Today is 25th anniversary of REMARKABLE family massacre in AR,enraged Mommy shot 6,killing 5,including all 3 of her womb excretions,is still alive & well,serving out Life prison sentence,now aged 62
Joe1orbit
This news item is two days old already, but I CANNOT resist posting it
anyway. It just has so MANY exciting, unique, and fascinating elements to it,
and it deals with a TOTALLY unknown, genuine MASS family murderess. I am SO
pleased that I managed to find it, and feel honored to able to share it.
The name Shirley Marie Curry probably does NOT ring ANY bells for most of you
folks. I must shamefully admit that it didn't ring any bells for me, either.
And yet the family massacre saga of Shirley is absolutely FASCINATING, and
unfolds beautifully in the news article below.
It was July 20th of 1974, 25 LONG years ago, to the EXACT DATE of today.
Shirley was a young gal, recently divorced from her hubby. A day earlier, at a
court hearing, a judge had granted custody of her 14 year old son-slave to her
ex-hubby. All THREE of her SLAVES had testified to the judge, that they were
AFRAID of Mommy Shirley. She was ENRAGED, determined to claim her vengeance.
She armed herself with a .38 caliber revolver. She decided to claim her
vengeance, and MASSACRE her ENTIRE family. Over the course of nine hours, she
systematically slaughtered all three of her children, her ex-hubby, her forsmer
sister-in law, and wounded her former brother-in-law. That's right folks, she
shot SIX, killing FIVE! Very impressive indeed!
Not only did she commit this massacre, she also demonstrated remarkable
artistic flair in her rampage, both RECORDING on audiotape, and in writing, her
own thoughts & feeling immediately before and after her remarkable rampage. She
had already gunned down all three of her child-slaves when she decided it was
important to TELL the world what she had done. She turned on an audio tape
recorder and said, calmly: " "I shot them. Richard went to sleep on the floor
in front of the TV, but Jesse went to his bed. That's where they'll be. Still
asleep. And in peace." She continuing talking for quite awhile, recording her
thoughts for posterity on topics as diverse as god, her ex-husband, vacuuming,
and injustice.
A few miles away, her ex-hubby and relatives lived, totally unaware that
Shirley had decided that the Day of Vengeance was at hand. After finishing the
recording, and probably checking to make sure that all three of her womb
excretions were dead, Shirley got into her car, loaded and trusty .38 caliber
revolver in hand, and drove to the home of her ex-hubby, where she committed
stage two of her deadly rampage, killing the ex-hubby & sister-in-law, wounding
the brother-in-law, before fleeing the scene. Police found her calm but
"glassy-eyed", hours after her massacre. She put up no type of resistence to
arrest.
Mass murderer Shirley was first found to be mentally incompetent and placed
in a loony bin, but later, her competency "restored", she was put on trial,
found Guilty of all five murders, and sentenced to Life in prison with no
parole eligibilty. Here we are, in 1999, 25 years later, and I am pleased to
report that Shirley, now aged 62, is still alive and well! Cool!
Just recently, the governor of AR denied Shirley's request for clemency.
Damn, this is a FASCINATING case! Some enterprising true crime author really
needs to write a BOOK about Shirley, at least CONTACT her in prison and see if
she is willing to express herself as BEAUTIFULLY as she did in the audio tape
and LETTERS that she wrote just before and during her killing spree. I just
LOVE it when serial or mass killers VERBALLY EXPRESS their True Reality
mindsets to us, and it doesn't really happen all that often. Just READ the
below quotes, how ELOQUENT this young, enraged mass murderess is, as she
expresses her feelings RIGHT at the TIME that she has DECIDED to massacre her
entire family.
The handwritten letter that she was CARRYING with her when arrested, read, in
part: "If you are reading this or having it read to you, it will mean I did it.
Which at this sorrowful hour, I mean to." Dam*, I wish this article would
reprint the ENTIRE text of the audio recording and letters that Shirley graced
us with! In that same letter, Shirley went on to say: "No one will come near
me. The kids are afraid of me, so they say on the stand. I am nothing, never
was nor ever will be, so why fight -- I QUIT. Nothing is worth it, now.'' What
an ELOQUENT expression of her total embrace of rage & hate & personal
hopelessness, her words provide!
Shirley got married in 1955, at the age of 18. They were married 12 years, &
had 3 child-slaves, 2 boys & a girl. It was Shirley herself who FILED for
divorce, but you can bet that was counting on winning SOLE custody of all her
slaves. She DID get custody of all three, but her ex-hubby managed to get a
specific clause into the divorce agreement, that once each child reached age
14, they could DECIDE which parent they wanted to live with. And sure enough,.
first her daughter and then her son, upon reaching age 14, decided to LEAVE
her, to abandon their slaveowner Mommy, and go live with Daddy. Shirley did NOT
take those abandonments well, at all. After all, the only REASON for a
child-slave living, is to MEET the NEEDS and DESIRES of their slaveowner-Mommy.
Shirley was caught after the bodies of the victims were found in both
locations, driving her car along as if nothing was wrong. Police pulled her
over, and she readily stopped. She DID have her 5 shot revolver, fully
RELOADED, with her, but cops managed to snatch it away. The FIRST thing that
Shirley said to the cops was: "I missed the sixth one, didn't I?", referring
probably to the WOUNDING of her former brother-in-law. Her aim was DEADLY
accurate in all the other five shootings, but she only managed to wound victim
#6.
A cop who dealt directly with Shirley during the 1974 arrest, declares that
she readily admitted to all five killings and: "She was still full of hate, not
remorseful for what she had done. She seemed almost proud for what she had
done. She really thought those children were in a better place." Wow, what a
GAL! She really KNEW how to direct her rage and hate OUTWARD, beautifully. So
RARE to see this skill, especially in a female. She never did try to kill
herself, and even though there is some reason to think that she MIGHT have been
suicidal, her actions, going to THREE different places to commit her killings,
first the three slaves in her own home, then driving to her ex-hubby's house &
killing him, THEN driving to her former in-law's house & shooting her final 2
victims, and THEN driving away AGAIN, proves to me that Shirley had PURE
homicidal rage, and few if any serious suicidal tendencies.
What an UPLIFTING and EXCITING news story this is! I literally felt my heart
pounding as I read all of the DETAILS of this case, 25 LONG years after the
fact!
Prison officials say that Shirley is a well-behaved inmate, doesn't cause any
serious problems. I am SO pleased that she has NOT attempted suicide at all,
and who knows, maybe she CELEBRATES her family massacre accomplishment, even
today. I am SORELY tempted to write to her in prison. She's at the the
McPherson Unit of the Newport Prison, in AR. Wow, to stumble across such an
INTENSE mass murder case, from 25 years ago, that I had NOT heard or read about
in the past, is just so rewarding.
I wish you a long and healthy and happy life, Shirley. Stay Strong!
Take care, JOE
The following appears courtesy of the 7/18/99 online edition of The Arkansas
Democrat-Gazette newspaper:
Mom went murderous on a night in July '74
LAURA KELLAMS
ARKANSAS DEMOCRAT-GAZETTE
LOWELL -- Shirley Marie Curry's young sons were dying by the time she pressed
the record button on her tape player.
She wanted to explain. She confided in the spinning reels of the cassette.
"I shot them, " she said placidly. "Richard went to sleep on the floor in
front of the TV, but Jesse went to his bed. That's where they'll be. Still
asleep. And in peace."
She rambled, talking about vacuuming, God, injustice, her ex-husband.
The tape machine rolled as unwitting family members and acquaintances got
ready for bed just a few miles away. Shortly after midnight on July 20, 1974,
the self-described lonely soul climbed in her Ford pickup with a handwritten
will and a mental list.
She planned to use her Charter Arms .38 Special to check her relatives off
that list, one at a time.
Monday is the 25th anniversary of the day a despondent Curry sped home from
a Chancery Court hearing in which she had lost custody of her 14-year-old son.
All three of her children had testified they were afraid of her. She wrote in a
letter that she had decided to quit fighting for those she loved so dearly.
She would spend the rest of the night killing them.
Before they found Curry, glassy-eyed and calm nine hours after the hearing,
police said, she had killed all her children, their father, her former
sister-in-law and injured her former brother-in-law.
Curry has been locked up since her arrest, first in a mental hospital and
then in state prison at Newport. Gov. Mike Huckabee recently denied her request
for clemency. Curry continues to serve out a life sentence without chance for
parole.
A quarter-century after the murders, the crime still haunts her family
members and the law-enforcement authorities who caught up with her that night
-- her still-loaded pistol at her side.
"If you are reading this or having it read to you, it will mean I did it.
Which at this sorrowful hour, I mean to,'' reads an apparent suicide letter she
carried with her when arrested.
Curry documented her crime with the letter and the 10-minute tape she made
after killing her sons. In the letter to "Toots" -- her nickname for her sister
-- Curry indicated she planned to kill herself.
"No one will come near me. The kids are afraid of me, so they say on the
stand. I am nothing, never was nor ever will be, so why fight -- I QUIT.
Nothing is worth it, now.''
Shirley Marie McBroom and Jimmy Lee Curry were married June 16, 1955. She
was 18; he was 24. In their 12-year marriage, the couple had three children,
Sabrina Marie, Jesse Lee and Richard Alan. Shirley Curry filed for divorce in
1967 citing "contempt, ridicule, neglect and unmerited reproach."
She was awarded custody of the children, but Jimmy Curry insisted upon a
provision that the children decide for themselves which parent to live with
after they turned 14.
Sabrina chose to live with her father when she reached that milestone in
1971. The boys lived with their mother in the small, rock-clad house west of
Lowell that she had built herself.
Shirley Curry was bitter about Sabrina's decision and refused to talk to
her. She believed the girl was trying to influence her brothers to come live
with their father.
By official accounts, Curry was hostile toward her ex-husband. She told
Richard she would kill his father if he chose to live with him.
"I'll blow his guts out," she told him, according to court documents.
Nevertheless, when the boy turned 14, he announced he would rather live with
his father.
Shirley Curry refused, and a custody battle ensued.
The case culminated with a hearing in Chancellor Thomas F. Butt's court in
Fayetteville on Friday morning, July 19, 1974.
Shirley Curry testified that she had threatened her husband. "I felt like
it," she said.
Butt, still on the bench in Washington County, remembers the hearing only
because of the events that followed.
"My recollection is there was nothing unusual about it. It was a typical
case," the judge said. "Rightly or wrongly, Mrs. Curry perceived that she had
not gotten what she wanted or deserved ... I don't recall she showed any undo
heightened emotion, other than that she was disappointed."
Butt ordered Shirley Curry to surrender custody of Richard. While
10-year-old Jesse would remain legally in Shirley's care, he was to go live
with his father and siblings for a month.
Jimmy and Saundra Curry planned to pick up the boys at 5 p.m. Saturday,
July 20, as the chancellor had ordered. As they drove home from the hearing in
Fayetteville, they got a glimpse of Shirley Curry's anger.
"Shirley almost sideswiped us, then pulled in front of us and threw on her
brakes," Saundra Curry told police in a written statement the next day. "Jimmy
backed off, giving her plenty of room -- if she decided to do something else."
When they got to Springdale, Jimmy Curry went to talk to his attorney,
Charles Davis, to tell him about the incident.
"He told me after he saw the look on her face, 'Something bad's going to
happen. Be careful,'" he recalled. Davis remembers loading his own
double-barreled shotgun and propping it by the door.
"He said they were going to be careful too, but they weren't."
After worrying most of the night, Jimmy and Saundra Curry had begun to doze
off when the frantic ringing of the doorbell roused them.
It was nearly 1 a.m. Saundra knew who it had to be.
"No, Jimmy," she warned.
Her 43-year-old husband tried to reassure her and climbed out of bed,
wearing only his underwear and blue socks. He headed for the front door and
swung it open without turning on the porch light.
"Oh my God," Jimmy cried.
Saundra heard a loud clap and Jimmy's groan, a second and third shot, the
sound of him hitting the floor. She smelled smoke.
She tried to think of a way out of the house, a way to get help. Then
Saundra heard the door to her stepdaughter's bedroom bang open.
"Who is it?" 17-year-old Sabrina asked, lying in bed in her flowered
pajamas, long brown hair mussed from sleep.
"It's your mother," Curry answered calmly.
The light flicked on. Sabrina's mother shot her twice in the head.
Saundra Sue Curry ran through the hallway to the foyer past her husband's
bleeding body and out the screen door. In her panic, she left her own sons in
the house. Screaming for help, she ran to the first house she could see with a
light on.
"Call the police! She's shot my husband!"
The neighbors had already made the call.
Neighbors would tell police they saw a woman, holding a gun, stroll slowly
and calmly out of the front door of the Currys' home and step into the driver's
seat of a gold-and-white pickup.
Police called to the scene found Jimmy Curry gasping for air and barely
alive. He faced the ceiling; a chest would gushed blood.
They radioed the information about Curry the police station. Within minutes
Patrolman Ollen Stepp was headed to Curry's Lowell home.
Stepp later became police chief. But that night, he was just a rookie, and
he was scared.
"My adrenaline was pumping 90 miles an hour. I thought she'd be there, and
that her or me, one of us was gonna get shot. I was just sick to death," Stepp
recalled.
When he got to the little house on Goad Springs Road, he saw Trooper Keith
Ferguson of the Arkansas State Police outside.
"I'd never been so happy to see anybody. I was so relieved," Stepp said.
Stepp and Ferguson peeked in the living room window.
They saw Curry's son, Richard, lying in front of the television in a pool
of blood.
Stepp kicked in the front door. They heard an unrecognizable gurgling
sound.
They checked Richard, who was already cold with death.
Stepp crept down the hallway toward the sound with his gun raised, while
Ferguson watched his back.
"That was the longest walk," Stepp remembered, shaking his head. He found
the source of the noise in a bedroom just a few feet away: 10-year-old Jesse,
lying in bed in his pajamas, shot in the head. He was unconscious and near
death.
Ferguson, now a state police sergeant nearing retirement, recalled: "There
was nothing we could do for him." He and Stepp called an ambulance.
After they realized that Shirley Curry was not at the house, Stepp headed
back to Springdale. While Ferguson waited for Benton County investigators to
arrive, he started looking around the neatly kept home.
The tape, rewound and ready to be played, lay in a recorder that Curry had
placed atop a pile of papers on her bed.
Ferguson pushed play and heard piano music, interrupted by Curry's
ramblings.
He called Springdale police to warn them that Curry could be intent on more
killing.
While police were investigating the murder scene on Michael Street in
Springdale, Shirley Curry drove to Jo Ann Brophy's door just six blocks away.
Brophy was Jimmy Curry's half-sister. Few details are known about Brophy's
death because there were no witnesses. She had been shot once in the nose.
Police found five empty shell casings on the bathroom counter where they
say Shirley Curry had reloaded her five-shot revolver.
From there, Curry later told police, she headed to Farmington where she
surprised James Robert Dotson, her sister's ex-husband. Dotson and Curry's
sister had a particularly nasty divorce, he later testified.
Curry had referred to his treatment of her sister on the tape recording
earlier that night.
"It seems like the ex-husband is the one that does all the running around,
playing around, having a ball ... There must be an end to it.''
Dotson opened the door to his trailer sometime before 2 a.m. July 20, and
saw Shirley Curry with her gun. He slammed the door shut.
He said Curry shot at the door anyway, and managed to wound him. Dotson
became Curry's only survivor that night.
He was the "sixth one" she later told police that she missed. Nearly five
years later, prosecutors used that statement to help convict her of murder.
Shirley Curry then drove down Wedington Drive past two Fayetteville police
officers who only seconds before heard a report to be on the lookout for
Curry's pickup.
Patrolmen Frank M. Upton and Gene Phillips were riding together that night
because Upton's patrol car had broken down.
They were ready for a fight, but Curry was easily arrested, passive,
"almost like she was in a daze."
While Phillips kept Curry's attention by walking in plain sight on the left
side of her pickup, Upton sneaked along the right side, jerked the passenger
door open and snatched her loaded pistol.
"I missed the sixth one, didn't I?" she asked Upton.
Other than that question, she remained quiet.
Back at the Springdale Police Department, detectives Mikelc Blocker and
Floyd Hancock interviewed Shirley Curry. Curious law enforcement officers
dropped by to catch a glimpse.
"I had to see her," Ferguson, who found the boys' bodies in Lowell,
recalled. "I had to see the person who would do that to her own children."
"She was the coldest person I've ever seen," he said.
Blocker, now Springdale police chief, remembered Curry as more animated.
"She was still full of hate, not remorseful for what she had done," Blocker
said. "She seemed almost proud for what she had done. She really thought those
children were in a better place."
Shirley Curry readily admitted she committed the murders but convicting her
proved difficult.
It would take seven years, two trials and an appeal to the Arkansas Supreme
Court to resolve the case, which hinged on whether a mental illness made Curry
legally responsible.
Eventually, Shirley Curry was convicted of capital murder and sentenced to
life in prison without parole.
Now 62, Curry is at the McPherson Unit of the state Department of
Correction at Newport.
"Overall, considering the amount of time she's been here, her institutional
record is good," said Dina Tyler, spokesman for the department.
Michael Dabney, Curry's public defender, stated in court documents that
Curry would never discuss what happened the night of the murders.
"Each time I approached this topic with her in conversation, she would
tense up. Her eyes would cloud with tears, and she would begin to shake. She
instructed me that she could never relate to me her memory of what happened."
This article was published on Sunday, July 18, 1999
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