0:00

What's up everybody welcome back to

0:03

another episode of Lights Out.

0:05

Today we've got a

0:08

serial killing granny for

0:10

you. A woman by

0:12

the name of Velma Barfield. Velma

0:14

decided to buy a bottle of

0:16

arsenic-based rat poison. It's been

0:19

called the king of poisons. This

0:21

made her the first woman executed in

0:23

the United States after it was reinstated

0:26

after a four-year suspension. She

0:28

had attended every one of her victims funerals.

0:32

Velma later admitted that when she watched her

0:34

victims die she felt

0:36

nothing. If there's

0:38

ever been a case deserving in

0:40

position of the ultimate penalty this

0:42

is it. Today

0:45

if it were possible

0:48

I wish that I could take every bit

0:51

of hurt on myself. Light

1:09

Out Everybody.

1:13

What's up everybody welcome back to

1:15

another episode of Lights Out. I'm

1:18

your host Josh and join the studio by my

1:20

co-host Austin. Hey man what's up? What's up

1:22

man and our producer Daniel. How's it

1:24

going everybody? Today we've

1:27

got a serial killing

1:30

granny for you. A

1:32

woman by the name of Velma

1:34

Barfield. Now

1:37

Velma draws a lot of similarities to

1:39

some other evil women we've covered on

1:41

the show including Shelley No-Tech.

1:44

Yep. And Diane

1:46

Staudie. Yeah they're very similar. A lot

1:49

of similar characteristics as well as the

1:52

method in which they murdered people are

1:54

very similar. We're talking about rat

1:57

poisoning today using rat poisoning. Yeah,

2:01

pretty great stuff. Which, poisoning in

2:03

my opinion is one of the

2:05

most brutal ways that you

2:08

could possibly kill somebody. Yeah. It's

2:11

very impersonal, but the things

2:13

that it does to your body is horrific. It's

2:15

very cowardly too. It's like,

2:18

yeah, and it's over

2:20

time death that

2:22

happens. And the symptoms

2:24

that these poisons cause your body

2:26

is just... I can't even

2:28

imagine what that must be like. Yeah, and you

2:31

can survive, which is the worst part. Depending on

2:33

the dosage, we'll see some of these victims. They'll

2:36

go to the hospital and be totally

2:38

destroyed, but then they'll heal only

2:41

to, you know, have it happen

2:43

again over time, because she's just

2:45

continuously poisoning them. It's just a

2:47

complete agony for days, weeks. And

2:51

to not even know why

2:53

this is happening to you, right?

2:56

That is just... it's terrifying to think about.

2:59

So Velma Barfield, she

3:01

is somebody who

3:05

was severely addicted

3:07

to drugs, and,

3:09

you know, she was also

3:11

this church-going Christian woman all

3:14

the way up into her death on

3:16

paper, with quotes around that. What's

3:19

interesting to me is that back in

3:21

the 70s and 80s, Velma had a

3:23

lot of support coming from the evangelical

3:25

Christian community. And,

3:27

you know, there's this whole sort

3:29

of controversy around, can

3:33

somebody who has murdered multiple people, and

3:35

she's suspected of murdering five to seven

3:38

different individuals over

3:40

the period of her life, and can

3:43

somebody who's done this, you

3:46

know, sort of wipe

3:49

their slate clean? I

3:52

mean, I like the positivity in

3:54

thinking that someone can, and I know

3:56

that's a big part of a lot

3:59

of faith-based. systems is forgiveness,

4:01

people can change, people

4:04

can find God, et cetera. We'll

4:07

see, I mean, I'm not 100% convinced

4:10

that Doma was just

4:12

this sweet, God-fearing woman

4:14

at the end of it, because I think

4:17

she's a manipulator, so it's hard for me to

4:19

say, and I think at the end of the

4:21

day, I really can't say. I can't judge her

4:23

character, I don't know. As

4:26

far as the afterlife is concerned, where this woman's

4:28

going, but I don't

4:31

know. Sometimes I feel it's very

4:34

convenient when

4:36

killers, towards

4:39

the end of their life, find

4:41

God, and all of a sudden, they're kind of

4:43

this reborn person, and

4:46

you know, they're, some

4:49

of them do show remorse for what they've done, and

4:51

I think in that particular situation, that you can judge

4:54

them a little differently, but

4:56

Doma, she just never seemed to really

5:00

care, in my

5:02

opinion, you know, it seems like she was

5:04

very disconnected from everything that she

5:06

had done, and never really understood the

5:08

extent of the damage that she had

5:11

caused throughout her life. So

5:14

this case is very interesting,

5:16

and very controversial for a lot of people. She

5:18

even wrote a book that was published, yeah, after

5:20

she died, and even in that book, I don't

5:22

know from what I read from it, she

5:25

never really gives off this. It's

5:30

a very open and honest

5:33

storytelling of her life, but

5:36

it almost feels like there's something just wrong

5:38

with her, and it's

5:41

hard to come to

5:43

terms with this woman, because she's

5:45

just so direct about not feeling

5:47

anything when her victims were dying,

5:49

and stuff like that, that just,

5:51

it doesn't sit well with me, and

5:53

it feels like there's something fundamentally wrong

5:56

with her, so it's hard

5:58

to judge someone who's just not. you

6:01

know possible I don't want to diagnose anyone with

6:03

anything but like you're not like the rest of

6:05

us here I can tell so I

6:07

don't know and I think as you'll see as

6:10

we go through her life that there are events in

6:13

her life that may have contributed

6:15

to a mental health

6:17

issues that are potentially spiraled out of

6:19

control and obviously when you

6:21

infuse drugs and alcohol and things

6:23

like that it's gonna make

6:26

all that even worse so this

6:29

one yeah this one's definitely

6:31

brutal and she was actually the first

6:33

woman to be executed

6:36

by lethal injection yep which

6:39

is pretty wild you don't hear I don't know I

6:41

feel like you don't hear about women being

6:43

executed period no it's pretty rare I don't have the

6:45

stats on it but I do know it's really where

6:47

rare for women to be on death row she

6:50

was also the first woman I

6:52

think to be executed after it

6:54

was reinstated federally which is how

6:57

to think about so let's

6:59

go ahead and dive into the story

7:02

of Velma Barfield so

7:05

Velma was born Margie Velma Bullard and

7:08

she was born during the worst of the Great Depression

7:10

on October 29 1932 in Eastover

7:13

North Carolina she was

7:15

the second of nine children and her parents

7:18

names were Murphy and Lillian Bullard her mother

7:20

went by Lily her father was

7:22

a cotton firmer and many

7:25

of us know what the Great Depression was

7:27

about and the collapse of cotton prices during

7:29

this time sent the family into financial turmoil

7:32

he could barely afford to feed and clothe

7:34

his large family they lived in

7:36

harsh cramped conditions in a small wooden

7:38

house and they had no electricity or

7:40

running water one of Velma

7:42

siblings died in infancy and another was

7:45

disfigured from polio meanwhile Murphy

7:47

was also trying to support his aging parents

7:49

who no longer worked and by

7:51

1935 he quit the farming industry and

7:53

worked for a logging company and then

7:56

later on he worked at a textile mill in Fayetteville

7:59

Murphy was a hard worker but when they had little

8:01

money, he often wasted it, as

8:03

he liked to impress people so he'd buy nice

8:06

things that they didn't need. Velma

8:08

was terrified of her father while growing up. He

8:10

had a violent temper and he was set off

8:12

by the smallest of things. He'd

8:15

also get extremely jealous. During

8:17

his outbursts he would physically abuse his children

8:19

and would also smash furniture. According

8:22

to some sources, Lily their mother would never

8:24

intervene or defend her children. Other

8:26

sources say she did her best to protect her children

8:29

and she would even take the blame for things so

8:31

Murphy wouldn't harm the kids. Velma

8:34

would often forgive her father because she thought Murphy's

8:36

outbursts were typical for a man but

8:38

she accused her mother of being too passive.

8:41

Velma ended up resenting Lily because of this and when

8:43

she was 12 years old she asked her mother why

8:46

she put up with him. Lily

8:48

said that she had nowhere else to go but Velma

8:50

never thought that excuse was good enough.

8:53

Meanwhile, she did well in school. She

8:56

enjoyed classes because it got her out of the house but

8:58

she never really did well with the other students. She

9:00

failed in group exercises and didn't have many

9:02

friends. She'd also have outbursts

9:04

in class that mimicked her father's short temper

9:06

at home. Unlike the other kids

9:09

Velma would often wear second hand or handmade

9:11

clothing to school which made her stand

9:13

out to the other kids. Since

9:15

she knew her family was poor she would often

9:17

sneak out of school and steal money from her

9:19

elderly neighbor. When her father found out what

9:21

she was doing he beat her. Even

9:24

though the Great Depression had been over for years

9:26

her family was still relatively poor since her father

9:29

was bad with money. So instead

9:31

of stealing from neighbors Velma started stealing

9:33

coins from her father's pants pockets at

9:35

home. She would then use that

9:37

money to buy the other kids candy and bribe

9:39

them into having a friendship with her. According

9:42

to Velma her father had sexually abused

9:44

her when she was 13 years old. This

9:47

was denied by her brothers but supposedly one

9:49

of her sisters later supported the accusation. In

9:52

her teenage years she met her future boyfriend a

9:55

boy named Thomas Burke. Her

9:57

father would only let Velma date when she was 16 years old.

10:00

years old so the two anxiously

10:02

awaited for Velma's 16th birthday. When

10:04

she later began dating Thomas her father did

10:07

not approve of the relationship. They'd

10:09

go out on dates but after a while Velma

10:11

felt guilty being away from home for so long.

10:14

She knew that when she was out on dates the

10:16

rest of her siblings were subjected to her father's wrath.

10:19

One evening, Thomas and Velma were driving

10:21

home from the movies. Suddenly

10:23

18 year old Thomas said that he wanted to

10:25

get married, out of the blue. Velma

10:28

immediately panicked. He knew

10:30

that getting engaged to Thomas would throw Murphy

10:32

into a fit of rage but on the

10:34

other hand she saw that marrying Thomas was

10:37

just an easy way to get out of

10:39

the house away from her parents so a

10:41

few days later she agreed to marry Thomas.

10:44

Meanwhile her father was switching jobs and was

10:46

moving the family to Wade which was a

10:49

few towns over. So instead of

10:51

a traditional marriage, Thomas and

10:53

Velma eloped. On the evening of December

10:55

1, 1949, 17 year old Velma was picked up by her friend,

10:57

Alvy Pender.

11:02

She told her parents it was just going to be

11:04

a regular night out with friends, nothing to worry about

11:07

but then they picked up Thomas and

11:09

drove over to Dillon, South Carolina. Velma

11:12

and Thomas then got married in a

11:14

courthouse and Alvy acted as a witness.

11:17

When Velma got home later that night she kept

11:19

her marriage a secret from the family. Thomas

11:22

did the same, this was an agreement that they

11:24

had. They planned on telling Velma's

11:26

parents right before they moved so it

11:28

would soften the blow. At

11:31

first they both agreed on the plan but

11:33

for some reason Thomas urged her to tell

11:35

everyone the next day so Velma

11:38

told her mother Lily and

11:40

then she asked if she could just softly

11:43

relay the info to her father Murphy

11:45

because she was a bit scared and

11:47

outbursts right? But Lily ended

11:49

up declining, she said look this is your

11:52

problem not hers, you have to tell your

11:54

father. So the next day Velma

11:56

ended up breaking the news to Murphy and

11:59

he was So upset he began throwing

12:01

things as he usually did when he

12:03

threw a temper tantrum, and he demanded

12:06

they get the marriage annulled immediately. Then

12:09

he began crying, which she said she

12:11

had never seen him do before. And

12:13

from then on, her relationship with her

12:16

father was just never the same. According

12:18

to Velma, Murphy was never mean to

12:21

her ever again, but Velma carried this

12:23

guilt with her for a long time.

12:26

You can kind of already see some problematic

12:28

family dynamics, right? I mean, not just

12:30

the outbursts and stuff, but Velma

12:34

blaming her mother for not

12:36

standing up to Murphy sounds

12:38

like maybe some internalized misogyny

12:41

where it's like, no, men are just going

12:43

to be men. It's

12:45

on the woman to defend herself and

12:47

her children. So that's strange.

12:50

And then the sudden switch of behavior

12:53

for Murphy. Right. Yeah.

12:55

And then when she gets this reaction from him,

12:58

she likely wasn't suspecting. And

13:02

that's very interesting to me because it makes me, I mean,

13:06

to me it validates her recollection

13:09

of her childhood

13:11

and the relationship that she

13:13

had with her father. It was almost

13:15

like Murphy realized that he was losing

13:18

his daughter because

13:20

now she was getting married and he

13:22

probably also knew that she was going

13:24

to be moving, moving out of the house. And,

13:26

you know, it seems like he was a very possessive

13:30

dad for sure. So a

13:32

few days later, Velma moves out of her parents'

13:34

home and Thomas and her ended up living with

13:36

his, his parents for a little while. Velma

13:39

said the first few years of their marriage were

13:41

the happiest years of her life. They

13:43

both dropped out of school and Thomas got a

13:45

job at a nearby cotton mill and later drove

13:47

a delivery truck. Velma found work

13:49

in a local pharmacy and the couple spent most of 1950 and

13:51

1951 living with

13:54

Thomas' parents. After a

13:56

while, Thomas ended up hating his job, so he

13:58

quit and moved in with Velma's his oldest brother,

14:00

Olive. Thomas then found work at

14:03

a cola bottling company. He made enough

14:05

that they could get a place of their own a few months

14:07

later. Velma soon

14:09

became pregnant and gave birth to their first

14:11

son, Ronald, or Ronnie Burke, on December 15,

14:15

1951, and just two years later, they

14:17

had another child, on September 3, 1953, and

14:21

that's when Velma gave birth to her daughter

14:23

named Kim. Velma

14:25

loved her children, and her children loved her.

14:28

She was overprotective of them when she likely

14:30

learned this behavior from her father, and she

14:33

later said that whenever she was separated

14:35

from her children, for whatever reason it

14:37

was, she felt physically

14:40

ill. Have you ever felt that

14:42

with Holly? I do understand that,

14:44

yeah. I mean, we haven't been away from her

14:47

for that long, but there was a, we

14:49

took a little trip, it was only for a

14:52

few days, and even like we took our company

14:54

camping trip. I

14:56

think that was the first time we were actually away from

14:58

her overnight for like what, two

15:00

nights or something? And

15:03

I don't think, I don't know if I would

15:05

say it was like physically ill, but mentally just

15:08

like it felt weird to

15:10

not know where she was at or what

15:13

she was doing. The alarm bells

15:15

were kind of, you were getting a little worried.

15:17

Yeah. It's like you had spent every

15:19

day with her basically up until then. Yeah, and I think

15:22

it gets easier as they get older.

15:24

I think when they're really young, you

15:26

especially kind of worry and there's definitely kind

15:29

of that pain there, but hopefully

15:31

it gets a little easier, but I've heard it

15:33

doesn't ever get easier. And even

15:35

when your kids grow up and move out of the house,

15:37

you're still... Yeah, or even like going to school, right? So

15:39

like eventually leaving the house to go. Totally, I'm not looking

15:41

forward to that. Yeah, definitely not looking

15:43

forward to that. But Ronnie

15:45

eventually started the first grade. Around

15:48

the same time, Dunwood got a job at a textile mill

15:50

working the overnight shift. They

15:52

worked out their schedules so someone could always be

15:55

home with the children. By

15:57

1962, Velma began having health problems. with

16:00

fibroid tumors in her uterus, which caused

16:02

intense pain and bleeding, doctors

16:04

advised that Velma needed a hysterectomy.

16:07

After the operation, Velma's brother John said she

16:09

was never the same. And

16:12

this type of surgery back in like the

16:14

50s was probably much different than it was.

16:17

That's a pretty, it's still a serious operation,

16:19

but it's fairly routine. Really,

16:21

it's not like, you know, they've

16:23

done, you know, they've been able to perfect it

16:25

over the years. Obviously there's no complications that can

16:27

come from it, but I can only

16:29

imagine what this, this must have been like.

16:31

Yeah. Because Velma later wrote,

16:34

quote, I didn't know how to handle

16:36

my nerves. From my early childhood, when

16:38

anything upset me, it made me nervous and

16:40

afraid. All that got worse

16:43

after my hysterectomy. Hysterectomies

16:46

can drastically alter hormones. And at

16:48

the time hormone treatment wasn't common

16:50

and therapy and counseling also weren't common

16:53

options. So with no social, mental or

16:55

emotional outlets, Velma

16:57

began to bottle up her feelings and she

16:59

would have outbursts just like her father. She

17:02

also developed back pain from the operation. And

17:05

obviously this change in her mood affected her

17:07

family as well as her marriage. And

17:09

on top of this, by 1965, Thomas's

17:11

father had passed away and Thomas

17:14

had also gotten into a car accident. He

17:16

suffered moderate injuries, but he began using alcohol

17:18

as a painkiller. He began drinking more

17:21

than usual. And he also joined a civic

17:23

organization where all the members were

17:25

also big drinkers. Both Velma's

17:27

and Thomas's personalities changed over the years

17:30

and their problems caused endless arguments. Velma's

17:32

temper mix of Thomas's drinking made life at

17:35

home unbearable. By

17:37

the mid 1960s, they had also fallen on

17:39

hard times financially. Velma's first

17:41

crime was writing a bad check, which

17:44

was later discovered and she was

17:46

ordered to pay the money back. Meanwhile,

17:48

Thomas was arrested for drunk driving

17:50

and he ended up losing his

17:52

driver's license, which this also cost

17:54

him his job at driving delivery

17:56

trucks for the cola ball company.

17:59

He then began to and drinking even more than usual

18:01

and he was unemployed for the next several

18:04

months. And obviously this is putting a lot

18:06

of strain on the family. Velma's

18:09

back pain also got worse so

18:11

a doctor prescribed her painkillers and

18:13

she soon developed a drug addiction.

18:17

And this is really the moment where

18:19

from here on out, Velma's entire life

18:21

just begins spiraling into essentially just a

18:24

drug addiction for almost the entire rest

18:26

of her life. By

18:29

now their children were both teenagers and

18:31

Velma and Thomas were both abusing drugs

18:33

and alcohol at home so you can

18:36

imagine that. The

18:39

relationship only got more toxic as time went

18:41

on. Velma would lose her

18:43

temper at the slightest thing that Thomas did, kinda

18:46

just like her father. The kids would

18:48

often try to de-escalate the fighting but they

18:50

later claimed it was almost impossible to get

18:52

their mother to stop screaming. So

18:55

by the end of the 1960s Velma tried

18:57

to get Thomas into a rehab

18:59

program for his drinking but

19:02

she ignored her own addiction which

19:04

is kind of hypocritical right? She

19:07

had developed anxiety and began losing a

19:09

concerning amount of weight and one morning

19:11

in 1968 she

19:13

actually collapsed in the kitchen while

19:15

making breakfast. Thomas was

19:17

too drunk to help that early in

19:19

the morning so their son Ronnie had

19:22

to call his grandfather Murphy to come

19:24

over for help. Murphy ended

19:26

up driving Velma to the hospital. After

19:29

being admitted the doctors told her she

19:31

had experienced a nervous breakdown. She

19:34

was discharged a week later and given

19:36

a prescription for Librium and this is

19:38

a psychotropic drug used to treat anxiety

19:41

disorders. It's also habit

19:43

forming which is a problem. The

19:46

doctors also suggested mental health treatment

19:48

and professional help with her marriage

19:50

but she ignored both of those

19:52

suggestions. Back at home

19:55

she kept abusing her pain medication

19:57

and now along with the Librium.

20:00

She began taking far higher doses than

20:02

what she was prescribed, and she also

20:04

sought out multiple doctors at once to

20:06

get as many prescriptions as she could.

20:10

Meanwhile her marriage continued to

20:12

fail and by the end

20:14

of 1968, Thelma and Thomas just

20:16

barely spoke with each other. Thomas

20:19

would always try to get sober but he

20:21

would often relapse a few months later, and

20:24

this obviously made it hard to just hold down

20:26

a job. His behavior had

20:28

also become very strange the more he

20:30

drank. Sometimes

20:34

he would head to the garage, get

20:36

inside the family car and just rev

20:39

the engine until the gas tank was empty. If

20:43

another family member tried to come in and

20:45

stop him, he would become physically and verbally

20:47

abusive until they just left him alone and

20:49

he would usually pass out after these

20:51

drunken episodes. I'm curious if he did

20:54

this with the garage door shut. Like

20:56

10 minutes life. And if this had almost been like a suicide

20:59

attempt. Yeah, it does seem that

21:02

way. Cause like,

21:04

it's such a strange thing to do. Right.

21:07

Unless you're trying to create a lot of carbon

21:10

monoxide, you know? Right, yeah, I mean

21:12

that's a good theory. This

21:16

episode is brought to you by our good

21:18

friends over at Hell Fresh. As

21:20

you can probably tell by looking at Austin and I, we

21:22

love to eat. We can never fill

21:25

our stomachs. It feels like I am always

21:27

hungry. I am too. Doesn't

21:29

matter what time of day it is. If someone's like,

21:31

here's some food, I'm going to eat it. Doesn't matter.

21:34

Dude, me too. I go to

21:36

bed last night. It's like 11 30

21:38

and I'm like, Oh, I'm hungry. Get those cravings.

21:40

Yeah, I'm just always hungry. But

21:42

the other thing that I am always running

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breakfast, lunch, dinner, snacks,

22:45

late night dessert, whatever you want. I've always thought of

22:47

it as a dinner thing. But yeah, you know what,

22:49

I maybe I need to think about this a little

22:52

differently here. You do. You need

22:54

to replace whatever you're doing for breakfast and lunch

22:57

and get hell fresh because it is absolutely delicious

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and you will save so much money. I mean,

23:02

delivery fees these days, dude, out

23:04

of control. So ridiculous. So let hell

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free. So

23:28

by March of 1969, Velma had had enough, which is, I

23:33

don't know, still hypocritical that she's

23:35

like, I look at my drunk husband.

23:37

Meanwhile, she's popping a bunch of pills

23:40

and these teenage children

23:42

are just caught in the middle of all this.

23:45

So Velma takes the high road, she packs

23:47

a suitcase for her and her daughter Kim,

23:49

while Thomas was passed out drunk one day.

23:52

She played on staying with her parents

23:55

for a while indefinitely. Ronnie, who was

23:57

17, he probably had to mature pretty quickly in

23:59

this house. He ended up

24:01

staying behind with his father because he thought someone

24:03

needed to take care of him. Which

24:05

good god. Imagine being 17

24:08

and being like, my parents are

24:10

completely destructive. I need to

24:12

watch over my dad because he's a drunk. I

24:15

can't imagine this. So

24:17

Ronnie blames the

24:20

family's toxicity on his father's

24:22

drinking. His father then

24:24

blames his mother's pill addiction. He

24:27

wants to take responsibility here, but after

24:29

a long discussion that night with Ronnie, Thomas

24:32

finally agreed to try to get sober again.

24:35

And this, you know, this was several times

24:37

over. Velma and Kim

24:39

ended up returning to the home a few days

24:41

later, but like always, Thomas fell

24:43

off the wagon after only a week of

24:45

being sober and things just returned to exactly

24:47

how they used to be. By

24:50

April, Ronnie and Kim decided to get out of

24:52

the house for a while to be away from

24:54

their parents, which was probably a good

24:57

move. So they went to stay with

24:59

their grandparents on the morning of April 21st, 1969.

25:02

Thomas stumbled home from work and he was obviously

25:04

drunk again and he passed

25:06

out in bed. Velma left to

25:09

go shopping with her mother and make a trip to

25:11

the laundromat. When she returned home

25:13

later that day, smoke filled the house. The

25:16

bedroom carpet and the inside walls were

25:18

black with smoke damage and Thomas

25:20

was lying dead in the bedroom.

25:24

Only what had happened is Thomas had passed

25:26

out with a lit cigarette between his fingers

25:28

and it lit their bedroom carpet on fire.

25:31

At some point, Thomas woke up and tried

25:33

to put the flames out, but he passed

25:35

out from smoke inhalation and died soon after.

25:38

A family dog named termite and their cat

25:40

Sadie also died. Do you think there's

25:42

any foul play here? I don't know.

25:45

I mean, that story, I can just

25:47

see it playing out exactly that way. Yeah.

25:50

My thing is though, I do know,

25:52

especially with alcoholics. I don't know why

25:54

I know this, but especially with drunks

25:56

when they would smoke cigarettes in bed.

26:00

You know, there's always the threat of passing out

26:02

when you're drunk So they would actually hold the

26:04

cigarette butt in between their pinky and ring finger

26:07

Because supposedly when you pass out fall

26:10

asleep, you won't drop the cigarette

26:12

butt Oh, and your

26:14

hands are like naturally hold it. So

26:16

that's why I'm like he probably He

26:20

had probably passed out a million times

26:22

with a lit cigarette but

26:25

so that's I think there might be and Obviously

26:28

she's conveniently out of the house when this

26:30

happens too So I don't know something to

26:32

think about maybe a little bit suspicious here

26:35

Or what if you you know, you could still be

26:37

holding the cigarette But what if you like roll out

26:39

of bed or something, you know or through, you know

26:41

You're so drunk you start throwing up or something like

26:43

that and you like lean over and kind of roll

26:45

out onto the floor and you're Lit

26:48

cigarette. Yeah. I mean, I'd

26:50

be a hot cigarette to light the carpet

26:52

right supposedly so newer cigarettes

26:54

They automatically go out But

26:58

old cigarettes they would just keep burning. Oh,

27:00

wow. Yeah, I don't know why

27:02

I know someone I don't know smoking back. I'm not

27:04

even a smoker. I don't know why I know that

27:07

So even though Thomas and his

27:09

drinking problem was very problematic

27:11

for the family Velma and her children still grieved

27:14

over his death I mean ultimately

27:17

They still lost a loved one His life

27:19

insurance policy only barely covered the funeral costs

27:21

and now Velma had to work as a

27:23

machine operator in a cotton Mill and a

27:26

clerk at Belks department store to support her

27:28

family. So now working multiple jobs She'd

27:31

work here for the next several years and she

27:33

had become friends with a woman named Pauline Barfield

27:35

who worked next door to the Department store they

27:38

had known each other for years and soon became

27:40

best friends at some point

27:42

Pauline introduced Velma to her husband Jennings

27:45

Jennings was disabled and suffered from

27:47

emphysema and diabetes He

27:49

had retired from a career in the civil service

27:51

because of his failing health and not long after

27:53

Velma's husband had died Jennings wife

27:56

Pauline also died from an

27:58

unexpected cerebral hemorrhage which

28:00

devastated both Velma and Jennings.

28:04

They bonded over their grief and soon enough,

28:06

Velma and Jennings started a relationship of their

28:08

own and after just a few

28:10

months, Jennings proposed.

28:13

Velma later admitted that she wasn't in love

28:15

with him but still accepted the proposal. Which

28:18

that's all very odd to me. Yeah.

28:21

It's just, you know, what are the chances of

28:24

this playing out the way that it did? Yeah.

28:27

I mean, it's not a cerebral hemorrhage, which I guess

28:29

can happen but... Yeah. It's...

28:32

I think my biggest gripe with that is

28:34

Velma later admitting she was never in love

28:36

with him. That came from

28:38

her book and it's like... She saw money? Yeah.

28:42

And I mean... Companionship, I guess, too.

28:44

Yeah, but also, no, I think you're

28:46

right with the money because we know

28:48

Jennings is... He's disabled.

28:50

He has a bunch of health problems. He's a

28:52

bit older, so... Yeah. She

28:55

might have been looking at it like that. So that just

28:58

tells you right there, kind of this

29:00

parasitic mind state that... Yup. That

29:02

Velma is and she's constantly looking for the next

29:04

person that she can manipulate in order to get

29:07

what she wants or what she needs. Yup. Jennings

29:10

didn't drink and she knew he

29:12

wouldn't treat her poorly. And that was enough

29:14

for her to apparently marry him. But

29:17

again, she claimed that she never loved him. Despite

29:20

all this, on August 23rd, 1970, they got married. And

29:23

Velma later said, quote, I

29:26

was as unhappy married as

29:28

I had been alone. That

29:30

is cold, right? Then why are

29:32

you getting married there? Right.

29:35

Jennings health problems were worse than she had

29:37

realized according to her and

29:39

he rarely listened to doctors' advice to

29:41

get himself healthier. Velma

29:44

was also his caretaker at home.

29:47

Meanwhile, Velma began taking Valium every day

29:49

along with her other medication. I can

29:51

only imagine the mixture

29:54

of all these medications and the side effects of

29:56

that. I mean, Valium, I don't pretty sure each

29:58

don't want to take with especially other. other benzos

30:00

or other types of painkillers.

30:02

So I mean, you can only

30:05

imagine the first state of

30:07

being. Yeah. And I know, you know, back

30:09

then it's all, all the medical

30:11

records were paper and they didn't

30:14

always cross reference everything. So they're

30:16

like, they, that's why when you

30:18

go to the doctor, they're like, what other prescription

30:20

medications are you on? You have to fill that

30:22

in. Well, if she's not doing that, cause she's

30:24

drug seeking, then they're just like, okay, it's

30:27

not that bad if she's just on this one medication.

30:29

Right. That's all they know. Or for all we know,

30:31

she's going to different pharmacies and yeah, it

30:34

wasn't like there's a database that the pharmacists were able to

30:36

like check what other pharmacies she had

30:38

been to. Right. It's like, Oh, here you go. Just

30:40

getting a bunch of doctors to write a bunch of

30:42

prescriptions. The more

30:44

Jennings resisted his treatment, the more she

30:46

abused prescription drugs. She always found a

30:48

way to blame his health problems for

30:50

her drug abuse. Meanwhile, Ronnie graduated

30:53

from high school that spring and he started to work

30:55

at the coal company where his father used to work.

30:58

And by that fall, he was enrolled at the university

31:00

of South Carolina. Velma realized

31:02

that with Ronnie out of the house, she had

31:04

lost one of the people who had truly made

31:06

her happy. To make it worse, Ronnie was drafted

31:08

into the military a few months later during the

31:10

Vietnam war. After this Velma

31:12

fell into another spiral of depression and

31:15

destruction. She resented Jennings for his health

31:17

problems and only saw him as a burden. And

31:20

she soon wished he was dead. And

31:23

instead of just doing the normal thing and

31:26

divorcing him, Velma decided to

31:28

buy a bottle of arsenic based rat

31:30

poison. By mid March, 1971, Jennings

31:33

contacted the lawyer to seek out a divorce

31:35

after only being married for six months. But

31:38

by this time it was already too late. On

31:41

March 21st, Velma snuck the arsenic

31:43

in one of Jennings meals. With

31:46

the amount of research I've done in the poisonings

31:48

and killing people. You can write a book on

31:50

it. Yeah. And I gotta be

31:52

on some lists by now from just my

31:54

Google search history here, but I hope

31:57

I can inform everyone a little bit on what.

32:00

really happens and why people use

32:02

arsenic. It's actually, it's been called

32:04

the king of poisons. Wow.

32:07

And like many poisons, it's often extremely

32:09

hard to detect because if you're not

32:11

looking for it, you're really not gonna

32:14

know this is the cause. And because

32:16

it's a lot of poisons, all

32:19

the damage is done internally, right?

32:21

It's not always all this

32:23

external symptoms that you're seeing. Exactly.

32:26

And all of the side effects

32:28

are similar to just

32:30

other things. You see naturally like, oh, he's

32:32

just has this illness or this disease. So

32:35

it's very easy to write it off. So

32:38

in Velma's case, which we'll see, she

32:40

knew how to choose most of her

32:42

victims. So there was often no suspicion

32:45

when they died. Arsenic

32:47

is extremely toxic to humans.

32:49

It's mostly odorless and tasteless.

32:51

And Velma was essentially buying

32:53

it for about $1 a

32:55

bottle in the common form of

32:57

rat poison. So she could just go to

32:59

the local store, pick up some rat poison,

33:01

drop it in people's food and drink. It's

33:04

mostly odorless and tasteless. And

33:07

that's how she did it. So here's

33:10

the nitty gritty. Symptoms of rat

33:12

poisoning can kick in within

33:14

minutes, sometimes hours, depending on the

33:17

dose. And they usually end about

33:19

12 hours after exposure if it's

33:21

not already fatal. Sometimes

33:24

symptoms can last for days,

33:26

depending, especially if she's dosing

33:28

them over multiple days. Right.

33:31

So for trivalent arsenic, which is

33:33

what Velma was most likely using,

33:35

it has a corrosive effect. Sometimes

33:37

oral sores could be visible inside

33:39

the victim's mouth or throat. They

33:42

would have suffered from GI

33:44

bleeding and gastroenteritis. Big

33:47

word there, which causes nausea,

33:49

vomiting and diarrhea. Another

33:51

side effect is dysphagia, which

33:54

is where they have trouble swallowing and

33:57

a large dosage like the one Velma

33:59

had given. would cause

34:01

extremely violent reactions inside the

34:03

body. That is horrific. Yeah.

34:05

There could be hours or

34:08

sometimes days of extreme agony.

34:12

Dehydration and hypotension could also

34:14

develop which includes chest pain,

34:16

coughing, numbness, and tingling. The

34:18

body will eventually go into shock

34:20

and then cardiac arrest one to

34:22

four days after ingestion which then

34:24

would result in death. I

34:27

don't know if you've heard of this. I actually did know

34:29

this. This is strange.

34:31

One of the few ways that you

34:34

can identify arsenic poisoning without an autopsy

34:36

is they actually smell like garlic, like

34:38

on their breath, urine, and body tissue.

34:41

But besides that, arsenic poisoning

34:43

is very discreet and there's

34:46

usually no suspicion unless if

34:48

people somehow connect the dots here. Yeah.

34:51

Well, how would you even know that

34:54

it was arsenic even with smelling garlic? I mean, they

34:56

could just eat a bunch of garlic bread or garlicy

34:58

pasta. True. I

35:01

mean, garlic's a very potent herb. Yeah.

35:04

It's just like a Jennings comes in who

35:06

has emphysema, diabetes, he's got all these health

35:09

issues, he can't work. All

35:11

of a sudden his body starts to break down. Oh, whatever.

35:14

He smells like garlic. Wouldn't think twice about

35:16

it that this guy is suffering from some

35:18

illness. Well, then look at his wife. His

35:21

wife is a wholesome woman. Churchgoing.

35:25

Caretaking for him. Nobody would

35:27

suspect that she'd be doing

35:29

something that could possibly be causing this. And

35:34

I think the knowledge around poisonings

35:36

was just obviously far less

35:38

than what we know today.

35:41

But even today it seems like it takes the

35:44

authorities a while sometimes to figure it out

35:46

or for an autopsy to be

35:48

done before they actually know what's going on. Yeah. Like

35:51

Diane Stoudy with the antifreeze. I mean, it took

35:53

several victims and it ended up being the Reverend

35:55

that had to call in the police to be

35:57

like, hey, you need to start connecting the dots.

36:00

something's going on. Just that hard to detect.

36:02

Yep. Jennings got to

36:04

the point where he couldn't breathe and Velma

36:06

rushed him to Cape Fear Valley Hospital. It's

36:09

unknown if she felt guilty, if

36:11

she just panicked or if she was putting on an

36:13

act, but Jennings made it to the hospital,

36:16

but unfortunately he died the following

36:18

morning from heart complications and

36:20

he was just 54 years old. No

36:23

one was suspicious of poisoning because

36:25

Jennings had suffered from failing health for years.

36:28

So there was no investigation, which

36:31

is exactly how Velma planned it. She

36:33

knew no one would second guess Jennings death. Velma

36:36

later admitted that when she watched her victims

36:38

die, she felt nothing,

36:41

which that's a scary thought. And

36:44

it's scary to admit that too. Yes.

36:47

And I don't know if that's, you

36:49

know, some positive self-reflection or if she's

36:51

just like, I,

36:54

yeah, I felt nothing. It's just a fact for her.

36:56

Yeah. Velma was relieved

36:58

that Jennings was gone, but now that

37:00

she was alone, she fell into a

37:02

depression and continued to abuse prescription medication.

37:05

And as you can imagine, her financial

37:07

problems also grew. Meanwhile, Ronnie tried to

37:10

get a deferment for his military enlistment and was

37:12

about to graduate high school. Velma

37:14

then experienced an overdose, which

37:16

she later admitted was a quote,

37:19

halfhearted suicide attempt. After

37:21

this, she struggled to show up for work. And after

37:23

seven years of working at the department store, she was

37:25

fired in December of 1971. Now she was living exclusively

37:29

off of Jennings life insurance money.

37:32

When she ran out of money, she moved

37:34

back in with her parents, Lillian Murphy in

37:36

1972. She knows her

37:38

father's health was now failing and he suffered

37:41

from respiratory problems. He'd later be diagnosed

37:43

with lung cancer. And by the time they discovered

37:45

it, it was already too late. As

37:47

he went into hospice, Velma found another

37:49

job in Rayford to help her mother

37:51

with bills. Murphy died later that

37:53

May. And again, Velma's addiction

37:56

worsened by January 1973. She overdosed

37:58

again. She

38:00

also began stealing any pills she could find in

38:02

her friends or neighbors houses. She

38:04

could no longer function without

38:07

medication. And Velma's relationship

38:09

with her mother Lily worsened. She

38:11

resented her for a few different reasons, the

38:13

first being that Lily expected Velma to take

38:15

care of her and do household chores whenever

38:17

she demanded. The second was

38:19

because any time Lily mentioned the old days

38:22

in Velma's childhood, she would say how great

38:24

they were and she wouldn't bother

38:26

mentioning the years of abuse that she

38:28

went through from her father Murphy.

38:31

Meanwhile her daughter Kim was now engaged to

38:33

be married, leaving Velma and her mother all

38:35

alone. Velma couldn't afford

38:37

a wedding for her daughter and she needed

38:40

more pills so she took out several loans

38:42

worth $2000 against her mother's house and

38:44

car behind her back. She

38:46

would then use most of this money for prescriptions.

38:49

In December 1974 the bank began sending Lily

38:51

notices of payment but she was confused and

38:53

thought they were old notices so she just

38:55

threw them away. Lily

38:57

Velma knew her mother was going to find out about

39:00

her basically stealing money so this is

39:02

how she justified poisoning her mother. One

39:05

day in mid December of that year Velma

39:07

picked up her mother's prescription bottles. She also

39:10

picked up another bottle of arsenic. She

39:12

convinced herself she was going to make her mother

39:14

ill. Velma then

39:16

poisoned her mother's food and

39:18

it made her sick for a few days. But

39:21

on December 30th 1974 she poisoned

39:23

her mother again with more

39:25

arsenic this time. Soon after

39:27

Lily began complaining of intense stomach pain

39:29

and began vomiting Velma called

39:32

her mother's doctor to pretend she was concerned. From

39:34

her symptoms the doctor thought that Lily might have

39:37

just had the stomach flu so

39:39

he just called in a prescription saying

39:41

that a visit wasn't even necessary. Velma

39:44

then called her brother Olive and convinced him that their mother

39:46

was sick but she didn't know why so they

39:48

called her an ambulance and got her to the hospital. Even

39:51

when they got there the other doctors told Velma

39:53

and Olive that they had seen a lot of

39:56

stomach flu cases recently and they

39:58

thought that's what Lily was suffering from. She

40:00

had diarrhea, vomiting, and nausea, just

40:02

like the others. But a few hours

40:04

later, Lily died of heart

40:07

complications, and Velma was

40:09

later seen weeping at the funeral, which is just…

40:12

Come on. Feels like an act to

40:14

me. Yeah. Just to sell the

40:16

story, you know? Yeah. She

40:19

knows damn well how her mother died.

40:22

Yeah, it's just a form of writing

40:24

that narrative and manipulating people.

40:28

So after Lily's death, Velma moved in

40:30

with her daughter, Kim, and her new

40:32

husband. Velma's drug abuse was

40:34

so bad by now that it caused,

40:36

you know, endless problems in this household,

40:38

so Kim and Ronnie began flushing their

40:40

mother's pills down the toilet when they

40:42

discovered them. According

40:44

to Kim, she hid pill bottles in

40:47

the washer, in rolls of toilet paper,

40:49

in her bra, out in

40:51

the yard, once she even hid some

40:53

in her hair rollers. Velma

40:55

just always knew how to get more

40:57

pills and find new hiding spots, and

40:59

Kim later admitted that she had seen

41:01

her mother passed out hundreds

41:03

of times while on health.

41:07

One day, Velma returned to her mother's

41:09

house to clear out some things. She

41:11

discovered her late husband's old checkbook, and

41:14

she used it to write bad checks to the

41:16

pharmacy to get more pills. But

41:18

this quickly caught up to her. Two days

41:20

later, the sheriff's deputies showed up

41:22

looking for Velma. Police

41:25

told her that if she just repaid the money,

41:27

there wouldn't be any issues. But

41:29

obviously, she didn't have the money, so that day,

41:32

Velma ended up overdosing again, trying to

41:34

end her life. But she

41:36

woke up in the hospital, and she had

41:38

actually broken her collarbone from the fall as

41:40

she had passed out. And

41:43

as she was recovering in the hospital,

41:45

the deputy sheriff returned with an arrest

41:47

warrant. She later pled guilty to

41:49

several counts of writing bad checks. She

41:51

was sentenced to six months at

41:54

North Carolina's Correctional Center for Women

41:56

in Raleigh. She only

41:58

served less than four months before being

42:00

released for good behavior. And

42:02

it doesn't surprise me at all,

42:05

Velma just sells the good Christian

42:07

woman narrative and off you go.

42:10

Right when she got out, she moved back in

42:12

with Kim and her husband, but she ended up

42:14

stealing a check from her son-in-law and used it

42:16

to fill up her description at the pharmacy. So

42:18

clearly she learned nothing from this. She then found

42:21

out her daughter was pregnant. With

42:23

a baby on the way, Kim and her husband

42:25

decided to gently kick Velma out of the house. So

42:28

to find a new place to stay,

42:30

Velma made arrangements to offer in-home care

42:32

to the elderly in

42:34

exchange for room and board. She's

42:37

so crafty. Yeah. She's like,

42:39

Oh, I don't have any money, so I have no way

42:41

to live. But you know what? I'll, I'm

42:43

pretty good at this caretaking thing. So

42:46

I'm going to go and sell myself doing that. And

42:48

like as a, I don't know, middle-aged

42:50

woman, church-going woman, just

42:53

want to help the elderly. Got the look for

42:55

sure. Yeah, she does. She definitely has the look

42:57

going for her. She

42:59

soon found a couple, 94 year

43:02

old Montgomery and his wife, 84 year

43:04

old Dolly Edwards. Montgomery had lost

43:06

his legs from complications due to diabetes,

43:08

and he was also blind. In

43:10

November, 1975, Dolly wanted to bring

43:12

her husband home from the hospital and

43:15

they knew they needed care because he was

43:17

bedridden. Dolly was a cancer survivor

43:19

and wouldn't be able to care for him by herself.

43:21

So the county nurse recommended

43:24

Velma Barfield. Velma

43:27

got the room and board she needed as well as

43:29

$75 a week from the Edwards. While taking

43:32

care of them, Velma began to see the same

43:34

type of characteristics of her mother and Dolly. Dolly

43:36

would tell her what to do and she was never satisfied

43:39

with how Velma did things. Ronnie

43:41

overheard a handful of their arguments and even

43:43

admitted that they sounded exactly like the arguments

43:45

between Velma and Lily before she died. Some

43:48

of their arguments were over how Dolly talked about

43:50

her nephew, Roland Stewart Taylor, who

43:53

went by Stewart. Velma had

43:55

met him a few times and thought he was

43:57

nice, but Dolly only talked poorly about him. She

43:59

often complain about his drinking problem and as it

44:01

turned out, Velma always argued with

44:04

Dolly because she had a romantic interest

44:06

in Stewart and wanted to defend him.

44:09

Stewart eventually asked Velma out on a few dates

44:11

but then he stopped coming by the house entirely.

44:14

When Velma mentioned it to Dolly she told

44:16

her that Stewart had gotten back with his

44:18

wife after being separated and returned home with

44:20

his children. On January 29, 1977

44:24

doctors claimed that Montgomery passed away from natural causes

44:26

so it was just Velma and Dolly left in

44:28

the house just like it was with her mother.

44:31

Velma later admitted that every time Dolly complained she

44:33

had the urge to scream at her and

44:36

even physically harm her. So that's

44:38

what she ended up doing. Just

44:40

like the others, Velma poisoned

44:42

Dolly. Dolly was in

44:45

excruciating pain for almost 24 hours and

44:47

the usual symptoms kicked in. Lots

44:49

of vomiting and diarrhea. Velma

44:52

had watched the entire thing unfold, all

44:54

the while feeling nothing. And

44:57

Dolly died the following morning, March 1, 1977. Since

45:01

Dolly was elderly, no one became suspicious.

45:05

Velma again was a church-going woman who knew

45:07

how to blend in. With both

45:09

of the Edwards dead, Velma moved on to

45:11

her next victims and found more people looking

45:13

for live-in care. They were 80-year-old

45:15

John Henry Lee and his wife, 76-year-old,

45:19

record Lee. Record had just

45:21

broken her leg and John couldn't take care of her

45:23

so in came Velma.

45:26

She moved in with them in late April,

45:28

1977 and she immediately found them annoying. She

45:31

said they argued quite a bit. After

45:33

a few months of working for them, Velma ended up hating

45:35

them just like the others. And she

45:37

fantasized about quitting but she needed the money.

45:41

To continue her drug addiction, she stole

45:43

John's checkbook to pay for her prescription

45:46

medication. Record and John

45:48

eventually got their bank statement and noticed the activity.

45:51

Someone had been writing unauthorized checks for $100 to $200 at

45:53

a time. So

45:56

they were like what's going on here and called

45:58

the police. find

46:00

a name other than John's connected to

46:02

the checks. The only suspect they

46:04

could think of was a good Christian woman, Velma Barfield,

46:06

who was living with the couple, but

46:08

they couldn't imagine her doing something like

46:10

that. So the investigation

46:13

ended. Wow, great investigating.

46:15

Like, well, she's a good churchgoing woman.

46:17

She doesn't look like she'd do it.

46:19

Yeah, that's it. Must've

46:21

been John, he's old, doesn't remember him.

46:23

Writing the checks, so it's probably just

46:25

not worth her time. That's probably the

46:27

conversations they had, but it's wild. It's

46:29

like, hey, we only have one suspect

46:31

here, but no way could it

46:33

be her. Let's forget about it. And this

46:35

happens a lot with these poison cases. Like,

46:38

oh, there's no way that person would do anything harmful

46:41

to them. She's getting

46:43

paid to take care of them. How could she? Right.

46:46

But seeing how the police were now getting involved,

46:48

Velma thought it was time to buy more arsenic.

46:51

Just like she did with Edwards and all of her

46:53

other previous victims, Velma told herself that all she wanted

46:55

to do was make her victims

46:57

sick. She's

46:59

trying to downplay this. She's like, I'm just gonna make them

47:02

sick, and then it's the sickness that's

47:04

gonna kill them. Not me. I

47:06

know, she's manipulating herself, right? She's building

47:09

this narrative to trick sick, and then

47:11

the sickness will just spiral out of

47:13

control. She's just lying to herself here.

47:16

And she'll stick with this lie forever.

47:19

She convinced herself that she, I

47:21

never wanted to kill anyone. I just

47:23

wanted to make them sick to the point where they don't know

47:25

what's going on and can't do anything. It's

47:29

just a bunch of bullshit. Yep. She

47:31

also claimed that she did

47:33

this in order to create enough

47:35

time for them to

47:38

be distracted from her forging

47:40

their checks, which is just

47:42

like, okay. I mean, I believe

47:44

that she did poison them over the checks,

47:46

but I don't think she did it without

47:49

realizing that they would die. No, she already

47:51

knew. She's already done this before. She already

47:53

knows what's gonna happen. Right. It's

47:57

just hard to think that she's like, oh, you know. I

48:00

don't know anything about arsenic. I never knew how dangerous

48:02

that was like I'm sure even

48:04

back then there was a label

48:07

on the balls was like fatal impingestion

48:09

with like sculling crumbs on the plastic

48:11

poison icon you know so

48:14

shortly after Belma

48:16

poisoned John's tea and coffee multiple times three

48:18

in fact on April 29 1977 and again

48:21

the symptoms were the same as her other

48:23

victims up until

48:27

then he had been in good health and he was even

48:29

doing chores around the house but soon

48:31

she was taking them to the hospital as the

48:33

poison kicked in doctors thought

48:35

that again he just had the stomach flu

48:38

and luckily he ended up getting better and he was actually released

48:40

from the hospital on May 2nd 1977

48:43

but throughout the rest of the month he kept

48:45

getting sick. But Belma surprise

48:49

just kept on poisoning him but

48:52

she wasn't giving him lethal doses because I

48:54

think she's like oh I'm just gonna draw

48:56

this out so it doesn't look

48:58

suspicious and after a month

49:00

of on and off again pain vomiting and

49:02

diarrhea John went back to the hospital and

49:05

by this point it was too late the

49:07

doctor said he was critically ill it

49:09

started to turn blue even and his skin was

49:12

cold and wet he

49:14

was also acting confused and unresponsive

49:17

and sadly the next day on June 4th 1977 John

49:20

passed away and no autopsy

49:22

was performed before his burial a

49:25

few days after John's death Stuart Taylor came to visit

49:27

and he said he was divorcing his wife and

49:30

was just quote-unquote checking in on

49:32

Belma. I spent a few

49:34

hours catching up and after his visit they

49:36

started up their romantic relationship again meanwhile Belma

49:38

continued to take care of record after

49:41

a few more months Belma quit her job and

49:43

became a nurse's aide at a nearby nursing home

49:45

which is like god only

49:47

they knew who they were hiring. Yep and she's

49:50

just onto the next one she's like oh

49:52

that's the ultimate place to go you

49:55

know plenty of victims there to take advantage of.

49:58

Belma worked a third shift and made a more money

50:00

than she had ever before so she

50:02

was able to move into a trailer home finally.

50:06

By now I'm just disgusted

50:08

because it's not only has she

50:11

killed multiple people now and she's manipulative

50:13

but it's also like she

50:15

doesn't feel anything when they die. Also

50:18

I'm gonna kill this man, start dating

50:20

his nephew and also continue to take

50:22

care of his wife for a little

50:25

bit after that before quitting. But then

50:27

just like pretend that everything's fine. It's

50:30

like you have nothing on your conscience

50:32

and that terrifies me. And

50:34

I think this was even

50:37

more about getting people out

50:39

of her way. I think

50:41

it was about money and about getting the

50:43

drugs she wanted but I think it was

50:45

also anybody that she just didn't

50:48

like or felt like were

50:51

prohibiting her from being happy with the people

50:53

she wanted to be with. She's just like

50:55

oh just take him out. Yeah. This woman

50:58

killed her own mother so I can't put

51:00

anything past her. Yeah. So

51:02

as she kept dating Stewart she noticed

51:05

something about him that bothered her. She

51:07

would see him for only a few days at

51:09

a time and then he'd disappear for a week.

51:12

Turns out he still had a

51:14

drinking problem and during these weeks

51:16

he would often go on benders but Velma

51:19

kept dating him anyway. They

51:21

would go out on weekend vacations

51:23

and despite his drinking problem Stewart I

51:25

guess made Velma happy.

51:29

By the fall of 1977 they

51:31

became engaged. Now Ronnie

51:34

and Kim thought this was a

51:36

terrible idea. Their mother had

51:38

already been married to an alcoholic before

51:41

Thomas which was their father and it

51:43

ended terribly right? But Velma tried

51:45

to convince them that hey look this time

51:47

was different. Stewart was working

51:50

on getting sober plus Stewart's divorce wouldn't

51:52

be finalized until the following May so

51:54

look there was still time to get

51:57

his act together. She

51:59

also knew how to manipulate Stuart. And

52:01

one example was that Stuart never went

52:03

to church, but his friends started noticing

52:05

that ever since he started dating Velma,

52:07

he was just this hardcore Christian. She

52:09

would get him to go to church

52:11

two to three times a week. And

52:14

here's an even stranger example of

52:16

Velma's manipulation. So in November of 1977,

52:19

police showed up at Velma's

52:23

trailer after a friend found her with

52:25

her wrists and ankles duct taped in

52:27

her bedroom. She also had tape across

52:30

her mouth. So according to

52:32

Velma, she had gotten up that morning

52:34

and headed to the bathroom to shower.

52:36

She said that a strange man had

52:38

broken into her trailer. He threw a

52:40

towel over her head, duct taped her

52:42

and secured her to the bed posts.

52:46

But when police showed up, they looked around.

52:48

There's no sign of forced entry.

52:51

Velma hadn't been assaulted besides being tied to

52:53

the bed. And there were

52:55

also no signs of a robbery. So

52:58

obviously this was all staged

53:00

by Velma, especially to get

53:02

Stewart's attention. And soon

53:04

enough, he comes running, he races over to the trailer

53:07

to check on her. He said it

53:09

was too dangerous for her to live alone. So look,

53:11

Velma, come, come move in with me over

53:14

in Lumberton. So now she's got a

53:16

place to stay. She doesn't have to, you

53:18

know, use her money towards her trailer any longer.

53:21

She gets to move in with him. And

53:23

of course, I mean, he has his own money.

53:25

He's got his own checkbooks and she knows this.

53:28

So their relationship only got worse

53:30

from there. Velma used his

53:33

checkbooks to fill her prescriptions, like always.

53:35

And Stewart noticed the bank statements by

53:37

December, which is like, of course he

53:39

did. I think

53:42

she's getting bolder here. Stewart's not elderly.

53:44

He's with it. He

53:46

checks his bank statements, right? But she's still

53:48

bold enough to steal from him. So

53:51

by December, he threatens to go

53:53

to the police if it

53:55

happens again. At 45 years old,

53:59

Velma tried to escape. Dave Stewart was oppressing

54:01

me by moving in with her

54:03

son Ronnie, but Ronnie was

54:05

living with his wife and child at the

54:07

time, and they didn't want her around

54:10

because obviously her drug addiction, her erratic

54:12

behavior, and she

54:14

was extremely heartbroken and enraged over

54:16

this. By January 1978, Velma

54:19

was back living with Stewart, she

54:21

quit her job and was briefly

54:24

hospitalized for her drug abuse problems.

54:27

She had no money and she

54:29

began stealing more checks from Stewart,

54:31

thinking that maybe his earlier threat of going

54:33

to the police was just an empty threat. And

54:37

then he threatens to go to the police again, so Velma,

54:40

what does she do? She decides to get

54:42

rid of him the same way she got

54:44

rid of everyone else. She

54:47

mixed arsenic into Stewart's beer,

54:49

cereal, and tea. He

54:51

became ill while they were at a

54:53

church service in Fayetteville. God,

54:55

that's just so callous. I

54:58

just have a picture in my head, her sitting

55:00

down for breakfast with Stewart. She

55:02

just made two bowls of cereal, she

55:04

obviously knows which bowl has the arsenic

55:06

in it, she's sitting down eating her

55:08

cereal across from Stewart while he's sitting

55:11

there eating arsenic and

55:14

breakfast. And then we're going to casually go

55:16

to church, and that was probably strategic, knowing

55:18

that the symptoms were going to kick in

55:20

in public. She now has

55:22

all these witnesses being like, oh yeah, he

55:25

fell violently ill in front of us. No

55:28

one was seeing Velma do anything to

55:30

him there, so it's just like, oh,

55:33

he's sick. And she's like, oh, my husband.

55:36

She's this endearing wife

55:38

that's worried about her

55:40

husband's illness and everybody gets

55:42

to see her in this positive light.

55:44

Exactly. I feel so. Very

55:46

manipulative. Have

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55:53

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wherever you get your

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podcast today. So

56:52

when they got to the hospital, just like you

56:54

were saying, Velma acted like she had been trying

56:56

to nurse Stewart back to hell. She

56:58

said she thought it was maybe

57:01

something he had eaten earlier in

57:03

the day. Which is crazy. What?

57:05

She's being honest there. She's like,

57:07

oh, maybe he ate something. Yeah,

57:10

the arsenic that you gave him. What, the

57:12

moldy cereal you gave him? Yeah, right. Doesn't

57:14

make any sense. Yeah. And

57:16

just like a lot of the others, they

57:18

diagnosed him with gastroenteritis, which as I said

57:20

earlier, that's just one of

57:22

the most common symptoms of arsenic

57:24

toxicity. But they didn't know this

57:26

was the cause at the time. They ended

57:29

up just giving Stewart some medication and they

57:31

ended up sending him home where Velma

57:33

continued to poison him. So

57:35

clearly nobody's connecting the dots.

57:37

The hospital, the doctors, police,

57:40

nobody's even remotely aware

57:42

of what's actually going on at this point.

57:44

Nope. On February 3rd, 1978,

57:47

Velma rushed him back to the

57:49

hospital and Stewart ended up dying

57:51

within an hour at

57:53

the funeral. Velma was invited to ride in

57:55

the family car to the burial plot. Up

57:58

until now, she had attended every free

58:00

one of her victims' funerals. She knew

58:03

exactly how to keep the victims' families

58:05

closed so she wouldn't attract

58:07

attention, and again, she was seen

58:09

crying at the funeral to blend

58:11

in. I just

58:13

have to wonder if anybody, like I wonder

58:15

if her kids are even like, this

58:18

is really fucking bizarre. Yeah, which

58:21

we'll see. It's because now if

58:23

you think about it, uh, Stewart,

58:26

so all of her other victims up

58:28

until now, pretty elderly

58:30

or they had health complications,

58:32

Stewart, perfectly healthy. Gets

58:35

the stomach flu and then that... Dunzo?

58:38

Yeah. But, so

58:40

here's where, here's where finally

58:43

we'll start to see. Yeah, Stewart's

58:45

56 at the time of his death and

58:48

he was a heavy drinker, but again, a lot

58:50

of people were drinking alcohol at

58:53

this point in time. And he also had no

58:55

other major health concerns. The doctors

58:57

and Stewart's family were shocked and

59:00

even confused over his death. Plus

59:02

Stewart's aunt and uncle, Dolly in Montgomery,

59:04

had just died the same way

59:06

the year before. So

59:08

the family made a very wise choice

59:11

and agreed to have an autopsy done. Not

59:14

long after, a phone call came into the

59:16

local police department claiming that there were several

59:19

murders disguised as natural deaths, which

59:21

at first police thought that this was just

59:23

a prank call, but the caller mentioned the

59:25

victims by name, including Stewart and Velma's mother,

59:27

Lily. And supposedly the caller

59:29

was one of Velma's sisters, which thank

59:31

God. Right. And I'm

59:33

glad it was someone in the family, someone closed,

59:36

because it's like, you someone has

59:38

to connect the dots at some point. But

59:40

it's like, huh, stranger over

59:42

these last few years, people who interact

59:44

with my sister are constantly

59:46

dying the same way. So it

59:49

was bound to happen and good on her sister

59:51

for calling that in. And I,

59:53

I would have to imagine that police

59:55

took that tip more seriously

59:58

because it was coming from Velma. sister versus

1:00:00

like if it's just an anonymous caller, somebody

1:00:02

completely unrelated, you know, somebody just from the

1:00:05

church or something, which even then that would

1:00:07

have been good. But I think it

1:00:10

really got police's attention because it was Velma's

1:00:12

own sister's like, Hey guys, like something's

1:00:15

up here. Something's very weird about all these

1:00:17

deaths. So this forced the police

1:00:19

to take a much deeper look into

1:00:22

what was actually going on with these other

1:00:24

victims. And the case gained

1:00:26

immediate priority. At first, no one believed

1:00:28

that Velma Barfield who had a good

1:00:30

reputation, you know, good church, going

1:00:32

woman took care of the elderly could

1:00:35

have ever done something like this.

1:00:38

After a few delays in a

1:00:40

lengthy examination process, lab technicians noticed

1:00:43

some abnormalities during Stewart's autopsy, but

1:00:45

no one could identify what was actually wrong with

1:00:47

Stewart. It wasn't until North

1:00:49

Carolina's chief medical examiner, Richard Hudson

1:00:51

Jr. got ahold of the results

1:00:53

and realized it had to have

1:00:55

been a few arsenic poisoning. A

1:00:58

few more tests were needed in order to confirm this.

1:01:01

On March 10th, a little over a month

1:01:03

after Stewart passed away Velma was visited by

1:01:05

Detective Benson Phillips from the Lumberton police department.

1:01:08

And he brought her in for questioning. Many

1:01:11

of the people in her life had

1:01:13

symptoms of gastroenteritis when they died. And

1:01:15

this was the first time police seriously

1:01:17

considered her as a suspect. When

1:01:19

they got her back to the interrogation room, and

1:01:22

only imagine how Velma act shocked.

1:01:25

Like what? Why am I here? Yeah, no

1:01:27

way. She even started

1:01:29

crying and told officers she didn't

1:01:31

kill anyone. But on March 16th,

1:01:33

the final results of Stewart's autopsy came in,

1:01:36

confirming he had died from arsenic

1:01:38

poisoning. When

1:01:40

detectives brought this information to Stewart's family,

1:01:43

his daughter, Alice, told them about Velma's

1:01:45

forged checks, which gave her a motive.

1:01:48

And at that point, Detective Benson

1:01:50

then arrested Velma. And when

1:01:52

he told her that they were exuming the bodies

1:01:54

of her previous victims, that's

1:01:56

when Velma realized I've

1:01:59

been caught. And. He immediately confessed

1:02:01

to killing her mother lily. And.

1:02:03

Her elderly employers, Dolly John.

1:02:06

Where. She said it was an accident. Silly.

1:02:08

Wanted to make them sick which. Nobody's.

1:02:11

Buying that a gas and it's like

1:02:13

yeah, you did make them sick and

1:02:16

they died like I know. It's

1:02:18

weird. She just tries to convince herself and

1:02:20

everybody else that this is just like putting

1:02:22

our way of like not accepting that she's

1:02:25

a killer, right? Yeah, And. And

1:02:27

her mind, you know, in her. You know?

1:02:29

she's probably got this demented view of her

1:02:31

faith and she's like a can't be a

1:02:33

killer Yeah, Fillers. Ill. Go to

1:02:36

Hell is going to help or it.

1:02:38

So I just made them sick which

1:02:40

is not as bad. It's yeah, some

1:02:42

city rosa cognitive dissonance either. In.

1:02:44

Again, like imagine this

1:02:47

woman's. Mental. State. Aren't.

1:02:49

You know, on prescription pills everyday

1:02:51

And true she's probably and. Suffering.

1:02:54

From severe. Disillusioned,

1:02:56

Yeah, that's a great point group. Yeah,

1:02:58

that's good note to make years that

1:03:00

you know. For the last several years

1:03:02

all these murders she had been addicted

1:03:04

to pills. The. Autopsy of

1:03:06

the zoom body of her late husband.

1:03:09

Jennings would also wintershall traces of arsenic.

1:03:11

But. She denied killing him. The.

1:03:14

Bodies of John Dolly in her mother Lily

1:03:16

also. Showed. Traces of arsenic.

1:03:18

Authority, Confessions and. Traces

1:03:21

of arsenic. She. Was only indicted

1:03:23

on one count of first degree murder for

1:03:25

Stuart Taylor. His. Case had the

1:03:27

most compelling evidence and they only need one

1:03:30

murder conviction to put her on death row

1:03:32

in North Carolina. Velma wasn't

1:03:34

present for indictment because she was

1:03:36

in the hospital for an extended

1:03:38

psychological examination. A psychiatrist doctor Bob

1:03:40

Rollins later determined she was competence

1:03:42

and trial. Sending. It's a very. Important.

1:03:46

Point. This case. Because. On.

1:03:48

May fifth, Nineteen Seventy Eight Them A did. Try.

1:03:51

To plead not guilty by reason of

1:03:53

insanity. Which. Doesn't surprise me

1:03:55

and all that she went that route. And.

1:03:58

her trial began on november twenty said in

1:04:00

1978. The prosecutor, Joe Freeman Britt

1:04:02

Jr. was confident he had an open and

1:04:05

shut case. He even skipped his opening statements

1:04:07

and went straight to his first witness. Each

1:04:22

witness brought onto the stand testified

1:04:24

a piece of the story of

1:04:26

Velma either forging checks abusing drugs

1:04:28

or killing Stewart. Those who testified

1:04:31

for the defense explained that Velma grew up

1:04:33

in a toxic household and later developed mental

1:04:35

illness and drug addiction. Which is

1:04:37

true, but that doesn't

1:04:39

mean you go and kill people. Right,

1:04:41

so do a lot of people. Right, and a

1:04:43

lot of people don't end up being

1:04:45

a murderer, right? The defense argued

1:04:47

that the drugs caused her to fall

1:04:50

into a quote, psychotic manic state, and

1:04:52

she wasn't in control during the murder.

1:04:55

When Velma later took the stand and claimed she only

1:04:57

wanted to make her victims sick, not kill them, she

1:04:59

said she just needed for them to be sick long

1:05:01

enough to cover up the thefts and

1:05:04

so that she could pay the money back. Like,

1:05:07

come on, who's buying that? Like she's

1:05:09

just taking out loans? Then why not

1:05:11

just go ask them for a loan?

1:05:13

Right, and I think what they're trying

1:05:15

to do here is like, oh look,

1:05:17

it's not first degree. This is,

1:05:19

these were accidental, right? She was, yes

1:05:21

she was doing something malicious, no

1:05:24

this wasn't the intended outcome. It's

1:05:26

like, give me a break. There's

1:05:28

pre-meditation written all over this.

1:05:30

Yes, and she had several other

1:05:32

victims which I know was a little bit of

1:05:34

a contentious part of

1:05:36

the trial because they did try and bring in

1:05:39

family members from other victims, but then

1:05:41

the defense kept shutting it down saying

1:05:43

like, look, this is only the trial

1:05:46

of Stewart. Right. So don't bring in any

1:05:49

of the other victims cases because this is

1:05:51

about Stewart, but it's like even the prosecution

1:05:53

was like, look, This plays

1:05:55

into all this. She has killed countless

1:05:57

other people, So you're trying to build.

1:06:00

This narrative of it accidental death, It's

1:06:02

just which I maybe would have worked. With.

1:06:04

Her first victim, right? if that was what

1:06:07

she's being tried for. Agree. But by this

1:06:09

point you're being tried for the murder of

1:06:11

sewer and it is. Very. Clear

1:06:13

yeah, but this is premeditated. First, Agree.

1:06:15

Murder? Yeah on. Like are some. Yeah.

1:06:18

I don't It's a complete. Shot

1:06:20

in the dark. For her defense, I'm hampshire like I

1:06:23

don't know how to defend. His first

1:06:25

and like out assist either you're

1:06:27

insane. You know here. Are.

1:06:30

Your mind basically. And that's why you you

1:06:32

did as. Or.

1:06:35

Know. What? Else is there

1:06:37

Yeah other than oh you didn't know

1:06:39

about are snakes and accident might have

1:06:41

And get this, this is wild as

1:06:44

a prosecution gave, they're closing statements. Download.

1:06:46

Begin clapping sarcastically.

1:06:50

Imagine bad idea worse. But.

1:06:54

Job or it was right the whole time.

1:06:56

He did have an open and shut case

1:06:58

because thelma's trial ended after only one week.

1:07:01

And. The jury only deliberated for an

1:07:03

hour while they're like, yeah, come

1:07:05

on guys, This is pretty obvious

1:07:07

here. They found Velma guilty of

1:07:09

first degree murder of. And. During

1:07:12

the penalty phase, they deliberated for three

1:07:14

more hours and they voted in favor

1:07:16

of them are being executed for her

1:07:18

cry. Job

1:07:20

or it later said quote, if there's

1:07:23

ever been a case deserving imposition

1:07:25

of the ultimate penalty, This.

1:07:27

Is it? During. The sentencing

1:07:29

velma showed no emotion. She sat

1:07:31

there in silence chewing gum. Sitting.

1:07:34

A few rows behind her, her daughter,

1:07:36

Kim, burst into tears. Velma.

1:07:39

Officially became the second woman on

1:07:41

North Carolina's death row since capital

1:07:44

punishment was reinstated the year before.

1:07:46

And she soon became known as

1:07:48

quote. Death. Row Granny. She

1:07:52

claims she wouldn't appeal and she

1:07:54

was quote ready to meet God.

1:07:56

She said quote. I know

1:07:58

people are saying oh. Poor old

1:08:00

Velma sitting up there on death row.

1:08:02

But I wish they wouldn't because I

1:08:05

know when the final breath comes it

1:08:07

will just be Goodbye Here and Hello

1:08:09

on the other side. I.

1:08:11

Have choi Unspeakable.

1:08:15

While. At that confidence. right?

1:08:18

I mean I know and and in the face. Your.

1:08:21

Your. First. Visit his same for

1:08:23

god to be judged the asked you

1:08:25

know the for your ever. Let.

1:08:27

Into Heaven right? And that's why I

1:08:29

think I like your theory on and

1:08:32

her manipulating herself into believing that all

1:08:34

this was an accident. Because look, I'm

1:08:36

ready to meet God because I've done

1:08:38

nothing wrong. I'm going to get in

1:08:40

the gates of heaven. It's.

1:08:42

Gonna be good Like she has convinced

1:08:44

herself over the years that she still

1:08:46

this Christian woman. It's going to heaven.

1:08:49

You. Know or it's this. The. Every.

1:08:51

Night you know after see poisons one

1:08:53

of her victims to thank God please

1:08:55

forgive Vehement sense of now and I'm

1:08:58

doubtful. God. Forgive mindset of like

1:09:00

are you know I can wipe my slate clean

1:09:02

after. Doing. Each and every one

1:09:04

of the send the I go I see the

1:09:06

problem with that as like. Sees.

1:09:08

Deluded yourself because you have

1:09:11

to be genuinely remorseful when

1:09:13

you're asking for forgiveness, but

1:09:15

doesn't seem like she has

1:09:17

here. As. She waited on death

1:09:19

row. She actually sobered up

1:09:21

for the first time in years

1:09:23

and she soon became a born

1:09:25

again Christian. Even though she had

1:09:27

always going to church, she now admitted that

1:09:29

she was just playing the part of a

1:09:31

good Christian. But. Now she claimed

1:09:34

she was truly changed. I.

1:09:36

Don't Has she ever read the story

1:09:38

of the boy who cried wolf? I'm

1:09:41

not sure Me: it's like you've lied

1:09:43

to us your entire life and all

1:09:45

the sudden how you expect us to

1:09:47

believe that. Now you're a

1:09:50

born again Christian. Okay, Yeah.

1:09:53

Now that you can't. You doing.

1:09:55

the thing yeah know and you're locked

1:09:57

up in a cage neo now years

1:10:00

good person. You know what I mean? It's just

1:10:02

so convenient. She also began counseling

1:10:05

the other women while in prison and they

1:10:07

began to look at her as a type

1:10:09

of mentor and some of the women saw

1:10:12

her as this kind of grandmother figure. If

1:10:14

you look at these pictures of her in

1:10:16

prison it's like a little grandmother's desk or

1:10:19

something. There's a picture of Jesus hanging there.

1:10:21

She got the short hair and like kind

1:10:23

of the big glasses. She looks like a

1:10:25

grandma and you kind

1:10:27

of get why people didn't connect

1:10:29

the dots because she genuinely does

1:10:32

give off this aura of

1:10:34

this innocent grandma like person. But

1:10:36

come on nobody's buying it. Just

1:10:38

look at a bottle of arsenic

1:10:40

from like the 80s and it

1:10:43

literally in big letters says poison.

1:10:46

Come on. Nobody believes you didn't

1:10:48

know that you were poisoning

1:10:50

them. Come on. It's

1:10:54

got a skull on there

1:10:56

for a reason. If you

1:10:58

ingest this you will become...

1:11:00

I'm totally convinced she knew that she

1:11:02

was gonna kill the victims. There's no doubt

1:11:04

in my mind. Even though

1:11:06

Velma previously said she wouldn't appeal and was

1:11:08

ready for death and ready to meet God

1:11:11

she ended up wasn't so sure. Yeah he ended

1:11:13

up appealing three times so no in the end

1:11:15

she wasn't ready to meet God. Maybe she started

1:11:17

reading the Good Book and was like oh I'm

1:11:19

gonna have a lot harder time here than I

1:11:22

expected. One of her appeals focused

1:11:24

on the testimony of Dorothy Lewis.

1:11:26

Dorothy was a professor of psychiatry

1:11:28

at New York University School of

1:11:30

Medicine and she was an

1:11:32

expert on violent behavior and she had also

1:11:35

been involved in a high-profile case which was

1:11:37

the Ted Bundy's trial so she had

1:11:39

been around the block. When she testified

1:11:42

during this trial, Dorothy

1:11:44

had claimed that Velma suffered

1:11:46

from a dissociative identity disorder

1:11:48

and Velma actually had a

1:11:50

second personality known as Billy.

1:11:53

Apparently Billy had actually convinced

1:11:55

Velma that she had been

1:11:58

sexually abused and so Billy

1:12:00

killed the abusers. out of

1:12:02

revenge. The idea was that

1:12:04

Billy was in control of Velma during

1:12:07

these murders and not Velma. And

1:12:09

I love this. The judge rejected

1:12:11

the appeal saying quote, one

1:12:14

of them did it. I don't care which

1:12:16

one, right? Which I think really sums it up.

1:12:18

It's like, okay, you

1:12:20

got a dissociative disorder. It's like someone,

1:12:23

someone in there is committing these

1:12:25

murders. So either way, we

1:12:27

don't really care. In response to

1:12:29

the rejected appeal, Velma said quote, I

1:12:32

know everybody has gone through a lot

1:12:34

of pain, all the families connected, I

1:12:36

am sorry. And I want to thank

1:12:38

everybody who has been supporting me all

1:12:40

these six years. Yeah, like I said

1:12:42

at the very beginning of this episode,

1:12:45

she was getting a lot of support from

1:12:48

religious community. Yeah, absolutely. I mean, like

1:12:50

I said, Billy Graham, who's like one

1:12:53

of the most famous preachers of all time,

1:12:55

him and his wife were exchanging letters

1:12:57

with her in prison. And, you

1:12:59

know, I think a lot of

1:13:01

people really felt like she,

1:13:03

you know, had finally repented

1:13:05

her sins, and she really changed at this point,

1:13:07

and that the death penalty was a harsh punishment

1:13:10

for what she had done. And I think

1:13:12

it was, you know, she was

1:13:14

garnering support, and she was hoping that ultimately,

1:13:16

you know, she get a

1:13:18

stay of execution or ultimately get her, her

1:13:21

sentence changed to

1:13:24

life in prison as opposed to death,

1:13:26

which she wasn't that far off. No,

1:13:28

she was some people really

1:13:30

did fear that she was going to

1:13:32

be exonerated. So that was on the

1:13:35

table. Velma filed her

1:13:37

final appeal on October 30 1984

1:13:40

on the grounds that she had been

1:13:42

incompetent at her original trial because of

1:13:44

drug use. This was later rejected. There

1:13:46

are fears that the governor might grant

1:13:48

Velma clemency. Ronnie and Kim both defended

1:13:50

their mother, but sturr's daughter Alice later

1:13:53

said, quote, she's an outstanding liar. She

1:13:55

does not want help. Velma

1:13:57

barfield enjoys killing through

1:13:59

the years. many became convinced that Velma's sentence

1:14:01

might be commuted. Her lawyers

1:14:03

constantly tried to get her a stay of

1:14:06

execution and her execution had been rescheduled multiple

1:14:08

times, but she eventually asked her

1:14:10

lawyers to abandon another appeal they were planning.

1:14:13

And we actually have a very

1:14:15

short clip from 1984 of her being

1:14:18

interviewed and imprisoned right

1:14:21

before her execution. So let's go ahead and take

1:14:23

a look at Velma here. Velma

1:14:26

Barfield was convicted and sentenced to die in

1:14:28

1978 for the poisoning death of her boyfriend.

1:14:32

She also admitted poisoning three other

1:14:34

people, including her mother. Barfield

1:14:36

had been awaiting her sentence in the

1:14:38

women's correctional facility in Raleigh. But

1:14:41

last week, for security reasons, say corrections

1:14:43

officials, she was moved to Raleigh's central

1:14:45

prison, where she is the only woman

1:14:47

prisoner. She now waits

1:14:49

in virtual isolation in a cell

1:14:52

just across from the execution chamber,

1:14:54

a constant reminder, she says, of

1:14:56

her likely fate. It's total isolation

1:14:58

from everybody that I had been

1:15:01

with for almost

1:15:03

six years. The first week I was

1:15:05

here was the worst week that

1:15:08

I have spent. Everything

1:15:10

about it. Barfield says drugs led her to

1:15:12

prison. She became addicted to tranquilizers, she says,

1:15:14

during a rocky period in her life. The

1:15:17

last 10 years, I just

1:15:19

like that. Years

1:15:22

of a

1:15:24

drug nightmare, days of

1:15:26

not knowing where you are

1:15:29

or why you've done. Her

1:15:31

attorney would not allow her to say whether she

1:15:33

knew what she was doing when she committed her

1:15:35

crimes. But once confined in

1:15:38

prison, Barfield says, she found God.

1:15:40

It's her relationship with God, she says, that

1:15:42

has enabled her to survive her confinement. Living

1:15:46

in prison, every day is a straw,

1:15:48

even at its best. And

1:15:54

I know that without him

1:15:57

and his strength that has sustained me, I

1:15:59

couldn't have made it. it even thus far. Now

1:16:02

drug free, a repentant bar field

1:16:04

says she regrets the pain she

1:16:06

has caused others. I'm

1:16:09

sorry for the hurt that I've caused

1:16:13

so many people. Today

1:16:17

if it

1:16:19

were possible, I

1:16:21

wish that I could take every bit of

1:16:24

hurt on myself. I

1:16:28

think it's an act. Ah,

1:16:32

I don't know. Do you think she's

1:16:34

genuine? Impossible

1:16:36

to say for sure. It's

1:16:42

hard because when you look at her and you hear her speak,

1:16:44

you want to feel like, oh,

1:16:47

you know what? Maybe she finally,

1:16:50

now that she's sober, realizes

1:16:52

the extent of what

1:16:54

she's done. And I think that's what

1:16:57

she plays into. She knows, she has the

1:16:59

look, she has the voice, she plays

1:17:01

into the religious appeal. I

1:17:03

think she's just so calculated that she knows

1:17:05

how to do it. Because if I were

1:17:07

to come across a woman like this at

1:17:09

the grocery store or something, I'd be like,

1:17:12

oh, that was a very pleasant woman. There's

1:17:14

no way she could. I've gotten stuff off

1:17:16

the top shelves for women like this. Yeah,

1:17:19

exactly. It's like, hey, son, can you grab

1:17:21

the top shelf and be like, sure. She

1:17:23

seems like everyone's grandma. And I

1:17:25

think that is what's hard in this

1:17:27

case to get over that and pull back

1:17:30

the layers of

1:17:33

that and start actually seeing the person

1:17:35

who's behind a facade of just

1:17:38

the nice grandma. But that's my

1:17:41

thought on it. If I had to

1:17:43

play devil's advocate, I would say when

1:17:45

you're addicted, you're struggling with

1:17:51

addiction. And depending on, we don't know

1:17:53

exactly which drug she

1:17:55

was necessarily addicted to over a long period of

1:17:57

her life. and

1:18:01

she's mixing different things. The

1:18:05

headspace that she was in could

1:18:08

have absolutely changed

1:18:12

the way that she was

1:18:14

perceiving reality. Her

1:18:16

consciousness is altered. So I

1:18:18

do think there is

1:18:21

a real possibility

1:18:25

that maybe a

1:18:27

lot of these things did happen because of this

1:18:29

altered state of consciousness that she was in. I

1:18:32

do think based on the

1:18:35

other decisions that she made

1:18:37

and being so planned

1:18:39

and almost methodical about it, I think

1:18:42

that's where it becomes hard for me to

1:18:44

just believe her story of like it

1:18:46

was the drugs. I was in this drug-induced

1:18:49

haze for years and years and years and that's why

1:18:52

I did what I did. She

1:18:55

wouldn't have been able to carry

1:18:57

this on as long as she did if

1:19:00

that were truly the case. It's like

1:19:03

there would have been a slip up or somewhere

1:19:07

along the way, maybe

1:19:09

things wouldn't have

1:19:11

worked out so perfectly in her favor. It's

1:19:15

hard to just say, oh man,

1:19:18

it was all because of the drugs. The drugs

1:19:21

kind of made you do this. I

1:19:24

appreciate that because you

1:19:26

do have to remember also she grew up

1:19:28

in an unstable household. There are a lot

1:19:31

of things to unpack in this case. I

1:19:33

think though with the drug abuse, I think

1:19:36

the seed of Velma's manipulation was

1:19:38

already planted long before her drug

1:19:41

abuse came into play. I

1:19:44

could see how the drug abuse

1:19:46

would exacerbate whatever was going

1:19:48

on with her already and

1:19:50

distorted her reality or whatever. Maybe just

1:19:52

gave her the confidence to start killing

1:19:55

these people, but I think Velma Barfield

1:19:57

as a killer probably manifested

1:19:59

before her. for the drug abuse.

1:20:01

Right, I think the

1:20:03

term cycle of abuse is very, rings

1:20:06

true in this case. Because I mean, you look at what

1:20:09

she went through as a child, the way that her

1:20:11

father treated her, she was sexually

1:20:14

abused, physically, mentally, emotionally

1:20:16

abused. And then those

1:20:19

traits are then passed down to her

1:20:21

and she starts exhibiting the exact same

1:20:23

behaviors as her father. So I

1:20:27

think that plays a big part in how

1:20:29

everything unfolds in her life and then

1:20:31

the drugs just kind of accelerate that,

1:20:33

right? And maybe

1:20:35

also, she's

1:20:38

obviously not thinking clearly, she

1:20:41

doesn't have a sober mind so you have to

1:20:43

take that into account. But I do

1:20:45

think the serial killing

1:20:49

leads me to believe that there was

1:20:52

sober moments throughout her life where she knew

1:20:54

what she was doing and she continued to

1:20:56

be doing it maybe perhaps because she was

1:20:59

addicted to drugs and needed to continue to

1:21:01

get money for drugs. But I think it

1:21:03

was also, it's also very evident that it

1:21:05

was because she clearly learned that like,

1:21:10

if I don't like somebody or

1:21:12

I don't need them anymore, then

1:21:14

I'll get rid of them. And then

1:21:17

also she's taking advantage of the

1:21:19

life insurance policies too. So she's,

1:21:22

I think there's enough decisions being

1:21:24

made there to

1:21:27

make me believe that she full

1:21:29

well knew what she was doing at the end of

1:21:31

the day. And I think once she finally got sober

1:21:33

in prison those last six years, she realized like, oh

1:21:36

wow, this was way worse than I

1:21:38

ever, ever really knew it was at

1:21:41

the time. Because I mean, even she

1:21:43

said to a prison warden, quote,

1:21:46

I don't want to die, but I understand that

1:21:49

I'm guilty. So it's like once you finally got

1:21:51

her mind sober, she

1:21:54

was like, oh, you know, I'm

1:21:57

definitely guilty of the crimes that I've been,

1:21:59

maybe. you know, in those final

1:22:02

years, she, you know, got

1:22:04

right with God and, you know, all that

1:22:06

perhaps but... Yeah, only after she faced the

1:22:08

consequences of her actions because I fear that

1:22:11

if she was never caught, she would have

1:22:13

just gone through this. Yeah, it's like a

1:22:15

class of sayings of like, you're only sorry

1:22:18

because you got caught, right? If

1:22:20

you hadn't gotten caught, would you have kept doing it? Yeah. And

1:22:23

to me, it seems like she would have. Her

1:22:25

last meal was reportedly cheese

1:22:28

doodles, which I had to look

1:22:30

that up because I've never heard of that before

1:22:32

and it looks like it was Cheetos, kind

1:22:34

of like cheese puffs type deal. Exactly.

1:22:37

Before Cheetos came along and Coca-Cola, she

1:22:40

was allowed to even choose what clothing

1:22:43

to wear during her execution and

1:22:45

she chose pink pajamas. After

1:22:48

six years on death row, the

1:22:50

day came, November 2nd, 1984. At

1:22:54

2.15 a.m., they executed

1:22:56

52-year-old Margie Velma Barfield

1:22:59

by lethal injection at North Carolina's

1:23:01

Central Prison. This made her

1:23:03

the first woman executed in the United States

1:23:05

after it was reinstated after her

1:23:08

four-year suspension. She was also the first woman to

1:23:10

be executed in the U.S. since 1962, that's 22

1:23:12

years earlier. Plus

1:23:16

she was the first woman to be

1:23:18

executed by lethal injection period. She

1:23:21

was buried two days later beside her late husband, Thomas

1:23:23

Burke, at the request of her son Ronnie. Some

1:23:25

sources say that right before Velma was executed,

1:23:27

she confessed to Ronnie that she had

1:23:29

started the fire that had killed Thomas

1:23:32

all those years ago. She

1:23:35

was only convicted of one murder and

1:23:37

confessed to three more, but it's believed she

1:23:39

might have killed between five to seven people.

1:23:43

And some of those people we talked about earlier

1:23:45

on, I think you kind of start to wonder,

1:23:47

like, did she have a hand in those

1:23:50

other people's hearts? Right, of unnatural

1:23:52

causes, death of the elderly. About

1:23:56

200 people attended her funeral and afterward

1:23:58

Ronnie told reporters, quote, Velma

1:24:00

said she wanted to be known as a

1:24:02

good Christian and nothing else. He

1:24:05

hoped that her good behavior in prison would balance

1:24:07

out the terrible murders she committed. But

1:24:09

many, many people out there

1:24:12

still believe she was a cunning cold-blooded killer

1:24:14

who continued to hide behind the disguise of

1:24:17

a sweet little Christian lady. So,

1:24:21

that's where we leave it. A

1:24:25

cold-blooded killer or a

1:24:27

good Christian woman that just got hooked

1:24:29

on drugs and decided

1:24:32

to start poisoning people. I

1:24:34

think my needle leans towards cold-blooded

1:24:37

killer. Even though,

1:24:39

I don't know, I try to see the good in people

1:24:41

and give them the benefit of the doubt as much as

1:24:43

I can. But in this case, I think

1:24:46

she was calculated. I think

1:24:48

she was manipulative. Obviously, there were

1:24:50

a lot of factors in her life to get her to

1:24:52

that point. Obviously,

1:24:54

we listed them all. Destructive

1:24:56

household, drug abuse, mental illness,

1:24:58

the hysterectomy also played a

1:25:01

factor into it. Also

1:25:03

being married to an alcoholic must be rough. I

1:25:06

mean, there's a lot. It's

1:25:09

kind of a sad tragic story all in all.

1:25:11

But I do think she was just at the end

1:25:14

of the day was a cold-blooded murder because I think

1:25:16

people face those life

1:25:18

circumstances all the time. I

1:25:21

think people are raised in destructive households.

1:25:23

I think people suffer from drug addiction.

1:25:26

You know, people go through a lot and they

1:25:28

don't do things like this. So that's

1:25:30

what makes me think she was bound

1:25:32

to be a killer and she thought she could get away

1:25:34

with it for as long as possible. I would

1:25:37

maybe think

1:25:39

otherwise had she eventually

1:25:42

just came clean on her own. Or

1:25:44

like turned herself in or like had

1:25:46

this revelation

1:25:49

of like, I've done

1:25:51

terrible things. But it took her

1:25:53

own family riding her out

1:25:55

for her to stop this cycle of

1:25:58

death that she was dishing out. So

1:26:01

I agree with you. I think she's

1:26:03

calculated cold-blooded killer. I think

1:26:07

you know the death penalty for

1:26:09

this I think is was

1:26:12

an interesting choice

1:26:14

in comparison to other killers who have

1:26:17

done you know not that I

1:26:20

think the way that she killed people as opposed

1:26:22

to other killers who have done

1:26:25

heinous heinous things yeah and get away

1:26:27

that get life in prison you know

1:26:30

okay oh yeah so

1:26:32

was there a benefit to executing her

1:26:34

I think ultimately you know I

1:26:36

have said this before but I have to go with

1:26:38

the victims here and you know obviously

1:26:40

film his own you

1:26:43

know son and daughter don't don't want to see

1:26:45

her executed but I have to go with with

1:26:48

Alice you know and some of the other

1:26:50

victims I'm sure they were like she

1:26:54

deserved this yeah and I mean you

1:26:56

know me I'm just fundamentally against the

1:27:00

death sentence but you

1:27:03

know either way that for me this probably

1:27:05

would have been if not sentence I would

1:27:07

hope that it would be a life

1:27:10

sentence with like no chance of

1:27:12

parole here because I just think

1:27:14

she's it a dangerous woman yeah

1:27:16

and you know if she did

1:27:18

if she genuinely did find God

1:27:20

and turned her life around and she

1:27:22

was a good mental she was a and if she

1:27:24

was a good mentor in prison then

1:27:26

yes she I

1:27:29

mean she clearly didn't like prison life she

1:27:31

vocalized that right in that interview but maybe

1:27:34

she could have found some little corner

1:27:36

of prison where she could have I

1:27:39

don't know she could have been asset to

1:27:41

the prison yeah you know helping other prisoners

1:27:43

kind of yeah and and

1:27:45

I know her relationship with

1:27:47

her children it was

1:27:50

a powerful and they really truly did love

1:27:52

her so you know they can at

1:27:54

least kept a relationship going there

1:27:56

but from the victim's point of view

1:27:58

yeah I it's That's a tough

1:28:00

call. She hurt countless people

1:28:03

in these. I mean, these

1:28:05

poor people died horrific, violent

1:28:07

deaths. Yeah. You know, poisoning or not,

1:28:09

it's still a horrible

1:28:11

way to go. And I can't even

1:28:13

imagine what that would

1:28:15

be like to die in

1:28:17

this way. I mean, and

1:28:20

not know why it's happening. And,

1:28:23

you know, everybody's just telling you you're sick, but

1:28:25

you know something else is going

1:28:27

on, something very wrong. And just

1:28:29

like the tragedy of hiring someone,

1:28:31

the guilt, because probably the family members

1:28:33

might have had a hand in like,

1:28:36

oh yeah, here's the nurse taking care

1:28:38

of my elderly parents or something. And

1:28:40

probably the guilt that would come along with that after

1:28:43

knowing that she was the one killing them,

1:28:46

person who was supposed to be taking care of them, right? What

1:28:49

do you think, Daniel? Where do you find

1:28:52

yourself with this one? Think she's a cold-blooded

1:28:55

killer or was, you know, kind

1:28:57

of the circumstances of her life, kind

1:28:59

of. I'll

1:29:01

just turn to this. I

1:29:04

think that if she wasn't struggling

1:29:07

with a drug addiction

1:29:09

or seems to be decades,

1:29:12

that she probably wouldn't have ended up killing at

1:29:15

all, in my opinion. I definitely think that

1:29:17

she is a calculated manipulative person. And I

1:29:19

think that just kind of, I don't want

1:29:21

to say runs in her family, but we're talking about the cycle

1:29:23

of abuse. But I think

1:29:25

the drug dependency numbed

1:29:28

her enough to the point where she knew

1:29:30

what she was doing. But when

1:29:34

you're in the deep part of an addiction,

1:29:36

you know what you're doing, but you don't understand

1:29:40

gravity of the consequences. You are,

1:29:43

in a sense, in a different reality. So I think

1:29:45

she was fully aware of what she was doing. And

1:29:47

she obviously committed the crime, so she deserves the punishment for

1:29:49

it. But I don't think that

1:29:51

if she was so deep into this addiction

1:29:54

that she would have committed these murders. I

1:29:56

still think she would have been abusive, manipulative,

1:29:58

and all these other horrible things. things but

1:30:01

I don't think she would have murdered. That's

1:30:03

just my opinion. I've

1:30:06

been called a narc before but you know

1:30:08

what I'll say, just be wary of drug

1:30:10

use out there. I mean I know we

1:30:12

all like to have fun and we do. We

1:30:16

like to party. We like to have. That's completely

1:30:18

fine but I know I've been... My partying days

1:30:20

are over man. Yeah, you got a kid now.

1:30:24

Just be wary of it man. You never know. And

1:30:26

even with prescription drugs. Yeah well everyone,

1:30:28

some of the most dangerous stuff is

1:30:30

prescribed from a doctor. Right, exactly. Like

1:30:32

the opioid epidemic and everything so I

1:30:35

don't know. Call me a narc in the comments, I

1:30:37

don't care. If

1:30:39

that's Daniel's take on it, that's

1:30:41

terrifying that drug abuse

1:30:44

can lead you down drugs.

1:30:46

I kind of agree a lot with what you're

1:30:48

saying because I do see how... And

1:30:51

I think it'd be interesting to know

1:30:54

the magnitude at how much

1:30:56

was she taking. You know what I mean?

1:30:58

And which drugs was she taking on at

1:31:00

any given day. And

1:31:02

really understand that on a deeper level because

1:31:05

if it is as bad as it seems

1:31:07

it was, I can definitely see how

1:31:09

your mind, you could convince yourself that

1:31:11

like, oh I'm just putting a

1:31:14

little bit of poison in here and they're getting

1:31:16

sick and not fully grasping

1:31:18

the full extent of

1:31:20

what you're doing and

1:31:23

maybe she could have been in a drug

1:31:27

induced haze when she was dosing

1:31:29

out the arsenic. Who

1:31:32

knows what that looked like. Not

1:31:35

that that's excusing any of it because just because

1:31:38

you're on drugs doesn't mean you go

1:31:40

that route. Yeah I was gonna say, don't go to

1:31:42

like, oh I'm gonna poison people and just be like,

1:31:45

oh I'm just making a dick. And

1:31:47

I'm not blaming the drugs solely. I'm more

1:31:49

saying that she had all of the personality

1:31:51

traits. Kind of a perfect dorm of

1:31:54

the drugs or what kind of pushed

1:31:56

it over the edge in the defense.

1:31:58

Well the dissociative personality just... disorder I

1:32:00

think was a spot on diagnosis

1:32:02

for her. Because you look

1:32:06

at some of the symptoms for that

1:32:08

and trauma first and foremost, and there's

1:32:10

definitely trauma there in her

1:32:12

childhood and really throughout

1:32:15

her life. But then drugs

1:32:17

is another big aspect to it that can make

1:32:20

that far worse. So I think it's just kind

1:32:22

of the culmination of all these things just kind

1:32:24

of put her in this

1:32:26

prime position to take things to the

1:32:29

next level. She

1:32:31

experimented with this and then saw

1:32:34

that it worked in her favor and ultimately

1:32:36

too, when you're addicted, you want to get

1:32:38

your next, you're just looking for your

1:32:40

next dose, you're just looking for your next prescription. And

1:32:42

so that overrides everything else, right?

1:32:44

No, I agree with that. I think

1:32:47

that is a really good way to

1:32:49

sum it up. It's Doma Barfield, the

1:32:51

perfect storm. It really is like the

1:32:53

culmination of everything in her life really

1:32:55

led to these murders. That's

1:32:57

really the best way you can sum it up. But

1:33:01

at the end of the day, it doesn't excuse what

1:33:03

she did, right? It doesn't bring these

1:33:06

people back. So, this might

1:33:09

be old fashioned, but

1:33:12

I stand by, you do the

1:33:15

crime, you

1:33:18

do the time, right? For sure. And ultimately

1:33:21

she did the crime, I

1:33:23

think sentencing, I think

1:33:26

there's definitely some other

1:33:28

alternatives there potentially, but if

1:33:30

this is what the victim's pushed for, then

1:33:32

I'd be on their side with it. But

1:33:35

yeah, this one's, ooh. Not

1:33:37

a tough one. Nothing fun in

1:33:40

this one for sure. But

1:33:42

we want to know your thoughts on this.

1:33:44

Where do you stand? Do you, what

1:33:47

do you feel would be fair punishment for

1:33:49

her? If not the death penalty, do

1:33:51

you feel that she's a cold-blooded killer, that

1:33:54

she premeditated every single one of these murders, or was

1:33:57

this a culmination of things? perfect

1:34:00

storm so to speak. We want to know your

1:34:02

thoughts but that is gonna be

1:34:04

it for us this week. We'll see you

1:34:06

guys next week. And until then,

1:34:09

bye-bye. you