#349 Maggie Freleng with Gwen Graham

A warning for listeners, this episode contains discussion of suicide. Please listen with caution and care. In nineteen eighty seven, Gwen Graham was twenty three years old and had high hopes and dreams for her future. She was a natural caretaker and wanted to be a veterinarian. After moving across the country to Michigan, she went to work at a nursing home called Alpine Manor. Gwen liked it there. She

Let's saying, I know the police are coming down to talk to me. They told me they said, your extral friend said that you killed somebody at an earthy home. And I laughed at him. I said, I can't believe he came down here for that bullshion, but then when they charged me with four more, that's when I started losing it. My name is Gwendolin Graham. I've been incarcerated in Michigan for thirty five years for something that I didn't do, that didn't even happen.

From LoVa for good. This is wrongful conviction with Maggie Freeling today. Gwen Graham Gwendolyn Gail Graham was born in Santa Maria, California, on August sixth, nineteen sixty three, to Mac Wade and Linda Ruth Graham.

I had a normal upbringing. I went to a public school. I have a younger sister, Corina, and an older brother, Robert. We were always at the beach. My dad used to take us down there. He had bought an old vintage truck, and those kids would be on the back of the truck or like on the sideboards and stuff, and he'd be driving around the dunes. He'd let us kids drive, so we felt grown up and everything.

Gwen and her siblings were growing up in a farm just a few miles from the beach.

We have chickens in the backyard and it was fun to have the little chicks when they be born. We turned the eggs in the incubator and stuff. We had a ducks. They would follow you around us like a puppy dough would.

Gwen's younger sister, Karina remembers how Gwen loved and cared for these animals.

Watching her take care of her animals and her little pig, Petunia.

She loved that little pig. You know.

She had a dog named Mitzi, and she loved that little animal.

So she was always very compassionate.

But while Gwen cared for everything and everyone around her, she was struggling with herself.

I didn't really know what to ask her what was going on. I felt like there was something. It just made me feel real different, probably around seven six and seven, because I liked girls, and I knew if that was I knew the end that there was something wrong with that, because they're supposed to like little boys and I didn't like little girls. And I didn't know what it was. I just knew that it was different, and I kept it to.

Myself, especially because her family was pretty conservative. They were religious, and in their world, being gay was taboo.

My parents had put us in a private Christian school, and my uncle was a head administrator there, and I remember at some point there was a discussion about homosexuality and it was not certainly not in a favorable light, and I realized at that time that that was me. And I had a friend at school and I went and talked to her and I told her I think I'm gay, and she told her parents about it, and I believe they contacted mind that's how they found out.

Gwen doesn't remember much about the discussion she eventually had with her parents about her sexuality, but she does remember the aftermath.

The philosophy or whatever the means, was just the prey it out of you, I guess. My uncle kept me after school for I think about three weeks, and we prayed on it and just prayed about it, talked about it, and it just never went away. It just didn't happen like that for me, and that just made me feel like there was even more wrong with me because that didn't work.

So Gwen kept to herself after that.

There used to be, uh, these really really tall trees across the street from us, and he used to crawl away into the top of these really tall trees and look over like the entire city. I felt like I was on top of the world. That's where I would go. So I always would go buy some place to be alone.

She was pretty much closed off.

This is Gwen's sister Karina.

Again.

As far as being gay, that's not something that she and I really talked a whole lot about.

I know that she had her struggles with it.

I would decide I was just gonna go ahead and pretend like I wasn't and just try to be what I was supposed to be date date guys, which that was like super rare. Most of the time. I just pre didn't like I didn't want to date. It didn't bother me, and I just just ignored it. When you know, I didn't discuss it. They didn't ask.

When she was in the second grade, Gwen's family moved from California to Texas. She lived there until she was about sixteen. That's when her parents split up and she went back to California to live with her dad. In California, Gwen found herself becoming more accepting of her sexuality.

I became acquainted with people that were comfortable with that lifestyle. They were out in the open about it, and it made me comfortable to be out in the open about it and not be as a you know, like ashamed, outwardly ashamed, publicly ashamed about what I was. I accepted it. That's who I am, and that makes me happy. There's really nothing I can do about. I can choose to be miserable the rest of my life and live for everybody else, or just live for me and just be okay with it.

When did you find out that Gwen was gay?

That wasn't my later teen years. I guess I was like many fifteen. She was sixteen. Then I found out, and I just I didn't have a problem with it. It didn't change how I felt about her. I've always loved her just for who she is.

Gwen moved back to Texas a few years later. She soon met a woman from Michigan and the two started dating. They decided to move to Michigan together, but when Gwen got there, she realized the change was not what she anticipated.

She had told me she had a really good job either four. I think it was Ford, one of our companies, and come to find out, she did not. When I got here, she was on public assistance and felt like the state owed hood living and she just wasn't going to work anymore. So I walked into a really bad situation.

Did you start working at the nursing home right away?

Yes? I did. I took the first job. I hit the ground run.

And Gwen took a job at Alpine Manor Nursing Home in Walker, a suburb of Grand Rapids. Alpine Manor Nursing Home was a safe haven for its residents and its workers. Many people who identified as queer or LGBTQ worked there. It was a comfortable environment where they felt free to joke around with each other and pursue all kinds of relationships.

I think it was mostly the women. There was a few men there. It was intimidating universe. So I was just really shy.

But soon Gwen made friends and started socializing. A woman named Don became one of Gwen's first friends. Don's roommate also worked there at the nursing home. Her name was Kathy Wood.

So she became a friend. What did you like about her? What was your friendship like?

Well, Kathy was very intelligent, a lot of fun to be around.

At the time, both Gwen and Kathy were getting fed up with their respective partners Don.

Had lost her job and she was just sitting around the house doing nothing, and my Griffert didn't want to work. She didn't want to do anything, she didn't want to move forward in life, and I just felt like over time her and I decided that well, she didn't want to support Don anymore, and I didn't want to support the person I was with. So I'm moving with Kathy. After she made Don leave.

They started out his roommates. Gwen was seeing another woman who worked at the nursing home, and Kathy was married to her husband Ken, but Kathy and Ken were going through a rocky time.

She said that her husband was coming over that night to pick up some of his things, and I said, well, I'm going out on the eight with a girl, and so I went over to the girl's house. And I wasn't over there at the girl's house very long, and Kathy had called and she was hysterical and saying that Ken was going to hurt her and please hurry back, and she was just really hysterical. I said, yeah, I'm coming.

Gwen headed over ready to go to battle for her friend, but she.

Stops me at the door and she's tea saying everything's okay, everything's okay. So I walked in and Ken was sitting there. He stood up and he introduced himself. He was really polite, really well spoken, and we sat down and had a friendly conversation. And the whole time I'm thinking about the phone conversation and what happened is that.

After Ken left, Gwen asked Kathy what that was all about. Kathy tried to explain, but things weren't adding up.

It didn't take me too long to figure out that she had done that because she was it was manipulative and she just didn't want me out with the girl.

I want to ask you about that, like, about Kathy being manipulative and a liar. Is this like one of the first times you started to realize.

That that wasn't the first incident. I thought, well, it can't really be that bad. I mean, the girl likes me and stuff, and we ended up being together.

Gwen really liked Kathy, but as time went on, she started noticing that Kathy was becoming increasingly jealous and manipulative.

Over time, thanks to God to be more vicious, more calculated, and not really good motive. Sometime just took me minute to sit down and think about the thing that she did figure out why she did him.

Gwen remembers one day she was with her good friend Lisa outside of the nurse home waiting for Kathy to get off work. When Kathy saw them together, she was suspicious and vindictive.

She ended up calling Lisa's cousin and telling him that Lisa had confided in her that the baby that they had together was not his, that she had had an affair on him. She just really visious stuff like it. It wasn't true, but this caused the conflict with him, and I do believe they ended up not together. Her and her husband ended up splitting up over it.

If I was to pick a partner for Gwen, she would not be absolutely not be one that.

I would choose for her.

Some of the things that she'd done to Gwen, you just don't do to somebody that you say you care about on your love.

Gwen dated Kathy for nine months before they split up.

I just got tired of all the the manipulating, the games, and I just couldn't do it anymore. I just wanted to be happy. I didn't want to be in this situation anymore, and I rubbed her.

Gwen and Cathy agreed to remain friends after the breakup. Gwen then left Alpine Manor for another job and started seriously dating another woman from the nursing home named Heather. The two decided to move out of Michigan and out of respect for their friendship. Gwen told Kathy the.

News, and I thought that everything was okay. I told her, I'm going to Texas and I'm going with Heather, and she seemed to be okay with everything.

So you thought everything was fine. So you and Heather go to Texas and then tell me what happens.

Last thing I know, the police are coming down to talk to me about her, saying that I killed people at a nursing home or killed a person up to nursing home as I was started out.

In August of nineteen eighty seven, around the same time that Gwen moved away with Heather, Kathy told her now ex husband Ken a shocking tale. Between January and April that year, while Gwen and Kathy were still working at Alpine Manor, a number of the patients passed away. Among them were sixty year old Marguerite Chambers, May Mason and Bell Burkhard, who were both in their seventies, and Edith

And it was in the paper and they were saying that people were killed at the nursing home. And I wasn't too worried about him. I never really thought it was going to go anywhere. So when they showed up at the door, when they came to talk to me, that that was sound of ridiculous. They told me, they said, your ext girlfriend said that you killed somebody at a nursing home. And I left him. I couldn't believe, I said, I can't believe he came down here for that bullshit.

But on December fourth, nineteen eighty eight, Gwen was arrested for murder. When she was arrested and brought back to Michigan, Gwen still thought things would be cleared up, that the police would realize Kathy was lying and that she would be released, but that didn't happen. The police and prosecutors then used doctor Cole's conclusions to bolster the story that Kathy was telling, saying that the other three women also must have died by asphyxiation.

When they charged me with four I think four or more. That's when I started losing it. I couldn't believe that it got as far as it did.

This episode is underwritten by AIG, a leading global insurance company. AIG is committed to corporate social responsibility and to making a positive difference in the lives of its employees and in the communities where they work and live. In light of the compelling need for pro bono legal assistance, and in recognition of AIG's commitment to criminal and social justice reform, the AIG pro Bono Program provides free legal services and

This idea of the lover's packed, this lover's tryst, this homicidal lesbian duo was extremely shocking and salacious. At the time.

This is Elizabeth Cole, clinical fellow at the Michigan Innocence Clinic.

It was no secret at the time that Gwen was in a relationship with another woman, that she had dated other women in the past, and that she identified as gay, and that played a really large part of trial. It was sort of central to the prosecutor's theme.

And that's how the prosecutor targeted his audience.

I mean, Grand Rapids is beautiful, but it is not the most liberal of towns, especially not in the eighties. As Gwen has told me before, there's a church on every street corner, and we have seen in the transcripts this intense undertone of homophobia throughout.

Schiper used that to his full advantage. When questioning Gwen on the stand.

The prosecutor asks her about her relationship with Kathy and whether or not that relationship was satisfying. And there was a lot of questions about whether or not Gwen had attempted to seduce other women, and whether or not Gwen

They spent more time to just going over details of my sex life, saying it was kinky. And I was thinking if it was my person, my grandma, that had been killed and they were talking about that, I would have been out in the courtroom and probably would have set up said well, the fun does I got to do with anything? Can we get back to, you know, my grandma?

But the actual evidence against Gwen was thin. It was a story that started with Kathy. And before trial, when Gwen and Kathy were in holding cells next to each other, Gwen says she had a chance to ask Kathy about it.

I said, why are you doing this? She said, because you hurt me, because you lied to me, because you tee it on me. I said, there is nothing I can do to change that, and she started She started crying and saying, but I loved you, and started banging her head on the wall in there, and so I was calling the guard and telling them she's over there hurting herself.

After that, Gwen thought that Kathy would come clean on the stand.

That's not what she did at all. I don't know what happened to her between that and getting on the stand. All of a sudden, she was totally composed and nailing me to the cloth.

Kathy testified as to what she told Ken, and eventually told police that she and Gwen plotted to kill the women in a lover's pact. The medical examiner, doctor Cole, testified that the cause of death for the two women he re examined was asphyxiation, and finally, witnesses from the nursing home said they had heard Gwen and Kathy making jokes about killing patients. So what did the defense do at trial? How did they try and refute this?

So the defense really tried, I think, to poke holes in every space that they could.

Gwen's defense attorney, James Piazza, started with Kathy.

The defense really tried to show that this was nothing more than a story made up by Kathy, but he was limited in what he was able to do. He requested mental health records on Kathy to be able to discuss that with her. So the judge says, after reviewing the records himself, that he was denying the motion for her psychological records to be revealed.

The judge determined that Kathy's mental health records would be irrelevant to the defense and could potentially even hurt their case. Despite this being an attorney's decision to make, the judge maintained that having these files available might actually help the prosecution's case because it would help argue that Kathy was

Everyone's sex life is not important because we're talking about murders here, and so I think he tried to sort of minimize the idea that because everyone is gay or was in a relationship with one another, that that meant something in this case.

Then Piazza focused on doctor Cole. On cross examination. Piazza questioned Cole about changing the manner of death for two of the women on their death certificates. Did he see any evidence in these two bodies that it was a homicide.

Based upon his testimony at trial. The short answer is no. There were a number of other things that these people could have passed away from. They were at a nursing home. Most of them had multiple maladies that could have been the reason they passed away, and doctor Cole at trial testified that there really wasn't any typical signs of smothering, which was the allegations that each of these individuals had been smothered, such as burst capillaries, bruising on the face

Doctor Cole admitted that if it wasn't for Cathy's confession, which he knew was the reason for the re examinations, he would not have determined the cause of death to be asphyxiation as for the other three women, because there had been no reexaminations. Piazza asked the judge to determine that there wasn't sufficient evidence for the jury to conclude that they were murdered. His request was denied. Finally, Gwen took the stand to defend herself, but it didn't go over as she hoped.

I think she feels like she didn't get to explain her side of the story the way that she wanted to. When she was testifying at trial. I think that she tried to explain a lot of the things that were presented, like the joke about killing people.

Gwen admits that the atmosphere at the nursing home sometimes led to gallows humor.

I mean, there was things that we did that were silly and just just to get through. It's a real hard place to work where you know, people pass away and people were sick in there, and you know that this is not a place that people were coming to get too muths or better.

What she was talking about was something witnesses testified to hearing at the nursing home. Gwen says this joke started with a horror movie Motel Hell, that a group of them had watched at a party. In the film, motel owners killed their guests and sold their bodies as meat to annoying customers.

And so I believe it was two of the boys at the party that started to say, well, the body is at a nursing home. We're about doing a chili cook off. And that's just where it started and just went from there, and every time that somebody would die, it was just a joke that we're going to have a chili cook off. That's all it ever was.

How do you feel about making those jokes?

Now?

I mean really awful, really awful, Yeah, really really awful considering where it went. I can't even imagine that if it had been my grandma or my mother and I heard her stuff like that and people making jokes about it, and you know, her death, and you know, I'd the horrible about it.

I think she tried to explain that, but after so many people had testified to it, it sort of fell flat. And I think that Gwen wasn't able really to talk about what it was that she wanted to talk about, which was her innocence. And so looking at Gwen's testimony, it seems like they tried to address all of the

Cathy took a plea deal of second degree murder in exchange for her testimony against Gwen. She was sentenced to twenty to forty years on September twentieth. Nineteen eighty nine, Gwen was convicted of all counts and given six concurrent sentences of life without parole.

Were you surprised when you found out she was convicted of this?

Oh yeah, I cried. I still cry, and I feel like she was railroaded.

It was fifteen years before Karina was able to visit Gwen in prison. At first, she didn't recognize her sister.

I know she was like twenty five or so when she went in, but her appearance had changed. Of course mine had changed. So I mean I remember standing in the middle of the room just.

Looking around, just like.

Calling her name, and then I looked at this lady sedued her chair and she was just crying that I knew it was her, And.

So they allowed us to hug.

Who were like, it's really you, You're really here. I'm like, yeah, I'm early here. Sho is so beautiful.

It was.

It was really nice, really great a moment.

Goud.

I'll never forget to be able to see her again.

I had a really hard time coping with how did this happen? I was in shock for probably years. I was just like an autopilot. I went through the motions there were times when I just couldn't do it anymore. I just felt like I just couldn't do it anymore. I tried to hang myself a couple of times, and officers found me and cut me down, and I quit trying because I figured, well, if guy's not going to let me kill myself unless be here for something, so

Although Gwen didn't think she could fix her wrongful conviction, she still tried. Gwen wrote letters to experts, attorneys, and innocence projects. In twenty twenty two, Elizabeth Cole was handed Gwen's case to review by the Michigan Innocence Clinic.

When you read the story of the case, it doesn't seem fully plausible. It seems really fantastical, like it would make great TV. And usually that stands out to us. The other thing about this case in particular, and I think why we decided to investigate, is that this case is based around some very weak evidence.

Currently, Elizabeth and the Michigan Innocence Clinic are looking at two specific angles that reinforce Helgwen's case was set up to fail. First, they're exploring how doctor Cole was prejudiced by outside information given to him prior to the re examination of the two bodies.

Each of these women were determined to have been murdered by smothering, and doctor Cole was very clear about the fact that that all came from his conversations with the police and from Cathy's statement, which he believed. I can't stress this enough. There is no medical basis for the homicide determination, and this was testified to at trial and then reconfirmed during a review by another medical examiner some years later that there is no medical evidence to support a theory of smothering.

Elizabeth says, the bottom line is any theory of a case should not be shared with medical examiners or similar personnel until after they make unbiased judgments, because this information can and likely will affect their opinions. The second avenue that the clinic is focusing on is the rampant homophobia exhibited throughout the trial.

This was an incredibly salacious trial. The testimony was especially salacious, and so there was sort of this connection for the prosecution between like this lack of morality and Gwen's sexual preferences. This idea of homophobia that was played very heavily throughout trial really colors everything else. It colors her relationships with the people who testified. It colors who she is. It colors police opinion of her, It colors juror's opinion of her.

The Michigan Innocence Clinic is currently writing a clemency petition on Gwen's behalf that will focus on these two issues, with the ultimate goal of getting Gwen out of prison. In twenty twenty, Kathy was released on parole, but only after spending almost thirty years in prison based on a lie she told to put Gwen behind bars. To this day, Kathy has not admitted she lied. Why do you think she's stuck with the story for so long or forever.

I thought along and hard about it when she said that we were killing all people's nursing home, and for her to sit there and tell anybody in the world that it was a lie and everything, and then she would have to have that on her shoulders for the rest of the life, and I just don't think that she can live with it. I think that she was okay with the time that she did because because I'm here for nothing, I think she was okay with her like she was paying her own little price for what

When you do get out, What do you hope to do with you, with your future, with your life.

I'm going to take my sister walk around the world. I want to just take her around the world and travel because she works so hard, also does work, work, work, and I just want her to slow down and have fond and I just want to spend time with her. The older I get, the more I realize that if I walk out of here, I'm not going to have a lot of time left. So my fucking list to get shorter and shorter. I'm not a killer. I'm a

If you want to help Gwen, you can contact Michigan Governor Gretchen Whitmer in support of Gwen and her clemency petition. You can also contact the Michigan Innocence Clinic to share your support for Gwen. These links will be in our bio. Next time on Wrongful Conviction with Maggie Freeling, we'll revisit our season one episode with death row prisoner Hank Skinner.

But I think with the evidence we have now that they're going to have to let me go, and they're going to have to acknowledge that I'm innocent. I think, after all I've suffered, that I deserve a chance. I deserve to be with my wife. I deserve to have a life. I deserve to be released and get the hell out of here, and I won't out.

Hank died in February at the prison hospital in Galveston, Texas, from complications following surgery for an aggressive brain tumor. Up until his death, he continued to maintain his innocence and to fight for exoneration. Thanks for listening to Wrongful Conviction with Maggie Freeling. Please support your local innocence organizations and go to the links in our bio to see how