Posted on 03/24/2006 8:28:46 AM PST by Blogger
Slain Minister's Wife to Be Charged With Murder Friday, March 24, 2006 MEMPHIS, Tenn. — The wife of a Tennessee pastor found shot dead in his house Wednesday will face first-degree murder charges, authorities announced Friday.
Mary Winklerwas found Thursday night with the couple's three daughters in Orange Beach, Ala., about 400 miles south of their home in Selmer.
Investigators with the Tennessee Bureau of Investigation said she was interviewed during the night and the charges were being prepared.
"We've interviewed her and she was cooperative," said Jennifer Johnson of the TBI, adding that once a warrant with the charges was drawn up, extradition proceedings would begin to have her returned to Tennessee.
Matthew Winkler was found shot to death in the bedroom of his parsonage Wednesday by church members who began searching for him after he failed to show up at an evening event at Selmer's Church of Christ.
Police said there were no signs of forced entry, but Winkler's wife and children — Breanna, 1; Mary Alice, 6; and Patricia, 8 — were gone.
(Excerpt) Read more at foxnews.com ...
There are hypocrites in every walk of life. Unfortunately, there are a lot of so-called Christians that are the worst. But that doesn't mean that blanket statements like the ones you made about the church of Christ are warranted.
jk,
do you think you are better person than a non-believer, or someone of a different faith???
...i suspect you will say "no", YET the teachings of your church imply otherwise
...your church does not accept someone who is a non-believer or other faiths, if they brainwash their membership into thinking that only THEY will go to heaven, and all others will go to hell...that is cultish thinking...mind you it's not as bad as mormons, but i'll save that for another post
Yep. I still call my Daddy by the name "Daddy" and he has been gone for almost four years now. He was always "Daddy". I AM a Southerner. I called him Daddy. He was a brave man (WWII combat veteran), a hard working carpenter; he loved me and I miss him terribly - the best father anyone could ever hope to have, a dear man. OH! AND HE WOULD HAVE NEVER, NEVER DONE SUCH A THING AS THE PERSON SUGGESTED! He would have slit his own throat before he would have done such a thing.
How long had athey been neighbors? Somebody said just a few days.
I am a human being, and I am a sinner. But I have been saved by coming in obedience to Christ. Do I still fail in my life? Yes. But I strive to live as Christ lived, and I know that I can come to Him when I fail and be forgiven of my sins, if I truly repent.
Believing that only those that do the will of God and come in obedience to Jesus Christ, in the manner that is specified in His Word, does not make one a cult member. You are free to call me what you wish. I am sure I have been called worse. Jesus made it clear that the path to eternal life would not be easy, and that it would be only accessible through Him. I will continue to trust in the Truth that comes from God's Word.
Also, I don't have a church. The church belongs to Christ, and I became a member of that body the day I came in obedience to Him.
Your information just shows that the husband knew that he was sitting on a unexploded bomb. Given the religious ideology of the cult they belonged to birth control was likely forbidden. She was not to take the anti-depressants prescribed.
I haven't heard that. They bought the house in June 2000, but I guess they might not have moved into it until recently, giving the statement you heard the benefit of the doubt.
We know the Winklers didn't move to Selmer until Feb 2005, so it looks to me like the Everitts were already there, since most people do live in the houses they buy - but of course, there are always exceptions.
I would need to hear someone else say they hadn't lived there but a few days, like another neighbor who knows them.
You are right, beckysueb, it could be that she freaked out and he did nothing wrong. Even if he had abused her or the girls he didn't deserve death (I'd of preferred to castrate him at this point, cause more suffering :)
I just made that statement in my post because I have had personal experience with some "Bible-thumpers" (I won't call them Christians, because they are anything but) who are in Church everytime the door is opened, but in their personal lives are the meanest, most hypocritical, unChristian people I know.
My first husband's family are like that. His father molested his daughters, granddaughters, etc., and attempted it on daughter in laws, but he learned the hard way not to mess with me.
I am still in touch with the granddaughters, and all of them have problems because of that evil man, their grandfather. That entire family is a wreck because of his handiwork. It's really sad.
He was the pillar of the community, deacon of the Church, and the most controlling person I've ever known. When I would escape his advances, he'd start preaching, telling me I needed to be in Church.
It would literally turn my stomach. He turned me against organized religion for a long time. That very religious man did more work for the devil than all the drunkards and heathens he mocked put together.
I finally forced their baby (in his 30s) away from there, away from that excuse for a church, and the control of his father. It didn't last long, though, he was not capable of living anywhere but in Mama and Daddy's back yard. So, he now lives in MaMas back yard, with a wife and four daughters.
Thank God his evil father is not there (he'd dead now) to molest his daughters. But I sometimes wonder about the rest of the extended family that all live on the "homeplace."
jk,
you wrote: "But that doesn't mean that blanket statements like the ones you made about the church of Christ are warranted."
..."blanket statements"???, how ironic is that you say i made a blanket statement (which i admit to), YET your church teaches the ultimate blanket statement: that only C of C'ers will go to heaven, and all others will go to hell
...i also found it curious that you never responded to my post that you think you are better than me, or any other non-believer, or even those of a different faith
If I had a gun, I would shoot every dog that comes uninvited into my yard too, since a pack of them killed my cat while she was in her own yard. That doesn't imply I'm abusive to humans or evil. So-called pets have been known to kill or maim children! Maybe he told the kids next door to get their dog out of his yard, and they ignored him, so he raised the level of his threat to make them listen. We don't always choose our words wisely when we are afraid that something will harm our children.
And people who know about shotguns think there could be several wounds from one shot, from the pellets (think of Mr. Whittington in TX).
I don't yet know which to rely upon. I lean towards "twice," only because Mary Winkler is said to have confessed to shooting him.
If it was really the turkey-hunting gun they kept in the house and if it was really a 12-gauge shotgun and if it was really found in her van (these are all things I have seen reported), then I would expect that she would have used both shots that were chambered, but probably didn't re-load.
I'm not too troubled by the children not hearing the shot(s) or even the neighbors, for that matter, because of the Mark Hacking case. Even though he used a rifle, he and Lori lived in a small apartment house with thin walls between the neighbors and it was not heard by a living soul.
In that case, he also shot through bedclothes, which might have muffled the noise some.
Now I saw that one local newspaper account from this morning (posted previous--DailyJoural) has resurrected what we first heard --
" ... shot her minister husband in the back while he was sleeping last week. ... "
whether or not it's true. I'm inclined to believe that four church members discovering his body might've leaked some info out to spouses or friends and that possibly this is accurate. But we don't know for sure. I've also read that he was found "near the bed."
Shooting him *in the bed* (whether he was sleeping or not) would have been the safest way to make sure no stray shots went thru walls to hurt anyone else in the house.
It's something else to think about.
Back in the 70s, some churches of Christ preached that they were the only true church, but that isn't really isn't heard very often anymore.
I am a member of the CoC and I believe anyone who follows Christ's commands will be saved. I've read the Bible and personally believe that the CoC adheres most closely those commands. It's not perfect, but we are not expected to be perfect. I know there are members of Christ's church all over the world. You are free to decide what you think is best for yourself. God gave you that choice.
I did respond to you. I said I was not better than anyone else. I also told you exactly what I believe. I don't feel the need to repeat myself over and over.
I keep hearing twice, however we will not conclusively know about this until his autopsy results are released. Maybe not even then, the courts could seal the autopsy findings until after the trial.
The reports I'm reading saw members of his church found him in a back bedroom, I'm sure the information that is being leaked is coming from one if not more of those who found his body.
I saw her defense atty last night on Greta's show and even he didn't deny she had confessed to shooting her husband. His only comment was that he "hadn't had time to see/read or hear her confession". Seems pretty slam dunk to me.
Add that to the fact there are absolutely no police reports of any abuse. No person has come forward to claim they ever heard of saw her stating she'd been abused or saw marks to prove abuse. I think the speculation needs to move on from trashing this dead man's reputationg into looking at why she was motivated to kill him.
Insurance money?
Sick of being married?
Psychosis of some sort?
Or how's this one...maybe she's just an evil person not unlike many others we currently have in prison for murder.
At first, I thought the co-defense counsel Leslie Ballin was a female, but figured out that *he* is not. I haven't seen or heard him in the media myself.
So, I surely hoped that there would be a female attorney assisting on the case, but all that I saw reported today was that there is a clerk of ambiguous given name, Lynn, an intern law student at Ole Miss.
From media:
" ... One of Winkler's defense attorneys, Leslie Ballin, said he hadn't seen Winkler's statement to Alabama police, but said he's not convinced it will amount to a legitimate confession."We will be looking at what condition she was held in, if she was without sleep or food, or any pressures that may have been lent (sic) upon her," Ballin said. ..."
" ... Farese said he has brought Memphis attorney Leslie Ballin into the defense team, as well as his son, attorney Steve Farese Jr., and Marc Garver, an attorney from Atlanta. He said third-year University of Mississippi Law School student Lynn Brown of Holly Springs is working as the team's clerk. ..."
It will be important to have the "female" questions addressed, such as PPD and problems inherent to being a (male) minister's spouse or working mother or even being petite and "quiet" or deferential. It would make whatever reasoning/motive/defense presented more believable and not "one size fits all", i.e., *cops screwed up, coroner screwed up, criminalists screwed up.*
We have a lot more to learn from finding out what the motivation was that drove a normally reticent and law-abiding person to go that next step over the line, into pulling that trigger.
Fair trials are the only way we have to promote justice in this counrty, which equals freedom.
You summed it up nicely. If a person is familiar with the southern lifestyle, they haven't reached the level of political correctness that the rest of the country has. Such as the shooting of the dog incident: here it would be a normal thing to do. If a neighbors dog threatens your kids or bothers you, warn the neighbors first, then shoot it. Everywhere else, it is like a capital offense to shoot an animal. Here, there is a more defined roll of a family. Dad is head of his household, Mom is his right arm and the kids are their future but they are more obedient to parents here. But that doesn't mean that Dad is a controlling monster. Thats just the way it is here. And people are very happy. Of course there are exceptions. But that is mostly the norm.
LOL! I would like to have seen somebody try and tell my mother or great grandmother to remain silent! They wore the pants in their CoC families!
It don't exactly work that way. He can beg for forgiveness all he wants but it won't be granted unless he truly has a change of heart, and if he has that change of heart, he will live it. He won't be out doing the same evil deeds over and over again.
Farese has been "all over the place" in what he's throwing out there. Lots of scattershot, so to speak.
This morning on GMA he said it "could be" cumulative and that the one thing that sparked it might seem small to everyone else.
(I don't think he knows the "one thing" that was told to the cops in Orange Beach. Yeah, he's a defense attorney and has said they haven't told him, that he has to wait until discovery, but I will take everything he says with a large or small grain of salt, depending on what rings true to me. He just seems to be tap dancing right now.)
It does appear that he is setting the stage for some type of mental illness defense, but it's still early in his relationship with Mary.
No it is not a cult but my father was not allowed to marry my mother until he left the Baptist Church and joined the Church of Christ some 45 years ago.
There is a very strict section of this very legalistic church, I know I grew up in it. It is mellowing with time, at least some of it is.
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