Sunday, April 02, 2006

What was the motive?

There is a lot of speculation floating around as to why Mary Winkler murdered her husband. Many news reports have stated that the police already know the motive for the killing, but they are not releasing any information about it yet.

I'm surprised. Usually there is always someone willing to leak information to the press (at least this is often the case when it is something to make the Bush administration look bad). So why is this motive being kept under wraps so well? I know that the usual reason(s) stated are so that the jury pool wouldn't be contaminated. But that didn't seem to matter with the Michael Jackson case as well as many other cases that had leaked information.

One possible theory for the murder that has been mentioned on several news shows is that the pastor may have been secretly abusing (possibly physically, sexually, or emotionally) either his wife or his kids. However, various interviews with people who know the family very well have turned up no reason to believe that this family was involved in, or subject to, any kind of abuse. So what went wrong?

This article gives us one idea to consider. Apparently, the wives of pastors can often become become isolated, lonely and depressed.

But is such a situation enough to drive a person to murder? I doubt it. She could have divorced him if she was under too much pressure, felt isolated and lonely. She didn't have to kill him!

Of course, the truth will eventually come out. It is a tragic situation all around. I feel so bad for the children! They already lost their father and now they will probably lose their mother to life in prison. Truly tragic and sad...

At the end of the article (link above) the defense lawyer gives us a hint that there were probably personal troubles in the marriage that were kept hidden from even their closest friends. There is much more to this story. Eventually, we will learn the truth.

Article excerpt:

Defense lawyer Steve Farese refused to talk about the Winklers' private life or if they had personal troubles.

I can't discuss anything she's told me," Farese said. "But I think you have to look at the entire picture. You can't look at the end of a story and determine what the beginning and middle were."



Some posts on what others are saying:

I Hope I'm Wrong. (Scroll down to Wed. March 29th post.)

The Winkler Defense

Lawyer Hints at Post-Partum Depression Defense

2 comments:

Patti said...

This has nothing to do with Mary. But I am a firm believer in not having a gun in the house. Statistics show that it is usually used on a family member. In the book, emotional intelligence, the author states that our brain can hi-jack us for 5-10 minutes and we would do something we thought we never could do. That is the average person. If Mary had post-partum depression or bi-polar illness, more of a chance for the brain to get hi-jack in a fit of emotional distress.

Christinewjc said...

Hi Patti,

Thanks for sharing that insightful information.

So many tragedies happen when a loaded gun is found in the house. Kids find ways to get their hands on them; even those under lock and key.

The Bible warns us: "The heart [is] deceitful above all [things], and desperately wicked: who can know it?" - Jeremiah 17:9

It kind of reiterates what you were saying about our brain, "hijacking us for 5-10 minutes."

I just read about another tragedy that happened when a gun got into the wrong hands. Awful!