Faye Copeland -- Missouri
Author: Miller, Tom
Title: The Copeland Killings
Summary: Ray Copeland offered destitute men a chance to escape rural
homeless shelters and reclaim their dignity. If they agreed to stay
sober, he would give them each a warm bed, three square meals, and
training in how to buy and sell livestock at auctions near his
Mooresville, Missouri farm. These drifters entrusted the gruff old farmer
with their future and instead became the victims of his murderous greed.
The Copeland Killings recounts the chilling true crime story of five
murders that shocked America's heartland. From 1986 to 1989, Copeland,
with the help of Faye, his wife of nearly fifty years, hired these
impoverished men as a part of a scheme to defraud his fellow farmers
of their livestock with bad checks. Then, to avoid discovery, Copeland
systematically shot each farmhand in the head and buried the body. Faye
kept a careful list, marking a crude "X" next to each victim's name;
she also made a quilt out of their clothing.
Oldest couple ever sentenced to death in the US. Faye was sixty-nine
and Ray was seventy-five at the time of their killings. Faye was the
oldest woman currently on death row, until her sentence was commuted
to life in 1999.
http://serial-killers.virtualave.net/books5.htm
http://www.angelfire.com/weird/flash333/killers/profile.html
http://www.mayhem.net/Crime/morg9908.html