remained sexually active and faithful; neither slept around.
On June 1, three weeks after the separation, a neighbor in Kathy's apartment building became alarmed at the nonstop crying of the two daughters. The neighbor knocked on the door, and when there was no answer, she called the police. Inside, on the floor downstairs, they found Kathy's body. Upstairs, the two toddlers were in their cribs, hungry and frightened.
Kathy had been raped and strangled. The time of death was between 1:00 a.m. and 6:00 a.m. When the police interviewed Greg, he said he was at home, asleep by himself, and thus had no alibi witness. He adamantly denied any involvement in his wife's murder and resented the questioning from the police.
The investigation produced a fingerprint on a phone that had been ripped from the wall and was on the floor near Kathy. The fingerprint matched neither Greg nor his wife. The police found pubic hair and, most important, what appeared to be a bite mark on Kathy's breast. A crime lab expert confirmed that the killer had bitten the breast hard during the attack.
Being the estranged spouse, Greg was soon the leading suspect, though the fingerprint did not match. Melvin Hett with the state crime lab concluded that the pubic hair was not microscopically consistent with Greg's sample. The police asked Greg to submit an impression of his teeth to compare with the bite mark.
Greg did not appreciate being a suspect. He was completely innocent and didn't trust the police. With the help of his parents, he paid $25,000 and retained a lawyer. The police did not appreciate Greg hiring a lawyer. They obtained a court order requiring him to submit an impression of his teeth. He did, and heard nothing for five months. He was raising his two daughters, working full-time as an ironworker, and hoping the police were history when they arrived one day in January 1986 with an arrest warrant for firstdegree murder, punishable by death.
His first lawyer, though well paid and with a good reputation, was far too interested in negotiating a plea bargain. Greg fired him a month before trial, then made the enormous mistake of hiring George Briggs, a washed-up old lawyer at the end of a long, colorful career. His fee was $2,500, a bargain and a red flag.
Briggs was from the old school of country lawyers. You get your witnesses, I'll get mine, and we'll show up at the courthouse and have a good fight. No pretrial discovery. When in doubt, just trust your instincts in court and fly by the seat of your pants.
Briggs was also an alcoholic who was addicted to painkillers that he began taking a few years earlier after a motorcycle accident left him partially brain damaged. On a good day he reeked of booze but could still go through the motions. On a bad day he'd been known to snore in the courtroom and urinate on himself and vomit in the judge's chambers. He was often seen staggering along the hallways of the courthouse. Greg and his parents became alarmed when Briggs drained a few bottles of beer during a lunch.
His drinking and drug addiction were well known to the trial judge and to the Oklahoma state bar association, but virtually nothing was done to either stop Briggs or help him, or protect his clients.
Greg's family located a highly regarded bite expert in Kansas, but Briggs was too busy or too hungover to chat with the man. Briggs interviewed no witnesses and, as far as Greg could tell, did little preparation.
The trial was a nightmare. The state called two bite experts, one of whom had finished dental school less than a year earlier. Briggs had nothing to rebut their testimony. The jury deliberated for two hours and found Greg guilty. Briggs called no mitigating witnesses, and the jury deliberated for one hour and set the punishment at death.
Thirty days later, Greg was taken back to court to receive his sentence of death. In cell 9, Greg hung newspapers across the bars of his door so no one could see him. He convinced himself that he was not on death row, but rather in his own little cocoon, somewhere else, biding his time reading voraciously and watching his small television. He spoke to no one but the Run Man, who, during his very first chat, asked Greg if he wanted to buy some marijuana. Yes, he did.
At first, Greg did not realize that a few lucky condemned men actually left The Row alive. Occasionally the appeals worked, good lawyers got involved, judges woke up, and miracles happened, but no one had informed him of this. He was sure he would be put to death, and, frankly, he wanted to get it over with.
For six months he left his cell only to shower, quickly and alone. Gradually, though, he made an acquaintance or two and was invited into the yard for an hour of exercise and socializing. Once he began talking, he became instantly disliked. Greg was a rarity on The Row, a man who strongly supported the death penalty. You do the ultimate crime, you pay the ultimate price, he argued loudly. Such opinions were unheard of. He also developed the irritating habit of watching David Letterman at full volume. Sleep is cherished on The Row, and many of the men spend half of each day in another world. When you're sleeping, you're cheating the system. Sleep is your time, not the state's. Condemned killers do not hesitate to threaten to kill again, and Greg soon heard the rumor that he was a marked man. Every death row has at least one boss and several who want to be. There are factions vying for control. They prey on the weak, often demanding payment for the right to 'live' on The Row. When word filtered to Greg that he needed to pay rent, he laughed and sent a message back that he would never pay a dime to anyone for living in such a rat hole.
The Row was ruled by Soledad, the nickname of a killer who'd once spent time in the famous prison in California. Soledad didn't appreciate Greg's pro-death-penalty stance, and he really didn't like David Letterman, and since any boss worthy of respect had to be ready to kill, Greg became the target.
Everyone has enemies on The Row. The feuds are nasty and arise quickly over anything.
A pack of cigarettes can provoke an attack in the yard or the shower. Two packs can get you killed.
Greg needed a friend to watch his back.
Annette's first visit to McAlester was sad and frightening, not that she was expecting anything else. She preferred not to go, but Ronnie had no one but his sisters. The guards patted her down and checked her purse. Moving through the layers of the Big House was like sinking into the dark belly of a beast. Doors clanged, keys rattled, guards glared as if she had no business there. She was numb, sleepwalking, with a hard knot in her stomach and a racing pulse.
They were from a nice family in a nice house on a shady street. Church on Sundays. A thousand baseball games when Ronnie was a boy. How had it all come to this? This will become a habit, she admitted to herself. She would hear the same sounds and see the same guards many times in the future. She asked if she could bring stuff- cookies, clothes, cash. No, came the quick answer. Only small change, so she handed the guard a handful of quarters and hoped he passed them on to Ronnie.
The visitation room was long and narrow and split down the center with thick sheets of Plexiglas that were divided by partitions to allow some measure of privacy. All conversations were by phone through a window. No touching whatsoever. Ronnie eventually showed up. No one was in a hurry at the prison. He looked healthy, maybe even a bit chubby, but then his weight had always gone up and down dramatically. He thanked her for coming, said he was surviving okay but needed money. The food was awful, and he wanted to buy something to eat at the canteen. He also was desperate for a guitar, and some books and magazines and a small television, which could be purchased through the canteen.
'Get me out of here, Annette,' he pleaded over and over. 'I didn't kill Debbie Carter and you know it.'
She had never wavered in her belief that he was innocent, though some family members now had doubts. She and her husband, Marlon, were both working and raising a family and trying to save a little. Money was tight. What was she supposed to do? The statefunded indigent lawyers were getting themselves organized for his appeals. Sell your house and hire a big lawyer, he said. Sell everything. Do anything. Just get me out.
The conversation was tense and there were tears. Another inmate arrived for a visit in the booth next to Ronnie. Annette could barely see him through the glass, but she was intrigued by who he was and whom he had killed.
Roger Dale Stafford, Ronnie told her, the famous steak-house murderer. He had nine death sentences, the current record on The Row. He executed six people, including five teenagers, in the rear of a steak house in Oklahoma City in a bungled robbery, then murdered a family of three.
They're all killers, Ronnie kept saying, and all they talk about is killing. It's everywhere on The Row. Get me out! Did he feel safe? she asked.
Hell no, not living with a bunch of killers. He had always believed in the death penalty, but now he was a die- hard supporter of it. He kept such opinions quiet, though, in his new neighborhood.
There were no time limits on the visits. They eventually said goodbye with sincere promises to write and call. Annette was emotionally drained when she left McAlester. The calls started immediately. On The Row they put a
