Posted on 05/20/2005 2:20:51 AM PDT by Cincinatus' Wife
After a Tampa man dies, his wife, embroiled in a dispute involving him and his daughter, is in jail after burying him without permission.
TAMPA - Two months ago, Ralph Hamilton pleaded with a Hillsborough County judge to save him from his wife of 22 years.
He said Carolyn had pumped him full of anti-anxiety, pain and heart medications. He said that she had discontinued his dialysis treatments against his will and that he had shrunk from 232 to 164 pounds, unable to walk or eat without help.
He said she cut him off from the outside world - "I was a prisoner" - and tried to turn him over to hospice to die.
"My wife is trying to kill me against my will," Hamilton wrote in a March request for a domestic violence injunction. "I am afraid of my wife and I do not yet have the strength to defend myself against her, either physically or mentally. My wife is hell bent on trying to kill me."
Carolyn Hamilton, 60, did not kill her husband. He died Sunday, at 69, after a fall that led to bleeding in his brain. He had been living with a sister in Temple Terrace.
But she did bury him. Without permission.
Authorities said Hamilton ordered workers to dig a grave for her husband Monday morning in a graveyard off Providence Road in Brandon. They said she returned later, removed a locked gate from its hinges and had him buried.
Officials never gave permission for her to conduct a burial, according to sheriff's reports. And she never presented a death certificate, a permit for burial or proof of ownership of the plot, valued at $800, authorities said.
"He was buried like a dog," said his daughter, Alicia Martinez. "There's not a marker; there's not one flower. For him to be thrown in the ground like that, I can't even tell you."
On Thursday, Hamilton was arrested and charged with trespassing and theft, ensuring that the bizarre family feud that had poisoned Ralph Hamilton's last days would follow him into his (unauthorized) grave.
* * *
The battle had been short, but ugly.
In early February, after learning that her father had not been taking dialysis, Alicia Martinez filed an emergency motion asking for guardianship of him.
She said that her stepmother had overmedicated her father, refused to follow his doctors' instructions and rejected attempts by his daughters and sisters to reach him. She wrote that Carolyn Hamilton was "deliberately killing" her father and that if he continued without dialysis treatments that he "will surely die."
The court awarded Martinez, 34, guardianship.
Carolyn Hamilton fought back, trying to get the decision overturned. She said her stepdaughter was trying to keep Ralph Hamilton from his "wife of 22 plus years" and had directed all his mail - including Social Security checks - to her address.
"The guardian is seemingly more concerned with (Ralph's) financial affairs than his health problems," Carolyn Hamilton wrote.
A judge disagreed.
Somewhere along the way, the Florida Department of Children and Families explored the case. Several subpoenas were issued to DCF employees, requesting "all records relating to your investigation of abuse allegations" concerning Ralph Hamilton.
By March 24, Ralph Hamilton drew up a list of nine people who were not to "visit with, see, or otherwise have any contact at all" with him. The first name on the list was his wife, followed by her children and various friends.
The same day, after a hospital visit from her that he said was unwelcome and unnerving, Ralph Hamilton filed his request for an injunction. He wrote that the confrontation left him "so upset that I had to be medicated" and that it "severely set me back mentally and psychologically in my recovery from her attempts to kill me."
A judge ordered Carolyn Hamilton to stay 500 feet away from her husband. A month later, he filed for divorce. He asked the court to award him their home and all the furnishings and appliances. He even asked for alimony.
He wouldn't live to see the outcome.
Earlier this month, his daughter said, he slipped off a bed, hit his head and never recovered from the internal bleeding. He died Sunday.
Despite his best efforts, he died a married man.
* * *
He knew a thing or two about death.
Hamilton spent 40 years in the funeral business. Born in Gibsonton and a graduate of Brandon High School, he went to mortuary school in Dallas and never strayed from that profession.
He married Carolyn in 1983 - his second marriage, her third, records show - and together they ran the Hamilton Funeral Home, later renamed Riverview Equities Inc. The early part of her marriage passed quietly, until she was arrested in 1996 and charged with stealing from a cemetery association where she served as treasurer.
Authorities said she forged 79 checks over 8 months - many written to Ralph Hamilton - and pocketed $40,000 from the Orange Hill Cemetery Association. They also said she fired the ground crew and hired her husband as groundskeeper.
She later pleaded guilty and was ordered to pay $25,000 restitution and serve 15 years' probation.
The mortuary business plugged along, but not without hitches. They refinanced their home to pay for business expenses, court records show.
Federal records show the Internal Revenue Service issued tax liens against the business, sometimes for as much as $33,000. As late as February, the couple owed more than $6,000 to the agency.
But their struggles at work pale in comparison to the feud that has wrecked the family in recent months. While judges ruled against Carolyn Hamilton and her husband's children fought to keep her away from him, the story isn't entirely one sided.
Mixed amid the court documents is a codicil to Ralph Hamilton's last will and testament, dated in December 2004 and signed by him, that berates his daughters for never accepting his wife, who "has been there for me through thick and thin."
He wrote that their love had no bounds and, "To this day she is there for me, every minute of the day." In addressing his daughters, he also wrote, "You have embarrassed me. ... The hurt and pain pain you have caused is totally uncalled for."
Martinez called the document a fraud.
"I showed that to my father, and his exact words were, "She's a sick, sick b----,' " she said. "He hated her in the end."
Everett Swilley, 79, of Riverview, who has known the Hamiltons for decades, sides with Carolyn, calling her an "upstanding person." in a family squabble.
"There ain't two finer people in this world than them two people," Swilley said of the couple. "Them girls of his are raising so much ruckus. It's heartbreaking to see Carolyn in the condition she's in. She's holding up a lot better than I would.
"That woman is doing everything she can to make things right," Swilley said, "and those daughters are trying to cut her throat every time she turns around."
For what it's worth, Swilley's name was on the list of people Ralph Hamilton forbid to visit.
* * *
Carolyn Hamilton remained in jail late Thursday evening without bail. She isn't invited to a memorial service her husband's family has planned for tonight. Martinez said she doesn't care what happens to her former stepmother. "Whatever she deserves, it will come her way," she said.
Martinez wants her father exhumed, to make sure his body was embalmed, dressed properly and clean-shaven. She wants a proper Masonic funeral.
"I haven't been able to grieve," she said. "I'd like to know my father's in there. To have closure, I need to know my father was respected."
Times staff writers Shannon Colavecchio-Van Sickler and Jeff Testerman and researcher Cathy Wos contributed to this report.
The real shock here is, why George Felos isn't mentioned. He could have saved this dame a whole lotta grief.
What an way to live - hate, hate, hate.
Another story about a loving spouse doing the best for her husband.
Imbezzlement, over medication, improper burial...in Florida of all places.
How awful. There is evil.
The FIL was married to her for less than ywo years. :/
Corrections Offender Network
Supervised Population Information Detail
(This information was current as of 11/14/04)
Offender Photo
DC Number: T10735
Name: HAMILTON, CAROLYN
Race: WHITE
Sex: FEMALE
Hair Color: BLONDE OR STRAWBERRY
Eye Color: BROWN
Height: 5'04''
Weight: 180
Birth Date: 07/24/1944
Supervision Begin Date: 02/04/1998
Current Location: TAMPA
Current Status: ACTIVE
Supervision Type: PROBATION FELONY
Scheduled Termination Date: 02/03/2013
Current Verified Address:
10617 CONE GROVE ROAD
RIVERVIEW, FL 33569
Aliases:
CAROLYN HAMILTON MARTHA CAROLYN HAMILTON
MARTHA MCMILLON MARTHA ROBERTS
MARTHA CAROLYN ROBERTS MARTHA CAROLYN SMITH
Identifiers:
DRIVER'S LICENSE - H543556447640
Note: The offense descriptions are truncated and do not necessarily reflect the crime for which the offender is on supervision. Please refer to the court documents or the Florida Statutes for further information or definition.
Current Community Supervision History:
Offense Date Offense Sentence Date County Case No. Community Supervision Length
10/18/1995 GRAND THEFT O/20,000 L/$100,00 02/04/1998 HILLSBOROUGH 9615034 15Y 0M 0D
Record: 1 of 1
The Florida Department of Corrections updates this information regularly, to ensure that it is complete and accurate, however this
EVIL SOUNDS LIKE TO NICE OF A WORD TO USE FOR THIS WOMAN!
This lady needs to spend a long time behind bars.
I AGREE SHE SHOULD HAVE BEEN KEPT BEHIND BARS THE JUDGE WHO LET HER OUT IS EITHER DIRTY OR CRAZY. I WOULD NOT RELECT HIM.
When you post with all capitalized letters it looks like you are shouting!
WHEN YOU POST WITH ALL CAPITALIZED LETTERS IT LOOKS LIKE YOU ARE SHOUTING!
Hey, Hey, HEY! Some of us are trying to eat breakfast!!!
Sorry about the caps lock!
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