Released After 20 Years In Prison, She Returned Home—And Found Someone Else Living Her Life
Margaret promised.
Three weeks later, Gerald Whitmore was found dead.
And two days after that, the police were at Margaret’s door with an arrest warrant.
What Was on That Flash Drive Wasn’t Evidence — It Was the Blueprint for a Murder, Written in Handwriting That Looked Like Margaret’s
The trial lasted three weeks. Some of it still blurs together when Margaret tries to reconstruct it.
But here’s what mattered: the flash drive Diane had given her didn’t contain financial documents. It contained detailed plans for Gerald Whitmore’s murder. Meeting times. Security schedules. Diagrams of his home. Instructions written in handwriting that looked like Margaret’s — but wasn’t.
According to the prosecution, Margaret was the mastermind. She had orchestrated everything, used Diane’s access to Whitmore’s office to gather intelligence, and arranged for a drifter named Curtis Webb to carry out the actual killing. Webb had been paid $8,000 in cash. The serial numbers on those bills traced back to a withdrawal from Margaret’s personal savings account — a withdrawal Margaret had not made.
Margaret had never met Curtis Webb. Had never set foot in Gerald Whitmore’s office. Had no idea how money from her own account had ended up in a killer’s hands.
None of that mattered.
Her fingerprints were on the flash drive. The money came from her account. The handwriting — close enough to fool the experts — was all over those plans.
And Diane.
Diane testified against her.
She sat on the witness stand in a black dress, tears streaming down her face, and told the court that Margaret had manipulated her, that Margaret had a longstanding grudge against Whitmore, that Diane had been frightened of her own sister. “I didn’t know what she was capable of,” Diane sobbed. “I was scared of her.”
Margaret sat at the defense table and watched her sister lie. Watched her cry those tears. Watched her destroy twenty years of a life with every word that came out of her mouth.
And still — even then — part of Margaret thought Diane must be confused. Must have been threatened into testifying. Couldn’t possibly be doing this on purpose.
That was the cruelest part. Even as Diane was sending her to prison, Margaret couldn’t fully believe it was intentional.
The jury deliberated for six hours. The verdict: guilty on all counts. Conspiracy to commit murder. Accessory to murder. First-degree murder under Tennessee’s felony murder rule. The judge sentenced her to thirty years.
She was fifty-two years old.
She would be eighty-two before she saw the outside world again — if she survived that long.
Leave a Comment