Preacher's Wife Mary Winkler Found Guilty of Voluntary Manslaughter

On Thursday, April 19, 2007, a Selmer, Tennessee jury of ten women and two men found Mary Winkler, accused of killing her preacher husband, Matthew Winkler, guilty of Voluntary Manslaughter. The jury found her guilty of manslaughter, rather than the murder charge the prosecution was seeking. Voluntary Manslaughter means the crime was committed in a "fit of passion" or other such crisis situation. It carries a sentence in Tennessee of 3-6 years, but Mary may serve only a third of that with the possibility of parole.

Matthew Winkler, a 31-year-old minister at the Fourth Street Church of Christ, was found dead in his Selmer home in March of 2006. His wife and three daughters were found a day later in a mini-van on the Alabama coast, after fleeing the scene. Mary claimed she shot her husband accidentally after aiming a shotgun at him, and did not remember shooting him. She did remember the sound of the gunshot and the smell of gunpowder, however.

The defense made a bold move to put Mary on the stand to testify in her own defense. She was demure and quiet, with eyes downcast, and seemed very uncomfortable when asked about her husband's long history of mental, physical, emotional and sexual abuse. Mary, a preacher's daughter, described her husband's love of pornography, his forcing her to look at it when she didn't want to, his pressing her for anal sex (which she called "painful and unnatural") against her will, and making her do "other things I didn't want to do, like oral sex." The defense presented her with a stiletto shoe with a six-inch heel and a black wig which she identified as things her preacher husband had bought for her and asked her to wear during their sexual encounters, along with mini-skirts and other attire she felt was inappropriate and made her uncomfortable to wear. When asked if she told her husband that having anal sex caused her pain, she said, "Matthew said if it damaged me physically, I could have surgery to fix it."

During a long testimony, Mary described a long history of controlling behavior by her husband, including isolating her from her family, threats if she "talked back" to him, him not allowing her to voice any opinion, and his constant criticism of her. She said she felt as if Matthew thought everything was always her fault, and that she could do nothing to please him. According to Mary and testimony by a neighbor, Matthew had a violent temper. The neighbor, a state trooper, described Matthew as being like the "Tasmanian Devil."

The prosecution attempted to prove that Mary had been involved in a check-kiting scheme and that she had killed her husband to keep him from finding out about it. However, after cross-examination, the bank employees of Regions Bank that testified, described Mary as confused over the bank's calls, and felt she had a lack of understanding about what the problem was the bank was describing over depositing checks that were not on collectible funds. Mary said Matthew gave her checks and told her to deposit them. Two checks in particular were from a sweepstakes scam operation.

A tearful Mary, when asked if she felt her husband deserved to die, replied, "No, he didn't deserve to die" and said that she loved her husband, even though she also feared him and his anger. The defense also presented information that Matthew Winkler quieted his children's crying, including an infant daughter, by placing his hand over their mouths and noses to stop their breathing. Mary also recounted an incident when Matthew was playing with one of the daughters at the age of 11 months, which resulted in an unexplained dislocated elbow. Matthew Winkler was also accused of kicking his wife in the face.

Matthew's parents both testified that they loved and had forgiven Mary, but that her children, of whom they now have custody, do not want to see their mother. During their testimony, they seemed to contradict their own testimony by saying how the three daughters love their mother and were very excited to see her during the one visit that was allowed.

Mary remained unemotional as the judge read the jury's verdict of guilty to voluntary manslaughter. The Winkler family has filed a wrongful death suit against their former daughter-in-law, which is still pending.