Strange stories in Criminal Law: Mary Morris

 On October 12th, 2000, Mary Lou Henderson Morris left home to go to work and disappeared.

While unclear what happened between then and her body being discovered later that evening, her car was eventually found, burned, on the side of the road only three miles from her home with her behind the wheel, her wedding ring missing.  With her body so badly burned, it was near impossible to determine the cause of death. 

Then several days later, Mary McGinnis Morris was also found dead less than thirty miles away from where Mary Lou Henderson Morris had been found. Her body was also found in her car on the side of the road, and her wedding ring was also missing. Her clothes were torn. She had bruises. Police found fibers in her mouth, suggesting she was gagged just prior to her death. And she had a gunshot wound on her head. Had this Mary seen it coming?  

​In the days prior, she reported to a friend having seen a man at a local store who had given her the creeps. Was he some random, deranged serial killer with a very specific "type"? Or was the killer someone she knew? The police suspected one of Mary #2's coworkers, with whom she'd never really gotten along. But they also suspected Mary #2's husband, who may have lied to the police about his alibi, who refused to take a polygraph test, and who retained a lawyer before even being identified as a suspect. (For anyone who reads this blog frequently, you know that reasons #1 and #2 are really lame reasons for suspecting someone of a crime.) The police never solved this crime, but plenty of suspicions abound. 

​Given that both crimes involved Marys' wedding rings going missing--a common facet of contract killings; the killer uses the ring to prove the deed has been done--folks wonder if Mary #2's husband had hired a professional to take care of his wife, and the assassin had initially killed the wrong woman. ​

Strange coincidence? Hired Killer? What do you think?