Genene Jones was a nurse who got off on the excitement of creating Code Blue medical emergencies. Genene played life-and-death games by injecting numerous babies with life-threatening drugs, putting them in mortal peril and then putting herself forward as the heroine when the babies pulled through. Unfortunately, many did not. Finally caught and convicted, she was sentenced to 159 years in prison. No one knows for certain how many babies perished at her hands as many of the records were destroyed. It is thought, however, that Genene may have murdered almost fifty infants dating back to the beginning of her nursing career in 1978.
What is particularly terrifying about this case, is the hospital that suspected her of harming the children, gave her a glowing reference to continue her killing spree else where.
Genene Jones is due for release on parole in 2017.
Margie Velma Barfield was born on October 29, 1932. She was a serial killer, convicted of one murder, admitted to four and is suspected of two more. She was the first woman in the United States to be executed after the 1976 resumption of capital punishment and the first since 1962. She was also the first woman to be executed by lethal injection.
Velma Barfield was born in rural South Carolina, but grew up near Fayetteville, North Carolina. Her father reportedly was abusive and she resented her mother who did not stop the beatings. She escaped by marrying Thomas Burke in 1949. The couple had two children and were reportedly happy until Barfield had a hysterectomy and developed back pain. These events led to a behavioral change in Barfield and an eventual drug addiction.
Thomas Burke began to drink and Barfield's complaints turned into bitter arguments. On April 4, 1969, after Burke had passed out, Barfield and the children left the house, returning to find the home burned and Burke dead. Only a few months later, her home burned once again, this time with a reward of insurance money.
In 1970, Barfield married a widower, Jennings Barfield. Less than a year after their marriage, Jennings died on March 22 1971 from heart complications, leaving Velma a widow once again.
In 1974, Barfield's mother, Lillian Bullard, showed symptoms of intense diarrhea, vomiting and nausea, only to fully recover a few days later. During the Christmas season of the same year, Lillian experienced the same illness as earlier that year, resulting in her death only hours after arriving at the hospital on December 30, 1974.
In 1976, Barfield began caring for the elderly, working for Montgomery and Dollie Edwards. Montgomery fell ill and died on January 29, 1977. A little over a month after the death of her husband, Dollie experienced identical symptoms to that of Velma's mother and she too died (March 1, 1977), a death to which Barfield later confessed.
The following year, 1977, Barfield took another caretaking job, this time for 76-year old Record Lee, who had broken her leg. On June 4, 1977, Lee's husband, John Henry, began experiencing racking pains in his stomach and chest along with vomiting and diarrhea. He died soon afterward and Barfield later confessed to his murder.
Another victim was Rowland Stuart Taylor, Barfield's boyfriend and a relative of Dollie Edwards. Fearing he had discovered she had been forging checks on his account, she mixed an arsenic-based rat poison into his beer and tea. He died on February 3, 1978, while she was trying to "nurse" him back to health; an autopsy found arsenic in Taylor's system. After her arrest, the body of Jennings Barfield was exhumed and found to have traces of arsenic, a murder that Barfield denied having committed. Although she subsequently confessed to the murders of Lillian Bullard, Dollie Edwards, and John Henry Lee,she was tried and convicted only for the murder of Taylor.
Prison and execution
During her stay on death row, Barfield became a devout born again Christian.
Her last few years were spent ministering to prisoners, for which she received praise from Billy Graham. was executed on November 2, 1984 at Central Prison in Raleigh, North Carolina. She released a statement before the execution, stating "I know that everybody has gone through a lot of pain, all the families connected, and I am sorry, and I want to thank everybody who have been supporting me all these six years." Barfield declined a last meal, having instead a bag of Cheez Doodles and a 12-ounce can of Coca-Cola.
Barfield was buried in a small rural North Carolina cemetery, near her first husband, Thomas Burke.
To learn more about Velma Barfield buy my new book.
If you've read the book. Do you want to answer these questions?
1. So was Velma Barfield a cold killer or a loving mother and grandma, whose life spiraled out of control through her addiction to prescription drugs. Drugs that befuddled her brain and confused her thinking and behavior?
2. Did her execution achieve anything?
3. Should she not have been allowed to live the rest of her life in prison where she was contributing by helping others?
4. If we believe taking a life is immoral, should we allow governments to do the same in our name?
Interview with Velma Barfield shortly before her execution.
live with that every day. I endure all of this knowing
that vindication will one day be mine. This is the last
time I’ll state – I did not kill my children"
These are the words of Kathleen Folbigg, the Australian mother convicted in October 2003 of murdering her four children aged between 19 days and 19 months. These words are from an extract of a letter written to her foster sister from the confines of Mulawa Women’s Prison in Sydney. The letter shows us a glimpse at the thoughts and feelings of a mother who maintains her innocence in the face of scathing and relentless public criticism.
Throughout her seven-week trial, Kathleen made front-page headlines in Australian newspapers and attracted the attention of the international community.
· Who could forget the haunting images? - the Sydney Morning Herald’s front-page life-size color pictures of Kathleen’s four dead children positioned under the heading “Dead by their mother’s hand”.
· Who could forget the statistics? That the odds of four babies dying of Sudden
· Infant Death Syndrome in the same family are “a staggering one in one trillion”.
· Who could forget the grieving husband and father.
Kathleen was portrayed, by the prosecution as a selfish woman who was obsessed with herself – particularly with working out at the gym and going out. Prosecutor MarkTedeschi, QC, argued that Folbigg “was deeply resentful of the intrusion her children had on her life, in particular on her sleep, her ability to go to the gym, and her ability to socialise including going out dancing” and that “she resolved this by killing them. She was totally obsessed with her own needs, wants and desires”.
Kathleen was labelled a “callous mother whose babies never stood a chance."
Today, more and more people are beginning to doubt Kathleen Folbigg’s guilt and the “expert medical” testimony that convicted her.
Buy my book about Kathleen Folbigg.
In a book, Murder, Medicine and Motherhood Emma Cunliffe, a professor of law in Canada, spent six years researching Kathleen Folbigg’s case.
Emma Cunliffe believes that Kathleen was wrongly convicted based on unreliable evidence from medical experts. She argues that medical experts in the court trial neglected to give evidence that fully showed the then current uncertainty in the scientific and medical communities about repeated unexplained deaths of infants in a single family. Emma Cunliffe, is so convinced of Kathleen’s wrongful conviction she is calling on the NSW to introduce the same ''last resort'' mechanism that was used in the Northern Territory to quash Lindy Chamberlain's murder conviction. Emma Cunliffe says the medical uncertainty that existed at the time of Kathleen’s trial and the appeals had since moved to a consensus view: that repeated unexplained infant deaths in a single family can and do occur. She strongly believes that Kathleen conviction is unsound and should be reviewed. Dr Cunliffe's opinions have won support from eminent forensic pathologists, who share her belief that a review of Kathleen Folbigg's conviction should be examined. Professor John Hilton who was a prosecution witness in Kathleen’s trial believes that Dr Cunliffe book is a “valuable contribution to this whole matter and is deserving of notice by the relevant authorities.'' Professor Stephen Cordner, the director of the Victorian Institute of Forensic Medicine says of Dr. Cunliffe’s book ''I think she's written a very even-handed book based on substantial research and persuasively concludes … that Kathleen Folbigg has been wrongly convicted.''
