[00:00:18] Speaker A: In July 1999, at the McPherson Women's Prison Unit in Newport, Arkansas, inmate number 702440A sat down and began typing. When she was done, she had produced a five page single spaced letter. The intended recipient was Bill McArthur. The author was Mary Lee Orsini. The date was July 2nd.
According to Mary Lee, that was purely coincidence, or as she put it, it was only consequence. End quote. Yep, it was purely a fluke. She had written the letter on the 17th anniversary of the shooting death of Alice MacArthur in 1982. The letter's existence was made public in 2003, but its contents are shared here for the first time.
[00:01:01] Speaker B: Bill, before I begin addressing the purpose of this letter, please permit me to explain that I fully realize that receiving any communication from me has to be difficult.
[00:01:12] Speaker A: Mary Lee asked MacArthur to keep in mind that some of the explanations she would offer in the letter, quote, are not excuses for my actions. They are just my inartful manner of attempting to communicate to you this message, end quote.
[00:01:25] Speaker B: As only you and I know, there were many lies and misconceptions at the trials grand jury and what was publicized. Oddly enough, as we both know, no one told the complete truth. I had always been so sure that my case would have been reversed in some court like the second one, Ron's death, at some time due to all of the errors. Life has an odd way of making you come to grips with the consequences of your wrongdoings. I suppose. Even though I had always promised myself I would make things right, had my case been reversed, I may not have done so. However, Bill, that is my offer. Now, I'm willing to completely clear your name publicly in the manner you select. I would ask that it be a simple manner, however, but I leave that to your discretion.
[00:02:09] Speaker A: Merrilee claimed there wasn't a simple reason to explain why she was reaching out to her former attorney for the first time in two decades.
[00:02:15] Speaker B: I continue by telling you from everything that is in me how sorry I am for the destruction I have caused in your and your family's life and that I take full responsibility for Alice's death. I ask humbly for you to find it in your heart to forgive me. It is not something I expect you to do easily. If ever there are no adequate words available for me to express the remorse I have, just be assured that there is never a day I do not feel this remorse. Bill, as I'm sure you are aware, while I was proceeding through the courts, I did not offer you as an alternative to what occurred. I Simply attempted to have the conviction overturned on what I knew or believed were errors of law. Oddly enough, I omitted some of the best issues for lack of knowledge.
[00:03:01] Speaker A: Marilee said that over the years she had refused to give interviews in the media, even against advice of friends and associates, end quote. Her next two paragraphs come out of left field.
[00:03:12] Speaker B: With this admission above. I also give you my word that the tapes I kept all of these years out of state, where I recorded some of the physical, intimate activity between us, will be destroyed by the time you receive this letter. When the producer from City Confidential was so insistent on interviewing me last year, I did come at that time, within an inch of handing them over to her. I concluded, however, that I had made some decisions years ago I was not willing to depart from, so I would not release them to her. After all, they serve no purpose. I refuse to be of further pain to you or anyone else. In whatever manner you decide you want me to use to clear your name. I simply ask that you do not ask me to lie about the affair. I will protect you by never mentioning it again.
[00:03:58] Speaker A: City Confidential was a true crime TV series that produced an episode dedicated to the Orsini MacArthur saga. Included in the episode were interviews with MacArthur, Eugene Yankee hall and Chris Piazza.
[00:04:09] Speaker B: If you will further permit me, Bill, I'd like to tell you how I reached this point in my life. That I must seek your forgiveness and to clear your name.
[00:04:17] Speaker A: The third page in much of orsini's spiel to MacArthur was devoted to one subject. Religion. Yes, in the 17 years she'd been behind bars, Merrily had or claimed to have found God. She detailed it at length. Here's a sampling.
[00:04:32] Speaker B: If I were to give it some sort of label, I'd have to conclude that my problems stem from total lack of confidence in myself or my worth as a human being. I mean, why does a person lie to begin with? It's to cover up the truth. Sometimes the truth is so painful and unacceptable, lying becomes easier. And like the chemical addictions, soon medicates the pain. As I mentioned earlier, Bill, I do not make excuses. I'm trying to offer a roadmap for you to grasp what I am relating to you. As only you and I know, I was not ever in love with you. What we had was nothing more than a physical relationship turned into a nightmare. I sometimes wish, for both of our sakes, it had been love. It might have made all this easier to explain or label. As it stands, then and now, it was nothing but pure evil on my part, nothing more. You were not at fault. I assure you that it is most difficult to day from where I now view the world to believe I ever had those thoughts or committed that deed. I know it does not make it any easier for you, but it took a lot of years and prayers for me to forgive myself and stop punishing myself for Alice's death.
[00:05:37] Speaker A: Marilee said that over the years she unsuccessfully tried to help Larry McLendon, the man who had shot Alice MacArthur, in his efforts to be released from prison.
[00:05:45] Speaker B: Over the years, I have unsuccessfully attempted to assist Larry McClendon in his endeavors to be released. As you may have concluded he is not guilty. I have often wondered how he will justice society with all the anger he must be carrying from this. His prior record, from what I understand, is what's preventing his release. I conclude by telling you that I will never seek clemency unless you are in agreement for me to do so. I will not put you, your family, or even my family through that ordeal. I cannot tell you that after 17 years, I don't want another chance. I certainly do. I don't deserve it, by all rights. Nonetheless, at almost 52, I'd like to go far away from Arkansas and hopefully contribute somehow to others lives who have been in similar circumstances, situations. I will not make any move to do so until, if ever, you are in agreement and let me know I can proceed.
[00:06:38] Speaker A: Merrily began closing her letter by telling MacArthur that there are no adequate words in the English language that she could use to express the deep remorse I feel for causing Alice's death and that I was not free on the inside until I forgave myself, even when it wasn't easy. She then brought up the inciting crime that first brought Bill MacArthur into Orsini's web 18 years prior.
[00:07:00] Speaker B: Before I close, I do want to thank you for believing in me regarding Ron's death. There were, and still are, a lot of unanswered questions regarding his death I don't suppose I'll ever have answered. However, I've come to terms with that. And for whatever it's now worth, your belief in my innocence was not misplaced. I just did everything possible that was wrong. In that case, then, as you are well aware, no one gives you a book of instructions on how to do all the correct things when your spouse is killed, do they? I close by telling you that I will continue to pray for you and your family. I pray for your peace, and most of all for your salvation and trust in God. Sincerely yours, Leigh Orsini.
[00:07:40] Speaker C: Everyone loves a good place to eat. And few things are more discouraging than spending good money on a bad meal. I'm Eric Harrison and I write for the Style section at the Arkansas Democrat Gazette. Knowing where to go, what to try and how much you'll shell go a long way toward making sure readers find the experience they are looking for rather than paying for big disappointment. Help us create a marketplace where consumers can rely on reviews and make informed choices by
[email protected] ADGNow Mary Leorcini loved.
[00:08:10] Speaker A: Sending people letters, likely as a tool to needle those she believed had wronged her or to get herself back in the newspaper headlines. Sometime after she went to prison, she addressed one to Chris Piazza, the prosecutor who put her behind bars.
[00:08:22] Speaker D: You know, after she was in the pen, I got a letter from her. She wanted me make another copy of her file. She said, I know you're back running with that little white dog you used to run with every day. Well, I had a wire haired terrier and I'd, I'd run with her every day until it got real hot in the summertime. And yeah, I'd leave her and I just started running with her again. And she sent a letter knowing that I'd run with my dog.
[00:08:52] Speaker A: That creep you out?
[00:08:55] Speaker D: I just didn't answer.
She was, she was where she needed to be, but I don't know who that was. Oh, but she had somebody watching. She was letting me know that. And then at the end she said, and I want my file.
[00:09:09] Speaker A: Another letter came in 2003, 21 years after he successfully put Orsini, Eugene, Yankee hall and Larry McClendon in jail, Piazza had moved on in his career. By the early 2000s, the former Pulaski county deputy prosecutor was hearing cases instead of presenting them in his role as a county circuit court judge. In early July of that year, Piazza received a letter from Orsini. In the letter, dated July 1, the woman said she wanted to make a new statement about her husband's death. I want to thank you for your zeal and your endurance and determination in representing the state of Arkansas to the fullest, seeing that justice prevailed even mercifully, she wrote in the letter, asking Piazza to forgive my motives of pride and foolishness and selfishness. Also I ask that you forgive me for my attitude of self centeredness and deception. She asked him for help in finding a source to whom I can direct these confessions. I have and will continue to do this as quietly as possible. Not that Piazza wanted anything to do with her. He'd been Quote, sick of this crap. End quote. Back in 1982, when, after Orsini's trial, Dub Bentley had sent him to Bill McArthur's probable cause hearing to take notes just in case.
So he passed the letter along to the current county prosecutor.
[00:10:17] Speaker D: Yeah, she said, I don't have the letter. I gave it to Larry Jagley because it was really prosecute. I put it in the file. I don't care anymore.
[00:10:24] Speaker A: Actually, Marile Orsini would be someone else's problem.
The more things change, the more they stay the same. 22 years had passed since Marilee Orsini had first sat across from two police officers for an interrogation. Unlike March 12, 1981, this interview held on July 17, 2003, was not with anyone from the North Little Rock Police Department, which had jurisdiction over the investigation into the murder of Rossini. Instead, it was with two investigators from the Pulaski County Sheriff's Office. Sergeant Jen Dixon and Major Jack Goodson. Both were former North Little Rock police officers during the 1980s who never had direct involvement in the case. The interview took place at a conference room just off the office of Warden Maggie Keeple. Dixon sat at the head of the table with Goodson to his left and Orsini on his right. It was 12:54pm when one of the two officers hit play a tape recorder.
[00:11:20] Speaker E: This will be a suspect interview in regards to the homicide of Mr. Ron Orini that happened on or about the 12th day of March of 1981.
This interview is taking place the McFerson Unit of the Arkansas Department of Corrections located at Newport, Arkansas. And present for the interview will be Sergeant Jim Dixon, Major Jack Goodson and Ms. Mary Lee Orsini. Ms. Orsini, I'm holding in front of you right now an advice and understanding of rights form. Do you recognize that form?
[00:11:55] Speaker F: Yes, sir.
[00:11:56] Speaker E: Does it indicate that in the upper right hand corner that you can read and write and is that your initials out beside your response? Yes to each question?
[00:12:04] Speaker F: Yes, sir.
[00:12:05] Speaker A: With the passage of time, the 54 year old Mary Lee still sounded like the woman who'd been interviewed by TJ Farley and Buddy Miles decades prior. But slightly rougher.
[00:12:14] Speaker E: Mr. Orsini, we got into a little conversation and at approximately 12:50pm you stated you wanted to talk to us about a homicide and criminal attempt to commit homicide. Is that correct?
[00:12:25] Speaker F: Yes, sir.
[00:12:27] Speaker A: As the interview played out, it would be clear that the officers talking to Marilee were in a similar position to the one Farley and Miles found themselves on on March 12, 1981. They didn't have complete grasp of who or what they were dealing with.
[00:12:39] Speaker E: It's my understanding that back on March 12, 1981, that your husband, Ron Orsini, was the victim of a homicide. Is that correct?
[00:12:49] Speaker F: That's correct, sir.
[00:12:50] Speaker E: What was Ron's full name?
[00:12:52] Speaker F: Ronald Gary Orsini.
[00:12:54] Speaker A: Before we go any further, doesn't hurt to remind you Marilee Orsini was a pathological liar. Even when he learned about what Marilee said over the course of the ensuing interview, Jean Lyons took all of it with a grain of salt.
[00:13:06] Speaker G: I really didn't have much of a reaction by then. I was surprised that she did, and I can't imagine why she did it. I would.
[00:13:16] Speaker H: I'm.
[00:13:16] Speaker G: I don't have quite the homicide cop skepticism, but I would. My response would be, I wonder what her angle was. I don't think for a minute she sincerely regretted what she'd done. And she must have been working some kind of scam. There must have been something she wanted that she would get if she pretended to give a shit. That's all I would say. I don't think she ever sincerely changed. Once you're down there for life and you know you're not, it's finally dawned on you you can't talk your way out.
Maybe there's. Maybe if you confess and show remorse, there's a new angle you can play.
[00:13:56] Speaker A: Lyons would know. During the period that he worked on his book Widow's Web, he talked to Mary Lee face to face as she served her life sentence.
[00:14:05] Speaker G: She was, as I say, charming and happily flirtatious, and until I displayed skepticism. And once I displayed skepticism and started asking her questions to which she didn't have a good answer, she became cold and almost threatening, as if she could have people do things. But by that time, I was pretty sure she couldn't have anybody do anything. But she turns like flipping a coin.
She was one kind of person, and then she very quickly became another kind of person the minute I asked her questions indicating that I knew more than she thought I knew.
[00:14:43] Speaker A: With that reminder out of the way, back to the interview where Sergeant Dixon got things underway.
[00:14:49] Speaker E: Would you just like to start at the beginning and tell me how all this came about?
And you can go back as far as you want to.
If you would like to cover what led up to the commission of this crime, then by all means do so and give as much detail as possible.
[00:15:09] Speaker F: I probably, you know, I may want to avoid some of that. Not. Not to cover up for anybody else, but maybe just because we Both have daughters there. And a lot of things are, you know, that my stepdaughter's there, no whole rock still. And she's a mother now. She's in her early 30s. And my daughter is living out of the city of Little Rock. But probably some of it doesn't need to really be, you know, in there. I'm not really interested. I mean, I'm not really interested in all the.
All the mess that led up to it as much as I am just the, you know, the actual confession that I was responsible for singly, by myself, with no one's help, no one's involvement, no one's knowledge of taking Osman's life.
[00:15:51] Speaker A: Just like the opening moments of her first 1981 interview, Mary Lee hemmed and hawed when pressed about what led to her husband's death. Whether it was an act as it had been before, is in the eye of the beholder.
[00:16:01] Speaker E: Could you go into enough detail to describe how this crime was committed?
[00:16:06] Speaker F: Yes, sir, I'll do that. Yes, I'll do that.
[00:16:09] Speaker E: Could we start with when you get up the morning or the date of the occurrence?
[00:16:16] Speaker F: Well, the crime was actually committed a little bit after 1 o'clock in the morning on March 12th.
I had stolen my husband's gun some weeks before.
I had secreted it in the house.
And that morning I got up and I went into the bedroom. My daughter had been ill and I had slept with my daughter a couple of nights before, which was legitimate. I mean, there was a lot made out of that, but that was legitimate. She had a swimmer's ear, which she frequently had problems with. And I was sleeping with her. And I got up and I had taken the gun and I had shot my husband. And I closed the door, locked the door and closed the door.
I went through a ruse that morning to prevent my daughter from going into the room.
I took her to school.
I then took the gun and the robe that I had on and the shoes that I had on, the rubber gloves I had on and everything, and I took and destroyed those. I don't know the name of the place. I could probably tell you where they were thrown. Probably not there anymore. I don't know about the gun, but.
And then I proceeded to go through the ruse of calling my husband at work. His partner told me how to get into the door, which I really didn't know how to get in the door.
I knew I'd seen him use something to get into the door. I later found out they were allen wrenches, but I used a skewer from the barbecue. And I went to the door and then I called the police and feigned a hysterical call to the Northwark Police Department. Really, they. The operator switched me, but I guess because the telephone number to the Sharewood and somehow it got switched over. I think I was. If I remember correctly, I was trying to get a hold of the ambulance and when I told her that my husband had blood all over him, then she called the operator was switching things around and it got real confusing and she called the Northern Rock Police Department. Someone did, I think the operator.
And they came out and it ensued from that.
There was a lot of controversy about a car being out front of my house that night and a girl sitting across the street. And that was when that came out. That was news to me. There was no car involved. There was no one else involved. It was solely a volition.
[00:18:43] Speaker E: Let me go back just a bit.
You state that you had detected your husband's gun a week or so prior to his death.
[00:18:52] Speaker F: And.
[00:18:52] Speaker E: And he.
[00:18:53] Speaker F: Several weeks. I can't remember the exact date on that.
[00:18:56] Speaker E: What, did he realize it was missing?
[00:18:58] Speaker F: Yes, he reported to the North Little Rock Police Department as being taken from the driveway so that he could actually file a claim on his insurance. He wasn't sure where he'd been taken. He actually missed it. When he actually missed it. We were in Jacksonville, Letter Italian food restaurant. And I think that's when he missed it.
[00:19:18] Speaker E: So he normally kept it in his car?
[00:19:20] Speaker F: Yeah, it was a. He. He worked in some high risk areas and he had it in a zip around folders and he had it up under his seat.
[00:19:28] Speaker E: What kind of gun was it? Do you remember?
[00:19:31] Speaker F: No, I don't.
[00:19:31] Speaker E: Do you recall what caliber it was?
[00:19:34] Speaker F: I think through the trial they said it was a.38. It was a big gun.
[00:19:38] Speaker A: A few minutes later, Dixon asked her about how she disposed of the gun and the clothes she was wearing the night of the murder.
[00:19:44] Speaker E: You stated that you took that. I believe you said your. Your. The clothes that you were wearing, was it a robe and a pair of house shoes or what?
[00:19:52] Speaker F: Robe, house. She's in a gown, if I remember correctly.
[00:19:55] Speaker E: Okay, you took that and the. And the revolver and you discarded those. Those items.
Did you do this before taking your.
[00:20:05] Speaker H: Daughter to school or.
[00:20:06] Speaker F: Never left the house. I went down to the.
To the garage. I wrapped everything up in the gun, up in the gown and robe and stuff and put it in the back in a plastic bag. Back behind my seat, back up to the bedroom where my daughter was and got her up. I dropped her off at the school and then I dropped her off there and gave her doctor's permit to go back to school and discarded the, discarded the gun and stuff. After that, I left him.
[00:20:39] Speaker E: Can you recall where you discarded these?
[00:20:41] Speaker F: I don't know the name of the street, but I can tell you that you've probably been familiar with Norwalk. I can tell you the direction is. I'm not real good about streets and stuff, but, but I went the old back way of the old, I don't remember that old highway that.
I think it's called the old Jacksonville highway. You go back behind like McGama up that way. Okay. You know how, how Wildwood and Sherwood. You come back up through that used to be the old Round Top filling station there. Okay. You come up that road there. Well, there's like swamps on both sides of that road. Okay.
Trammel Road. Okay. As I'm facing Sherwood, there was a culvert or a little bridge like thing. I threw the gun and the, and the screwdriver thing that I used to break into the back door. I threw it over this way on the, into that swamp. The gown and stuff I threw back up by a dump there. I saw a bunch of stuff discarded.
[00:21:37] Speaker E: Okay, I'm a little confused about the. You threw a screwdriver away. You, you used to break into what?
[00:21:44] Speaker F: I used a break in, into the house. My husband had several days before, had left his keys out and he had taken a screwdriver and popped the back door open. Well, I'd seen him do that and so that gave me the idea of bruising a, a break into the door. But the door was already partially dam from him breaking into it. But I just put the thing there and the door was not, that was the only door in that house. It was a hollow door. And so it moved real easy to do that with.
[00:22:09] Speaker E: Okay, so you went through the motions of faking a break in prior to his death and.
[00:22:15] Speaker F: Well, it really was after his death. I mean, I went, I, I, I went back through, you know, went back in there thinking, you know, probably female stupid logic. I mean, if you, you committed a crime, you're going to think stupidly. I mean, what's smart about any of this, you know.
So stupidly I went back and I used a screwdriver and I popped the, pushed the door open like that. And then I thought, well, I get rid of the screwdriver too. So I had the screwdriver and the, I guess it's a screwdriver. It was a tool and the gun I wrapped it up, threw it away.
[00:22:47] Speaker H: Okay.
[00:22:48] Speaker E: To cap everything off or to kind of condense things. Then after your husband's.
After you killed your husband that day, you pried on the back door to make it look as if someone had broken in. Okay.
[00:22:59] Speaker F: And it already had marks on it.
[00:23:01] Speaker E: Already had marks on it. But you went ahead and tried to stage a break in.
[00:23:06] Speaker F: And it took me several attempts, which made it look like the door had been chewed on, you know.
[00:23:12] Speaker E: So then you took the screwdriver, the. The revolver and your clothing and. And such and carried out Triangle Road and discarded it on either side.
[00:23:21] Speaker F: Yeah.
[00:23:22] Speaker E: Okay.
[00:23:24] Speaker A: It's possible Mary Lee misspoke when saying she attempted to ruse a break in of the back door of her home. When detectives scoured 7412 Pontiac Drive in 1981, there were no signs of any break in on the exterior doors. Only the doorway leading from the garage through the house was tampered with. And the Orsini's maid had said there had been no marks there. On March 9, the interview eventually would circle back to the garage door.
[00:23:46] Speaker H: Okay, now, when did you do use the screwdriver?
[00:23:52] Speaker F: When I left the upstairs. I went back. You know, I went downstairs. I, you know, I guess my mind was racing. I. I don't remember my mindset. I don't know that I had worn that. Not except insanity.
You know, I got the screwdriver. If I recall, the screwdriver was just laying there.
[00:24:08] Speaker H: When you put the stuff in the.
[00:24:10] Speaker F: Car, I saw the screwdriver. You know, the best I can remember is I saw the screwdriver and I thought, well, I'm going to go over here and act like I'm opening this door. And when I went to the door, there was already marks on the door. Well, it took me more. Well, it wasn't marks. It was like a mark or two. And it took me more tries to do what I'd seen my husband just do real easily a day or two before.
[00:24:28] Speaker H: Which door was that door leading from.
[00:24:30] Speaker F: The garage into the upstairs in the cabinet, it led into a playroom area, in fact, went into the playroom area, and right there was the.
[00:24:41] Speaker H: The laundry room, which leads into the house.
[00:24:44] Speaker F: Yes, sir.
[00:24:45] Speaker H: So about the door. That was from the garage area into the house. It's a wooden door.
[00:24:52] Speaker F: It was a hollow door. It was the only hollow door in that whole house. And so the reason I knew that is because my husband told me that.
[00:24:58] Speaker H: Did you shut the door and then jimmy it or. I mean, how did you. Or did you just scratch I mean.
[00:25:04] Speaker F: I shut the door and I put it right in the. With a lock. Thing goes like this. And just pushed it like that. And after several tries, when the door came open.
[00:25:12] Speaker H: Okay, and then what did you do with the.
The tool which you.
[00:25:16] Speaker F: I'm assuming at that time. I put in the stuff with the. With the car. I know I had it with me, so I don't remember why I put it in there.
[00:25:23] Speaker H: Okay. And then that's when you went back.
[00:25:25] Speaker F: Back upstairs.
[00:25:26] Speaker H: Upstairs to your dollar tree. Okay.
[00:25:28] Speaker F: And you know, that's probably from that time. All that probably wouldn't. Wasn't five minutes.
[00:25:33] Speaker A: Major Goodson didn't directly address Merilee until 16 minutes into the interview. It was here where Goodson indicated his own lack of awareness about some of the facts of the Orsini case.
[00:25:43] Speaker H: I know this is hard on you. Not because we're looking at it from the 20 years away. And you're probably. When you go over that, you're. You're back to that time when you were making other decisions. And I know they're probably pretty tough to try to go back through that. And we appreciate that.
But there are some hard questions that we have to ask.
[00:26:08] Speaker A: Kleenex or something more hemming, more hawing. As it happened in 1981, someone had to console a seemingly emotional Mary Lee. When the hard questions were asked.
[00:26:19] Speaker H: I didn't read a lot about what had occurred, but a lot of this stuff that you just mentioned, I think was or has been in either papers or books or whatever.
[00:26:29] Speaker A: Yeah.
[00:26:29] Speaker F: Like it may.
[00:26:30] Speaker H: What I need you to do is try to go through this. I know you don't want to get into the reason for it, but I think we need to go into some motive about why you would do this to your husband. If we don't get into that. Don't. It sort of doesn't all fit. You know what I'm saying?
[00:26:47] Speaker F: And I know what you're saying, but. And I'm not really wanting to cover up, but I just really think that for mice psych that I don't need to go into Marie. I'm responsible.
[00:27:00] Speaker A: Goodson did not let her off the hook.
[00:27:02] Speaker H: Concerns me is you stole your husband's gun two weeks prior. Does that mean that you were planning this at least two weeks prior to.
[00:27:10] Speaker F: Yeah, I was. You know, of course, you've never done anything like this, and I hadn't either prior at that point. And you talked yourself into it. You talk yourself out of it. You talk yourself into it. You talk yourself out of it.
That's what I was. What I was doing.
[00:27:26] Speaker H: Can you give me some idea as to why you would do that to your husband and your. The father of your daughter?
[00:27:32] Speaker F: He was my daughter's stepfather, but.
[00:27:34] Speaker H: Oh, okay.
[00:27:35] Speaker F: But nonetheless, Ron did not deserve this, you know, So I know that sounds contradictory, but I mean, there was just a set of circumstances that led up to it, and they're not really important to them.
[00:27:47] Speaker H: Well, it is. In order to. Making sense of. When someone says I kill someone, the first question that you're going to ask if somebody tells you that is, why is it financial?
[00:28:01] Speaker F: Part it was financial. In part, it was financial. We had.
[00:28:04] Speaker H: Is it abuse?
[00:28:06] Speaker F: No, he had. No, no. And nor was he sexually, nor did he do anything to my.
[00:28:11] Speaker H: That's what I'm saying. If you don't. If you don't come up with no, then you've got this, all this out here that can come.
[00:28:18] Speaker F: I understand. So. So you're saying omission is as bad.
[00:28:21] Speaker H: As is okay, because you're leaving it out there for anything.
[00:28:24] Speaker F: I make a brief toward this instead of just really putting it out there because all the details involve a lot of innocent people that really didn't do anything wrong, but they. It's involving them, you know, and I just really don't want to get into a whole lot of, you know, you know that there's no way I do this quietly. I can't go crawl at the table and do this, even though it's right. And it's just. There's still people gonna suffer behind this.
[00:28:54] Speaker H: I'm telling you, I can appreciate your strength over this.
[00:28:58] Speaker A: After this back and forth of apparent hesitancy, Mary Lee confidently launched into a spiel of exposition that would make her younger self proud.
[00:29:07] Speaker H: I'm telling you, I can appreciate your strength over this, but again, I think that you do an injustice.
[00:29:13] Speaker F: But primarily it was financial. We had gotten ourselves into a situation which primarily was my fault for. For over. My husband had wanted to move back when we were in our original house that we had. We were married. And if y'all remember, when Carter was in office, it was projection interest rates going sky high. And by, by the end of 1980, remember, it was 23%. And my husband was in the. The contracting business and air conditioning business. So he, he knew kind of what was going to happen. And he said, you know, we need to move. House that we lived in doubled itself, you know, and we got our loan quick. The problem that we had is that all the other transactions we got involved with a real estate Agent that wasn't all the up and up and twisted some things around and which was my fault for letting her do that. I didn't. And I did it behind my Asel's back to try to go ahead and take care of the situation, to get into the house, which we both were happy with getting into the house. But you know, to make a long story short, Ron was killed so he wouldn't catch me. And all those, all the lies that I tucked him, you know, I, I know that sounds really crazy, but you can, you care enough for somebody that you don't want them to know really that there's, that you aren't honest with them.
[00:30:37] Speaker H: Was there ever any threats of any harm or anything? If something.
[00:30:42] Speaker F: I look back now, you know, wisdom comes after understanding, you know, well, when you get wisdom and you get understanding, you know, the wisest thing would have been, would have been to sit down with him and work it out. Because at that time my income was increasing and there could have been a solution.
Evidently there was areas I wasn't mature in and I was scared I'd lied to him enough about the situation. Said most people kill over affairs. Both of us, neither one of us was having affairs. You know, I think that's probably why the case was always so crazy, because there was no clear cut motive.
[00:31:18] Speaker A: We've reached the first fact check portion of this interview. At no point did Marilee mention her massive monthly Dillard payments or the $4,000 she spent on expensive new drapes, the ones she took down and placed with old drapes when she faked a home robbery in June 1981. Also, she wasn't even working in 1981. The only income coming into the Orsini home was Ron's. As for Mary Lee's claims that neither she or Ron were having affairs, who knows, but we'll let her own record after shooting Ron speak for itself.
[00:31:46] Speaker F: Yes, Sergeant Varley brought out the thing, but you know, even he didn't get an accurate picture of what was he brought out what you know, the financial situation. Because he traced it back who you could see that, you know, in all essence within a week we would have collapsed, you know, financially at the present state. If I, you know, that's what my thinking was then.
Had I, had I been wise, which I was not, I could have sat down with my husband and there could have been some renegotiating. But I wasn't wise.
I was very stupid.
[00:32:24] Speaker H: So you're saying that that's the reason that this all occurred on that night? The night that you walked in there with a gun in your hand was due to the fact that. And I don't put words in your mouth, but I'm trying to understand that you didn't want to be confronted with the facts of the lies that you told him that exactly that would were about to come out.
[00:32:50] Speaker A: Goodson would later press Mary Lee about her claim that she had been manipulated by a real estate agent.
[00:32:56] Speaker H: Explain that again to me because I think that's going to be a point where they're either going to have to accept your response or they're going to go out here and look for all these things. So I want to make it clear.
[00:33:08] Speaker F: There was nothing else. Essentially it was just that misguided by some people that directed me in a path with the finances. I got in over my head.
[00:33:20] Speaker H: What are some examples of what that.
[00:33:21] Speaker E: Would be.
[00:33:24] Speaker F: Agreeing to.
To doing different types of mortgages and this would be paid off. And I was in over my head. I didn't understand what they were really dealing. And then my husband was at a point with his business. He was saying take care of it, take care of it. He really wasn't really involved in all of it. And he expected me just to come home with the bill of sale. You know, I'm saying he just. He wanted out of his hair. You know how you. I don't like a lot of detail. You just want the woman to go clean up the mess. Give me. Give it to me and to. I see policemen are different. Y'all want to hear a lot of details. Most men want us. They want to know right here at home. I bet you're not detail oriented. You won't know two, three words. So that's the way men are and that's the way he. He operated. One, two or three words. It was clear as I with solved, you know and I listened to some advice and had a convoluted tangled up real estate mess that I didn't. I ended up being messed up over.
[00:34:16] Speaker H: Did you say Investigator Farley with no Hill Rock found out those detail?
[00:34:22] Speaker F: He, he made some efforts to it but the, the problem was with Sergeant Farley and, and I'm not rebuking him in this because I think he was prompted that I was guilty.
But he had a. He had a tendency not to be.
He takes a lot of rabbits and had he stayed on the trail he wouldn't. He would have caught it. Maybe that's a modest way of saying it.
[00:34:46] Speaker E: Let me interrupt you and ask and follow up with how would that have Benefited you at the time. Did he have a large life insurance policy to get you out of debt or.
[00:34:56] Speaker F: Well, yes and no.
I knew he had. He had come back around and in January of that year and put credit life on the house that we were in, on both of us. I mean, there's a letter that's in evidence that he sent his signature that did that.
I had more life insurance on me. I had like twice as much life insurance on me because I was making more money at that time than he did. And I knew that part of the life insurance that he had went to his other daughter. So in essence, I knew that I have a life insurance part that wasn't going to be that much, but the fact that it would have paid off that house and I could have gotten this straightened down and, you know, my mind was not thinking right at that time.
[00:35:40] Speaker H: How much life insurance policies did you have on both of you?
[00:35:44] Speaker F: Years, I had like 125 and he had like 50, I think, because he had a small one with his company.
[00:35:50] Speaker E: What was on the house back then?
[00:35:52] Speaker F: I want to say about 70,000.
[00:35:55] Speaker A: As Farley and Miles uncovered in 1981, it was Mary Lee, not Ron, who took out the credit life insurance plan on their house.
Major Goodson asked Merilee where she had kept Ron's stolen gun in the weeks before his murder. She said she kept it hidden in the spare bedroom that was being renovated for when Ron's biological daughter visited. Goodson then had Mary Lee take him and Dixon back to the evening of March 11, 1981, the night before.
[00:36:21] Speaker H: When did you make your mind up? Did this happen that you said at one o'clock in the morning?
On the 12th, on the 12th, the night before? Would you go over some of that point as to what your mindset was and what your. And I know it's asking you to go back, but I think probably you're pretty clear on what all you did that night.
[00:36:45] Speaker F: My husband's father was in the hospital dying of cancer at that time, and he, he had gone to. He didn't suffer. He had gone to the hospital and he'd come back home. And I'm not real clear just from. Because it was just an ordinary evening. He and my daughter were talking about football or different stuff that they, they talked about. And Tiffany had been staying home, like I said, for a couple days or a day or so from school. You know, we went to bed and I, you know, which I had done the night before. I slept with Timmy, which had nothing to do, you know, I know that looks like it does, but that had nothing to do with the crime, the fact that I was. Another bedroom.
She had actually been watching TV during the day and had been in our bedroom most of the day, as I recall.
And, you know, I wrestled with it probably all the way up to the moment that I went in there.
[00:37:38] Speaker H: So y'all were in the bed in her room.
She goes to sleep. And at some point, when she wasn't.
[00:37:45] Speaker F: Sedated, they made comments at the trial that she was sedated, and I sedated her to new.
[00:37:50] Speaker H: Was she on medication from the illness?
[00:37:53] Speaker F: I don't recall, but she was. If she was, it wasn't a sedative. It had been an antibiotic or something. I don't really recall. The only thing that she ever took, and she didn't have any at that time, as I recall, something for her menstrual cramps.
[00:38:09] Speaker A: Another reminder, a prescription for the sleeping pill Dalmane, which had the side effects of dizziness and nausea, had been taken out by Marilee months before the murder and had been filled by her on March 3rd.
[00:38:20] Speaker H: So you. You and her there in the bedroom, and is that where you made the decision to go?
[00:38:26] Speaker F: To be perfectly honest, I think I made a decision the second before I did it. You know, I mean, the actual decision, you know, it's like I said, you wrestle with it. You go back and forth.
[00:38:35] Speaker H: Apparently you got out, got up and went out of the room, shut the door. Is that normally what you do, shut the door on your daughter when you cleave the room?
[00:38:43] Speaker F: Yeah, because we kept our bedroom doors closed because we had two cats and. Okay, so what's crazy about them being in our room?
[00:38:49] Speaker H: So when you left the room, you had not made the decision to do that then you think, or do you think you know what I needed to do it?
[00:38:57] Speaker F: I think that there was other nights that I had pondered this, you know, within a few week period of time. And I think until the moment that it actually happened, that it was one. It was just that indecisive, because it was. There was many days that I wanted to sit down and tell him the truth.
[00:39:14] Speaker H: So you left your daughter's room and you go to the closet where the boxes are.
[00:39:19] Speaker F: It was the room, which is why the chase.
[00:39:23] Speaker H: Do you remember?
[00:39:24] Speaker F: You know, I really don't. I don't remember. I really don't remember. I knew where the gun was and knew it was a secret, and I'm sure I probably got in, but I. But I had walked around several nights with the gun in my hand.
[00:39:38] Speaker H: So this is just one of those nights out of a few nights that you just did it. Okay, let me. And again, I hate to ask you details, but it. I have to get details in order to. Again, there's a lot of stuff in the paper. There's a lot. There's a book, one or two, I think, out on this thing. So I'm trying to have you remember something that maybe that you haven't told anybody that or that someone else didn't know that we could. We can find out that occurred.
[00:40:05] Speaker F: Well, other than the fact that I didn't know anything about a jacked up car the little girl saw, I didn't hear it or see it, and I was up.
[00:40:13] Speaker H: That's things that law enforcement.
[00:40:15] Speaker F: Yeah, it's things that, you know, I. I never knew. I mean, I never even. I was up walking around the house and I never saw a car out there. So whether this little girl made this up, whether it actually happened.
[00:40:27] Speaker A: Now, Tracy King's description of the car she saw from her bedroom window the night of Ron's murder had been that it was a dark and shiny sedan, like Mary lee's relatively new 1978 Chevy Caprice. The day of her grand jury testimony, King had approached Farley to let him know her testimony had changed while a smiling Merrilee looked on. Here's an anecdote we didn't mention in episode two. Sometime after she was interviewed by Farley and Miles, a detective with the Fred Meyers Agency who Merrily had hired to investigate the murder, had taken King to a store parking lot to identify a car that looked like the one she saw. But according to Widow's Web, the effort only confused her, and Marilee had to use that opportunity to coax her memory. That's when the shiny sedan had become a dirty car that was jacked up in the back end quote. As Farley told Gene lyons back in 2003, Mary Lee gave her version of what happened in the moments after she pulled the trigger.
[00:41:18] Speaker F: You know that once that the gun went off, dogs all around the area started barking.
[00:41:25] Speaker H: That's what I'm talking about.
[00:41:27] Speaker F: Yeah.
My daughter, when I went back in the room, my daughter raised up, you know, in fact, yeah, I do remember that my daughter. I had gotten back in bed and my daughter raised up and I pretended to be asleep and she climbed over me. Look out the window. And then she got back in bed.
[00:41:43] Speaker H: After you. After you. Chapter. That's why I'm trying.
[00:41:47] Speaker F: I was asleep. She did not know I Was away somehow.
[00:41:51] Speaker A: Tiffany Orsini had slept through a gun being shot across the hallway from her room and her mother climbing back into bed with her. Yet the sound of dogs barking woke her up. Goodson backtracked to the moments before Merrilee pulled the trigger.
[00:42:04] Speaker H: Then you went into yours and his bedroom. Did you shut the door behind you?
[00:42:08] Speaker F: Yes, I did.
[00:42:10] Speaker H: And what position was he lying in.
[00:42:13] Speaker F: As you recall, with his back to the door? I don't really remember.
The light was out except for a night light, and I could tell you, but his back was to the door. But you normally slept that way anyway, facing that wall. So he would have slept on his left side.
[00:42:29] Speaker H: On his left side like this?
[00:42:31] Speaker F: Something like that.
[00:42:32] Speaker E: When you fired the gun, did. What did you do to prepare to fire?
[00:42:37] Speaker F: I think that means did you.
[00:42:42] Speaker E: Actually aim it at the back of his head or did you touch the back of his head with it at any time?
Did you shoot directly into them or do a pillow or any of the bed sheets or anything immediately after, what did you do?
[00:43:02] Speaker F: The best that I can recall, I closed the door, closed and locked the door and went into my daughter's bathroom and took the gown and the robe and. And gloves off. I had on, like, dishwashing gloves, latex gloves, and the shoes I had on.
I rolled them up and put another gown on, and I took that stuff downstairs to the car, which the car was in the garage. Put it in the back seat in a plastic. Like a shopping bag.
[00:43:37] Speaker E: You said that, you know, one horn that these dogs in the neighborhood bark and that you felt like your daughter had set up in bed.
[00:43:45] Speaker F: Well, she did. She.
[00:43:47] Speaker E: How do you know this, though? I mean, you're. You're not in the room at that time. It's walking, you know. Tell me about that.
[00:43:53] Speaker F: After all this had ensued, I went back to the bedroom, which is.
I can't. I'm not good at timespans, but I'm gonna say five minutes to go back. Well, it was like the dogs were just cutting up, you know, all over the neighborhood. I mean, it wasn't an instantaneous. Okay, but it's like the dogs were just barking, you know, the neighbor's dog was barking. The dogs over here to the. The house was barking. We didn't have a dog, but they were barking. And I was already back in the bed. And my daughter woke up, raised up, and climbed over me and looked out the window, didn't say anything to me, you know, and got back in bed. She later said. She later told me that morning, did I hear the dogs barking. And I told her, I said, what dogs? And so she, she told me that last, during the night, she heard the dogs barking all the place. You know, what was going on. I said, well, could have been somebody walking through the yards or something.
[00:44:41] Speaker E: Okay, so just for clarification, she didn't, she didn't waken to the sound of this gunshot? She woken after you'd already got back in bed with her and the dogs were barking.
[00:44:53] Speaker H: Okay.
[00:44:54] Speaker F: And the, and the sound of gunshot was deafening to me, you know.
[00:44:59] Speaker A: After an uncharacteristic brief moment of silence, Mary Lee then brought up the gunshot from her fake robbery attempt on June 14, 1981, which Goodson was one of the responding officers to cause.
[00:45:10] Speaker F: In fact, the night with that other thing, when you came to the house with the thing, that gun went off. And I don't know if you recall, but we like to have never got Tiffany up. Tiffany was in the room and did not wake up, was sound asleep and the door was there. So you know the position for the bedrooms with the head type stairs. So, yeah.
[00:45:28] Speaker A: After a few other follow up questions, Goodson asked Mary Lee about how she spent the rest of the early morning hours after she shot Ron.
[00:45:34] Speaker H: What happened the rest of the night? Did you go back to sleep or did you.
[00:45:38] Speaker F: What.
[00:45:38] Speaker A: What happened?
[00:45:39] Speaker F: I stayed awake until the time it was I got up, which I don't remember. At 4:35 o'clock.
[00:45:46] Speaker H: And what time did your daughter get.
[00:45:47] Speaker F: Up from 21 years ago? I couldn't honestly tell you, but she.
[00:45:51] Speaker H: Was going to school that day.
[00:45:52] Speaker F: She was going to school Thursday.
[00:45:55] Speaker H: She got up. Your husband's still in bed. Y'all are both aware of that, right? I mean, you said you made some excuses for him.
[00:46:02] Speaker F: No, I did not make. No. The door was locked and I'd gotten up. And if I recall, Tiffany wanted to get in the room for some reason. I don't remember what the. You know, for sake of just being honest, I don't remember what the reason was, but she wanted to get in the room and I told her the door was locked, to leave it alone, that I would call daddy and find out where the key was. And so she left it alone.
[00:46:25] Speaker H: So she assumed that your husband had already left. Go to work.
[00:46:28] Speaker F: The only suspicion is when we pulled out of the driveway, there was a truck sitting in the driveway.
[00:46:33] Speaker A: Now here, Mary Lee takes an opportunity to paint people who testified in her trials as being liars.
[00:46:38] Speaker F: You know, this is one of those things, you know, you go to trial and you expect Everybody to tell the truth. And about half the witnesses got there and told a story that wasn't true. And you're wondering, you know, why people. You're the bad guy. Why aren't they telling the truth? But several times, my husband's partner, Vernon, had picked my husband up. My husband had a real big engine in that truck, and there was times it wouldn't turn over, and he hadn't had it started. Now, since we moved in that house in September, he'd never been there. But several times when we lived in Normal Garden, Vernon would come by and get Ron until they could do something with a starter that he had problems with that wouldn't hit a dead spot. I don't remember circumstances.
[00:47:12] Speaker H: Your daughter questioned that when y'all, she.
[00:47:14] Speaker F: Said, you know, well, there. What's Dave's truck doing there? Something to that effect. And I said, well, d.
I didn't make a big deal out of it. And she wasn't really all that suspicious.
[00:47:23] Speaker A: From here, Mary Lee's story plays out much like it did in 1981, with her taking Tiffany to breakfast at Andy's, then visiting a pharmacy before taking Tiffany to school. Also, as she did in 81, she felt the need to provide innocuous details that no one would have asked her about, like the cost of Andy's breakfast specials and looking at attabeed gold beads that girls wore at the time. Merrily, even committed to the part where she had stopped at a filling station to have her car looked at after it started making a noise. Goodson, Dickson and Merrilee then spent a chunk of time trying to retrace the path she had taken to where she had disposed of her murder weapon. After driving north on the old Jacksonville highway and then turning west on Trammell Road toward Sherwood, she stopped east of the intersection of Highway 67 and 167 and Trammell Road near a swampy area located on the north and south sides of Trammell Road. She pulled off to the right side of the road. She got out and heaped the bag with the gun as far as she could.
[00:48:16] Speaker H: You went back home, and once you got home, what did you pull into the garage?
[00:48:20] Speaker F: I couldn't tell you that.
[00:48:22] Speaker H: What do you recall occurring?
[00:48:24] Speaker F: I remember going back into the house, and I think I went to the phone and called Pete at the office or called the office, you know, to ask if my husband was there. And I remember if Pete answered the phone or someone answered the phone or whatever. Wasn't Pete sued? A conversation about going fishing with Ron and this. And Pete said. And this was one of the other things. You know, I wondered why he changed his story at trial. Because he said to me, well, I think I saw his truck out back. Well, all three or four of them had the same kind of trucks. But at trial, he didn't remember that statement, but he actually said that to me. And, you know, when your mind is in that mindset, you're thinking, good. You know, you think you saw him. So this is. It's gonna fit in good. So he came back. He said, no, he said, I didn't see him. He said, but I asked him how to get in the room. And he said he made some comment about me climbing in the window up there and laughed about that. And so I told him I had a skewer. And so that's how I, you know, I popped the door open because I didn't know how to get the door open without you.
[00:49:18] Speaker H: Decided to go ahead and go in.
[00:49:21] Speaker F: I opened the door, just got back out of it real quick. I didn't go on.
[00:49:25] Speaker A: Mary Lee then shared what happened after she placed her fateful phone call to the police.
[00:49:29] Speaker F: Yeah, I went out. I said. I just went out and said on the front stoop. And there was a real young patrolman that was there first. I used to know his name, but I don't know his name now. He showed up first.
This is not totally accurate because I don't have to recall this. He asked me what had happened, and I told him my husband was upstairs. I'd found him with blood all over him.
And he went upstairs and he asked me if my husband had been having headaches.
[00:49:55] Speaker A: That patrolman was Officer Bill Mallet. Whether Marilee's recollection of the front porch encounter was spot on or possibly aided by having read Widow's Web, her side of the story essentially synced with Mallet's version.
[00:50:07] Speaker F: And I told him, well, my husband did. My husband. I both had real bad allergies, and I said yes. And I was wondering why he was asking me if he had headaches, you know, and he said, well, I think your husband's Ned. Really, you know what's going through my mind? I'm wondering what is going on here? Can't this policeman tell that he's been shot?
[00:50:25] Speaker A: When Mallett asked her about the possibility of Ron having an aneurysm, Mallett recalled, Mary Lee had gazed at him with, quote, a look of wonder and amazement, end quote, began to speak before she stopped and said nothing.
[00:50:40] Speaker C: You love cheering on the home team you never missed a date night.
But as you were enjoying these moments, our city was changing.
When history is made in Arkansas, will you be the last to know? Stay ahead, Stay informed. Go to arkansasonline.com.
[00:51:15] Speaker A: There was still about 22 minutes left. In the interview. Major Goodson asked Merilee how the story she was telling now compared to what she had said back in 1981. She explained how her story simply revolved around her finding Ron's body.
[00:51:29] Speaker H: You slept with your daughter that night. You got up next morning.
[00:51:32] Speaker F: It was a mixture of truth and a mixture of not, you know, of untruth. It was a mixture of actuality. I did sleep with my daughter. That did occur. She was sick. Reason I was sleeping with it.
[00:51:42] Speaker A: So why, why after 22 years, had Mary Lee Orsini finally decided to unburden herself about the murder of Ron Orsini? Well, as she told it, she'd been trying to for years.
[00:51:54] Speaker F: Well, I've tried to since 1996. 96, when I first told my mother, she asked me then not to say anything. And again in 99, I talked to her about it right before she died and she just begged me not to do it. My daughter is successful and she's married and she's living away from Little Rock and my family suffered a lot.
Their family suffered a lot. And my mother in law died last year without me resolving this with her. And I was crazy about my mother in law.
[00:52:25] Speaker A: If you recall, 1999 was the year that Mary Lee wrote her letter to Bill McArthur. Mary Lee's mother, Julia died on December 23rd of that year. The letter in which Mary Lee still played up her innocent act about Ron's Death was dated July 2. Goodson asked Merrilee why she felt the need to send a letter to Chris Piazza. At first she balked, asking if the tape recorder could be turned off for a few minutes.
[00:52:48] Speaker H: I really don't, I dread to be up front on all it. Turn it off, it'll look like, yeah.
[00:52:55] Speaker F: I'm being upfront about it. It's just that a lot of people might misinterpret what I'm going to say. I, you know, anytime that I would pray, the Lord just kept having a heaviness on my heart about this. And I was praying and, and you know, Chris Piazza just came to my mind, wrestled with it a couple of days and wrote the letter out a couple of, a couple times. And, you know, I, I just became grateful for him for pursuing it, you know, not letting me get by.
Diligently pursuing the initial case and not. Not being afraid to let me get to go after doing his job.
And even though at the time that there was false evidence used, the trial and I, and I wrestled through the courts because there was a lot of false evidence used at my trial to convict me. They even used a lot of lies. But, you know, God is just, you know, he's. In proverbs, it says the sense the sentence is just in the hands of a king. And that means when a judge gives you a sentence, it's just regardless of what that sentence is. And so I knew that it looked like the time he was promoting a career and all this stuff and that's how your mind can think, but he was really just doing. He was representing the state of Arkansas justly.
[00:54:09] Speaker A: Goodson tried multiple times to get Mary Lee to share any details about her crime that no one else but possibly investigators would know.
[00:54:17] Speaker F: Essentially there was so much truth mixed in with the lies until the truth could stand, you know what I'm saying? It was able enough. There was enough validation where you could go to that and you hit a wall. And so a lot of times I think when the police hit that wall, maybe the prosecutor, they would make a curve and they would have the truth there. And I think possibly had the truth been pursued initially, you know, I could have been stopped initially.
[00:54:41] Speaker H: What we're trying to do is figure out what it is that the person that did this crime would know that occurred that nobody else knows.
In other words, if you said you did this and someone else said they did this, how would we know which one of you did the crime? And if you did something, one thing.
[00:55:03] Speaker F: On the exact time that it occurred, it occurred, if I'm not mistaken, at 105 in the morning. Because I remember seeing a clock in the house and thinking they came out. At trial, it was a neighbor that said she heard a bump at 11. Something that was like. But it was things like that that I always wondered, where do they get that? You know. And then Dr. Malik came up with this far fetched theory. You know, he came out with stuff. I went to him one time, he called me to his office and asked me questions and, and somehow we got on the subject of poisoning and I. And we started talking about poisoning. And then when he testified, he said, I asked how to kill with arsenic poison. And that wouldn't even, you know, I wouldn't even know anything about that. But it was. He got on the subject about how to autopsy people would, I mean, well, the only wonder, you know, that's why I'm saying that was the kind of stuff that always would throw me.
[00:55:51] Speaker A: After an hour and 20 minutes, Mary Le Orsini's confession interview came to a close.
[00:55:57] Speaker E: You think anything we failed to cover in regards to this at this time? Is there anything you want to add?
[00:56:04] Speaker A: No.
[00:56:04] Speaker F: It's just that no one will ever know the regret I have for being, you know, for taking his life.
Plus, the harm that's caused everyone cannot be expressed in words.
[00:56:21] Speaker E: Okay, we'll go ahead and conclude the interview. We're still at the Department of Corrections McPherson Unit in Newport, Arkansas. Still present for the interviews, Major Jack Goodson, Sergeant Jim Dixon and Mary Lee Orsini. The time now is 2:15pm That'll be all that's on this tape.
[00:56:41] Speaker A: If, as Gene Lyons theorized, Mayor Lee had an ulterior motive to giving her confession, she never got to see it through. On August 13, 2003, the news was made public. Mary Lee had confessed to killing Ron Orsini. But the public had learned something else. The previous day, Mary Lee Orsini was dead.
On the morning of August 11, Mary Lee woke up in her barracks complaining of chest pains. She was treated at the prison infirmary before being taken by ambulance to a Newport hospital where she died. Lyons, interviewed for the story that announced the confession had been made, was asked for his confession theory. The only motive I can see for her was to possibly make it right for her daughter after all these years, Lyons said. It's the only humane motive I can think of. I must say, it's very difficult for me to think she had a humane motive at all.
Here's another story we didn't mention until now. During her original grand jury in 1981, Marilee apparently tried to pin Ron's murder on her daughter, even going as far as to claim Tiffany had been sexually assaulted by him. Buddy Miles feared for years that by asking mary lee on March 12, 1981 if there had been any problems between Ron and Tiffany, he had unwittingly planted the seeds for that defense.
A secret vote was made during the first grand jury but was never made public.
During the 1983 grand jury, TJ Farley testified that after the vote he overheard someone say that seven out of 16 jurors had voted to indict the 13 year old girl.
On August 22nd, a story detailing Mary Lee's confession account was published in the Democrat Gazette in a feature written by Noel Ohman. In it, Oman wrote that Pulaski county deputies had looked at the area. Mary Lee claimed to have disposed of her murder weapon, but decided against the search. They noted that a culvert had been built and shoulder work and road work had been done in that area in the years since 1981.
If you're wondering why during their nearly 90 minute interview, Major Goodson and Sergeant Dixon never asked Merrilee about the murder of Alex MacArthur, there was a reason. According to a case summary that was published in the Democrat Gazette On Aug. 22, Mary Lee had confessed to Moore. The reason it wasn't recorded was Goodson and Dixon's very limited knowledge of the facts and a desire to talk with the prosecutor's office in both Little Rock and North Little Rock police about how to proceed due to her death. A second interview never happened. In the untaped portion, Mary Lee confessed to both the failed bombing of Alice MacArthur and the conspiracy that led to her being shot in her home. Sergeant Dixon wrote that Mary Lee further stated that Bill McArthur had no knowledge of her plans to kill Alice MacArthur and that she, Yankee hall and McClendon were the people responsible for her death.
Of course, Tommy Robinson had something to say about Merrilee's confession about the plot. They just didn't tape record that part of it. Robinson said, that dog won't hunt. I want to see the case closed. I'm tired of reading about it, but let's put all the cards on the table. Merrilee admitted to perjuring herself in court when she claimed Bill McArthur knew of the plot. Wrote Dixon.
She said that she was mad at Bill because he and she had started having an affair after she hired him as her attorney. She stated that when he was asked about her, he denied that there was anything going on between them and that fact drew suspicion to him. She said there were numerous people who had seen them out together and it made him look guilty. She said that she was bitter toward him for not acknowledging their affair and that this was why she lied about him in court.
Informed of this, a 65 year old Bill McArthur scoffed. If there was an affair involved, it was strictly in her head. MacArthur said it wasn't real. In fact, 22 years ago she gave some statements about places we had been, including dates and times and, and we were able to refute every one of them. MacArthur added that after 22 years, quote, I hope it will finally be over. End quote.
[01:00:45] Speaker F: The Orsini Tapes is a production of the Arkansas Democrat Gazette. The show is written and hosted by Daniel McFadden and Tony Holt and is produced by Kyle McDaniel.
[01:00:58] Speaker A: The archive audio for this podcast came from three sources the north of the Laroque Police Department, the Pulaski County Prosecutor's Office, and the Gene Lyons Collection at the University of Arkansas Library. A special thanks to Juliette Robinson for the hours she spent digitizing Jean Lyons tapes. We are deeply thankful. We would like to give a very special thanks to Parker Mancino for portraying Mary Leorini in this podcast episode. Also special thanks to Kiera Bradford and the Arkansas Democrat Gazette marketing team and to Kerry Hill for producing the artwork for this podcast.
