony here today that you have not dated anyone or had a relationship with anyone since you got out of your mental health treatment?”

  “I have not.”

  “Did you or did you not have a relationship with Darrell Ray Pillow?”

  “Yes,” Mary admitted.

  “You did?”

  “Uh-huh,” she said with a nod.

  “And are you still dating him?”

  “No.”

  “When did that stop?”

  “Sometime in August.”

  “When did it begin?”

  “Springtime.”

  “Were you ever close to getting married?”

  “No.”

  “You never discussed marriage?” he pressed.

  “Light discussions, but nothing serious.”

  “You don’t think there’s any problem with getting in a new relationship this shortly after you murdered another man who you had a relationship with?”

  “I don’t think that’s appropriate terminology,” Mary objected.

  “I’m sorry, was ‘murder’ an inappropriate terminology?”

  When Kay Farese Turner complained that the line of questioning was not relevant, Chancellor Harmon said it was relevant to him.

  Mary answered, “We talked and got to know each other, and then, I just came to a point where I wanted to be single, and all I want is my girls.”
>
  At the end of the hearing, Harmon issued a court order allowing Mary a supervised visit with her daughters on September 30. But the day before, in the state Court of Appeals, a response was issued on Dan and Diane’s emergency filing. The court stayed all visitation activities until the claims of “irreparable harm” alleged by the Winklers could be fully explored.

  Months after the criminal trial, District Attorney General Michael Dunavant added fuel to the custody fire, when he spoke to Tonya Smith-King of The Jackson Sun about Mary’s flight after Matthew’s death. “She drove hundreds of miles to Jackson, Mississippi, spent one night, and then to Orange Beach, Alabama, and was in a hotel the next night. She was running out of money. How was she going to feed her children? How was she going to get back to Tennessee?

  “You know what she was going to do? She was going to kill her children, and herself, and she was just going to do it at the beach instead of in Selmer, Tennessee. Now, that’s my own personal observation and opinion, which she never came out and admitted that. But that’s our speculation. We couldn’t prove it at trial.”

  Mary continued to receive media attention. She was featured on Snapped, airing on the Oxygen channel and on the syndicated Montel Williams Show.

  And she achieved the ultimate in the talk-show circuit—an appearance on The Oprah Winfrey Show. The courts blocked her travel to Chicago, but an interview in her lawyer’s office was telecast to millions.

  As the summer of 2008 approached, Mary no longer lived with her loyal friend, Rudy Thomsen. She no longer worked for Paul Pillow and Matt Hash at Cleaner’s Express. And the battle for the custody of the girls raged into its third year.

  Surprisingly, it all came to an abrupt end on August 1, 2008. That afternoon, Mary Winkler picked up her girls and took them to her home in McMinnville. Matthew’s parents and Mary reached an out-of-court agreement allowing the children to live with their mother. No formal custody papers were filed at that time.

  Mary has begun her life anew.

  Matthew’s parents will never again see their son’s smile.

  And three little girls struggle to find meaning, healing and understanding in a world turned upside down.

  Afterword

  Was justice done in the courthouse in McNairy County, Tennessee? It’s a difficult question to answer. This case has no black and white, no sharp defining edges delineating the truth. The bottom line for me, though, is that the ultimate act of domestic violence is homicide. Mary committed that act and Matthew was its victim.

  But what of Mary’s alleged years of victimization at Matthew’s hand? If you believe every word she said, it still comes down to one cold, hard fact: Mary was not in fear of her life when she pulled that trigger. She could not possibly feel as if she were in imminent danger—Matthew was asleep when she shot him in the back.

  Can you believe Mary’s entire story? There appears to be enough corroboration to indicate that Matthew was controlling and did have a quick temper. But beyond that, so many stories were changed between the time of Matthew’s death and now, that it’s difficult to ascertain the truth.

  Mary’s father Clark Freeman originally said that he had no idea that his daughter was being abused; a month later, he suspected, but did nothing; and in the spring, he told of the many times he begged her to leave.

  Her attorneys alleged that she was sexually abused. Mary testified that she’d been forced to perform anal and oral sex, and dress up in “slutty” clothes. But she also said that if she told Matthew to stop, he would. On The Oprah Winfrey Show, she said that Matthew would stop what he was doing if she made the slightest involuntary flinch. Perhaps Mary should have spoken up more often in the bedroom, but didn’t. And since she didn’t, he had no way of knowing in the heat of passion that she was unhappy with their sexual activity.

  There are other things that don’t have “the ring of truth” Steve Farese mentioned in his closing. Mary testified that in February 2006, she forwarded all of the family mail to a post office box at Matthew’s instruction because he’d threatened the neighbors’ dog and feared they would tamper with his mail. But that run-in with Sharyn Everitt had been many months before.

  The shoe—something about it was off. I was amazed that no one searching the home in the aftermath of Matthew’s death ever saw it. When I listened to Special Agent Brent Booth’s admission that he saw the orange tackle box but did not look inside it or collect it as evidence, that excuse sounded sensible. However, when the shoe was revealed in the courtroom, no one on the prosecution side had seen it before. Steve Farese argued that it was not a typical shoe for a preacher’s wife, and he was right. If any one of the investigators had seen it, surely it would have stood out enough to be remembered.

  And why just one shoe? And how did the defense obtain it? No one testified to that. Every visit Mary’s attorneys made to the home on Mollie Drive was monitored by law enforcement. They would have known if the lawyers removed anything.

  The wig is confusing me, too. Typically, a man who wants his spouse to wear a wig selects one that is strikingly different from his wife’s usual style to add to the fantasy. Long blonde tresses, for instance, would have made more sense than that short brunette hank of hair that was revealed.

  Then, there was a story circulating in September 2007 that cast doubt on Mary’s credibility. According to McMinnville friends, Mary rented a U-Haul and a friend volunteered his cattle truck so that she could retrieve her furniture from the Selmer home. But they later claimed that Mary told them as she prepared to leave, she learned that Dan and Diane Winkler had obtained a court order forbidding it.

  In Selmer, though, it’s believed that the church is eager to get the Winklers’ belongings out of the parsonage, and people were in the house that day waiting for Mary’s arrival to do just that. But Mary never came.

  A search of jurisdictions uncovered no court order. If the McMinnville tale were true, there would be a document in evidence somewhere. Why, though, would Mary even fabricate a story like that?

  If Mary is a liar, as the prosecution alleged, what was her motive for shooting Matthew? Was it really over the mess at the bank? That logic does not hold. She would not be afraid of Matthew unless she was abused. And if she didn’t genuinely fear him, why would she react that way over a financial problem?

  That brings us full circle and, in my mind, proves that Mary’s story cannot be total fabrication. But “Why?” still lingers in the air.

  Some place a mountain of blame on the churches of Christ. Is such a condemnation really fair? As in other conservative walks of faith, the churches of Christ do not acknowledge that there is a difference between the laws God set down to govern our lives in perpetuity and the prohibitions in the Bible that are merely reflections of that social reality. In biblical times, women were second-class citizens, less educated, less powerful, more vulnerable. In that context, the gender distinctions seem a concession to the times. But to adherents of the churches of Christ, it is immutable, timeless law.

  Matthew and Mary were both raised in that faith and accepted its tenets. They observed the authority of the man in their birth homes. It was only logical that they brought it to their marriage. Mary accepted her secondary role as a matter of course, just as her mother did. She continued the habit of obedience, and paid the emotional price required by submission to another human being and by the suppression of her aspirations to the desires of someone else. The corrupting influence of holding a dominant position can distort reasoning and warp behavior—as it may have done to Matthew. It definitely created a gulf between them that only equality could fill.

  Where is the truth about their relationship? In Dr. Zager’s testimony? Zager only knew what Mary told her, and what she could discern with psychological evaluation tools. The analysis of those tests, however, is part science, part art.

  We are left with no corroborating police or medical reports that indisputably point to domestic violence toward Mary or the children. No one but Mary claimed to see M
atthew cutting off the baby’s breath to make her stop crying. There are those who saw evidence of Matthew’s dominance in Mary’s life, but no unassailable eyewitnesses to spousal abuse.

  Unfortunately, this is all too often the case when a marriage ends in a violent loss of life. Red flags are often not seen or warning signs are ignored.

  One truth stands firm. Abuse within the home is a lethal force in our society. Tear down the walls and throw open the doors. Shine light on the darkness that destroys lives. Look at your family members and friends. Watch out for the subtle indicators of emotional, verbal and physical abuse—the isolation, the lowered self-esteem, the bouts of depression, the frequent injuries. When you see them, reach out and don’t let go.

  Ministers’ wives are particularly vulnerable to isolation because of their position in life. If you are active in your church, advocate for the pastor’s wife to be given opportunities to network with other women married to clergy. There are organizations designed for just that purpose. She needs a safe place to voice her concerns, laugh at problems and share secrets without concern of harming her husband’s career. Help her find one.

  One unresolved issue remained in this case: the custody of the now fatherless Patricia, Allie and Breanna. Who should raise these girls? What is in their best interests?

  Many vilify Dan and Diane Winkler, and do not want them to keep the children. They receive criticism for their religious beliefs from those who insist that if the children live with them, it will perpetuate the cycle of submission and destruction. But if that is true, does it matter where they go? Mary, too, is still an active adherent of the churches of Christ.

  Others criticize the Winklers, saying that they are vengeful and vindictive. Why such harsh criticism for family members of the victim? Their choice in the courtroom to conceal their pain behind a mask of stoicism does not negate their suffering. They are victims, too. They have lost a loved one to an act of violence at Mary’s hand. Even Steve Farese, in his closing, empathized with the sorrow they undoubtedly feel.