Fred dinenage (narrates): In February 1978,
56-year-old Stuart Taylor suffered a slow and painful death.
With the consent of his family and partner,
doctors performed an autopsy
to find out what had led to the sudden downturn
in his health.
They decided to do that in that case
simply because of his reaction and found out
that he had been poisoned with arsenic.
Stuart had been targeted by his partner,
45-year-old grandmother, velma barfield.
The kindly looking churchgoer
had been leading a secret double life,
funding a drug addiction by stealing from others
before killing them.
Barfield is a chameleon.
She simply blends into her surroundings
so much so that nobody ever suspects
that she's defrauding the people that she's caring for.
She is this good Christian woman.
And nobody would ever think that she's capable
of the things that are going on.
The murder of Stuart Taylor
would expose barfield's life of crime.
She had poisoned and killed five people,
including her own mother.
This is a serial killer who knows no bounds
and also is perfectly happy to do
whatever it needs to sustain the image
that she wants to project of herself.
Velma barfield had been unmasked
as one of the world's most evil killers.
(Theme music)
In November 1984,
52-year-old velma barfield was executed via lethal injection
in Raleigh, north Carolina.
Years earlier the so called 'death row granny'
had confessed to killing four people,
but evidence linked her to at least five,
one of whom was her own mother.
Journalist Dennis Patterson visited the killer
while she awaited her fate on death row.
When you sat down to talk to her,
she's very quiet,
and very soft spoken and very sincere,
and you could almost believe she was a victim of something.
She would talk about being ready to meet god
and that she had tried to help others.
And I believed her.
It wasn't a question of whether
I thought she was not telling the truth.
It's just it didn't make up for the crime.
Dennis went on to witness barfield's execution first-hand.
He had followed the story
since her arrest for the murder of her partner,
Stuart Taylor in 1978.
Barfield had poisoned him, slowly.
How do you make their cereal in the morning
and put in the cereal and the milk and the rat poison,
and then sit there across the table from them
and eat your cereal, watch them eat theirs,
and it not guilt you right to the limit
that you're watching yourself kill somebody?
I can't get my mind around that.
This killer's story
begins in cumberland county, north Carolina.
Margie velma bullard
was born on the October 29, 1932.
The eldest girl in a family of nine children,
life was difficult from the outset.
Barfield's childhood was peppered with tragedy.
Some of her siblings died in infancy,
another sibling was quite disfigured because of polio.
So, all of these things would have had an impact on her.
This was not the idyllic American childhood.
These were the years after the great depression.
The family were literally dirt, poor.
The house had no electric heating, no hot water.
It was a really tough existence.
She felt a sense of shame,
because her family weren't very well-to-do.
The children at school would make fun of her clothes
and the kind of foods that she took in to eat for lunch.
I think that shame cemented itself,
and I think it impacted on the woman she'd become.
Growing up,
barfield tried to avoid being on the wrong side
of her hot-tempered father,
whom she feared throughout her young life.
Looking at barfield's parents,
her father was very dominant and very patriarchal.
And her mother was incredibly submissive,
so, she comes from this very traditional setup.
And, when we look at her father's behaviour,
he seems to be quite abusive.
In terms of the control that he has over the family unit.
And barfield's mother
feels like she's constantly treading on eggshells the whole time
trying not to upset her husband.
And barfield becomes quite frustrated at her mother,
when she sees how submissive
she's being and that she's not standing up for herself.
I think she thought her mother should have done better,
that she should have fought back,
protected her children more
against this violent man with a bad temper
who did what he wanted.
Barfield found church to be a refuge
from her wretched home life.
And in 1948,
the 16-year-old found another possible escape route
from her tyrannical father.
Barfield meets Thomas Burke as part of the baseball games
that her father used to organise.
He was involved in these too.
And when barfield's father finds out
that she has this relationship with Thomas Burke,
he wants to put a stop to it.
He doesn't want her dating before she's 16 years old
but barfield is absolutely determined.
And when she's 17, she does start dating him again.
But there are some strict conditions on it,
she's always got to go out and double date with another couple.
She's always got to be home by 10pm.
So, even though she's getting what she wants,
there are still those restrictions on her.
And I think that is part of what fuels her
to want to get married so young.
She wants out of this family unit.
And she thinks that marriage is the pathway to independence.
The two teenagers eloped in December 1949
and went on to have two children together.
But married life was far from ideal for barfield,
her husband was a drinker,
which went against her Christian beliefs.
And in April 1969, tragedy struck.
According to the legend, he's dead drunk,
fallen asleep on the sofa
and a cigarette has fallen onto the floor.
Velma is out.
The children are out at school.
The house burns down
and Thomas Burke loses his life in the fire.
As the 1960s became the 1970s,
velma barfield was widowed and hiding a growing addiction.
Back in 1962,
a hysterectomy had left her in constant pain
and suffering from depression.
What actually happens then
is that her imbalance in personality seizes
on prescription medicine as a way of easing the pain.
And she goes from doctor to doctor
to get different drugs at different times
so that she can increase her own use.
So, rather than become an alcoholic,
she becomes effectively a drug addict.
And I think for the first time in her life,
she's found something that numbs her.
That kind of takes away the pain and the depression
and all of those issues over which she has no control.
So, I think this is a problem which is just going to escalate.
It's only going to get worse.
Lees than ten years after losing her first husband,
velma barfield's life had spiralled out of control.
By march 1978
she was working as a carer in lumberton, north Carolina
and had begun to fund her painkiller addiction
by stealing from the people she was meant to be protecting.
And barfield was hiding an even bigger secret.
I was covering, if I remember correctly, a meeting,
government meeting in the courthouse of robeson county.
And a law enforcement fellow that I knew pass me in the hallway
and asked if I had checked the arrest sheets that evening.
I said, "no, I hadn't."
He said, "well, you might want to go by and check."
And of course for a reporter
that's always a sign that you ought to do
what somebody suggests that you do.
So, I went by and checked,
and sure enough going down through the sheet,
and here is this older woman
who's been charged with first-degree murder.
A post-mortem on 56-year-old Stuart Taylor
revealed that his body had been riddled with arsenic.
Investigators believed
he had been poisoned by his partner, velma barfield.
The investigation was very high profile.
It was just so unusual having a woman
with a sterling reputation,
who worked for elderly patients, who was a regular church goer,
wouldn't even work on the evenings or days
that church was going on because of her religious beliefs.
It was just a very unusual case.
A deeper delve in barfield's backstory
suggested that maybe Stuart Taylor wasn't her only victim.
So, I started getting calls from people saying,
"she's been associated with a number of deaths
"that are sort of unusual."
I know one fellow had said she had at least one,
two husbands had died under unusual circumstances.
Her mother had passed away sort of unexpectedly.
As the rumour mill continued to turn,
barfield had more secrets to reveal to detectives.
After she's charged,
velma surprises the authorities
by confessing to three other killings,
her mother,
dollie Edwards and John Henry Lee.
And that sort just cemented it to the investigators that,
"yeah, we're dealing with somebody here, who's...
"This is not a one-off, a, you know, personal situation.
"This is...
"This is a practise that's been going on."
Velma barfield's confessions had stunned detectives.
She had admitted to killing her mother, her partner
and two of the vulnerable people she was meant to be looking after.
Investigators were only just beginning
to scratch the surface on the deathly past
of the 45-year-old,
a life of fraud, lies and murder.
In march 1978, 45-year-old velma barfield
was charged with the murder of her partner Stuart Taylor,
but her life of crime had begun eight years previously.
In August 1970,
she married the man whose name she would take on in the future,
Jennings barfield.
Jennings suffered from emphysema and diabetes
and his new wife effectively became his carer too.
During her marriage to Jennings barfield,
it could best be described as a tempestuous relationship.
She was still overdosing on drugs.
He would take her to hospital, they were going to divorce,
and then, how convenient, he dies.
In April 1971,
after less than a year of marriage to his wife,
54-year-old Jennings barfield developed a sudden illness and died.
No-one pays very much attention.
He had been ill for a long time. It was obviously natural causes.
And velma is just now a widow, in fact now twice widowed.
Later that same year,
39-year-old velma barfield's prescription drug addiction
was reeling out of control.
She lost her job, her home and not long after
the man who had made her childhood so traumatic.
Her father Murphy dies of lung cancer in 1972.
And before long velma moves back in with her mother Lillie.
They have a very combative relationship
to put it politely.
Barfield always had a very antagonistic relationship
with her mother Lillie
because she felt like that she was put upon.
She felt that Lillie was making demands of her,
that she should be running around for her,
doing chores, looking after her.
And there's a particular period of time
in 1974,
where that had indeed been going on.
And it's at this time that Lillie becomes quite ill.
She develops really bad stomach cramps.
She's vomiting, she has diarrhoea.
She's very, very unwell indeed.
And barfield takes her to hospital.
And she spends a few days in hospital
and then she's discharged,
and that seems to be the end of the matter.
As a way of funding her addiction,
barfield began to forge her mother's signature
on loan applications.
And by late 1974,
she had successfully racked up $2,000 worth of debt
in the name of Lillie bullard.
Her mother is a perfect Mark.
She could take out a loan on something
that her mother owns, whether it's a house or a car.
And she wants to cover up
that the stealing to sustain the drug addiction.
You have a woman literally in a spiral of addiction.
Then certainly out of the blue, something a bit strange happens.
Barfield's mother receives a letter
saying that she has a car loan that is overdue.
And the car is going to be repossessed
if she doesn't pay the loan off.
And she thinks, "well, this is nonsense,
"it's surely some kind of admin error.
"I haven't taken out a car loan."
When her mother discovers or gets letters
saying that she owes money
or that they're going to reclaim the house
or they're going to reclaim the car.
Velma is determined
that should never come to the surface.
Soon after the letter arrived, Lillie bullard fell ill once more.
But this time, she wouldn't recover.
She again becomes very ill with similar symptoms to the ones
that she had before.
She complains of terrible problems,
awful pain, terrible diarrhoea.
She's in a terrible state.
She gets taken to hospital and dies on the December 30, 1974.
Lillie bullard officially died of a heart attack,
but in truth
she had become the second victim of velma barfield.
The 40-year-old prescription drug addict
had poisoned her second husband Jennings barfield
with arsenic in 1971.
And now, she done the same to her own mother.
But nobody had any idea.
What's really interesting about the arsenic
is that while it's an effective poison,
it's something that most people think
only really exists in old Agatha christie novels.
It's not something that's at the forefront
of the average pathologist's mind.
Barfield continued to fund her addiction with crime.
After five cheques forged in her dead husband's name bounced,
she attempted to take her own life.
But she was unsuccessful
and investigators soon caught up with her.
Barfield goes to prison.
She's sentenced to six months for a series of bad checks.
But she doesn't serve that full six months sentence,
she's released after three on the grounds of good behaviour.
In November 1975,
barfield was out of prison
and had found a new career for herself.
She was hired as a live-in caretaker
for 93-year-old Montgomery Edwards.
Montgomery was very disabled, indeed he was bedridden,
he had sight problems.
He was a diabetic, he was an amputee.
His wife dollie was slightly more mobile
but they needed help nonetheless.
So, barfield takes on a job looking after them.
She essentially moves in.
She... she gets involved in their care.
In January 1977, Montgomery Edwards passed away.
But barfield continued to live in the house
with Montgomery's 85-year-old wife dollie.
Dollie was somebody who was quite meticulous
and she wanted a good service from barfield
for the money that she was paying her.
And she picked up on the fact
that barfield could sometimes be a bit lazy, a bit sloppy.
And dollie was quite a direct person
and she would tell barfield about this.
And barfield did not like this,
whatsoever because this compromised her feelings of control
within this household.
So, in the end dollie, for the same reason
as her mother has got to go,
otherwise she may well blow the whistle on velma.
Be it for money or just out of spite,
barfield began to poison dollie in February 1977.
When dollie became incredibly unwell with vomiting and diarrhoea,
she told her stepson, "I think it's the flu."
And she did look like she had flu,
she was very weak, she was very pale.
But barfield was quite keen to go to the hospital with her
when she was admitted.
Barfield is a constant presence here,
whenever she seems to be around, dollie's health seems to decline.
And that's no coincidence.
Once again, she's a lady in her 80s.
She's just lost her husband.
Well, it doesn't look unnatural to anyone.
And the fact that the single thread through all these deaths
is velma barfield is well...
Coincidence.
In fact, velma barfield has murdered dollie Edwards.
Once again velma barfield
has taken the ultimate action of killing someone
who might just reveal her own difficulties.
Barfield preys on the weak, and the old and the innocent.
And this tells me that she is a predator.
She looks out for people's vulnerabilities
and she exploits them.
She lives a very parasitic kind of lifestyle.
So, she will take what she wants from people
and then she will move on.
And it takes a certain kind of person
to be able to do this time and time again.
It takes somebody with no compassion,
somebody with no empathy,
somebody who is only looking out for themselves.
Once again velma barfield's crimes went undetected.
She had now claimed three victims and people were none the wiser.
Just a month after the death of dollie Edwards,
barfield found another couple
to live with and care for, John and record Lee.
They reached quite a nice amicable arrangement
whereby barfield would have time off on particular days of the week.
So, she could go to church
and she could engage in the things
that she wanted to do
because she very much came across as this nice Christian woman.
Just days after moving in with the elderly couple,
barfield forged a cheque for $50.
There's this mysterious check that emerges
that apparently record has signed.
And she has no recollection of signing this check whatsoever.
So, her husband John calls the police in.
But the case doesn't go anywhere,
because they don't know anybody
who could possibly have done this to them.
And the last suspect on the list is this good Christian woman,
who's come to care for them.
By embezzling such small amounts,
barfield was able to keep her thefts under the radar.
It was just a few dollars here and there.
And when they went back and checked,
they came across $100, $200 checks
that had been written that obviously hadn't been signed
by the person.
She's taking little bits,
because that gives her a little kick.
It makes her feel that she's the one that's in control
in these households.
And that control is something that she's become addicted to.
So, she's not gonna just take a load of money and then disappear,
because then her control and her power is gone.
And that is something that she's addicted to
at this point in time.
Concerned that the lees were on to her,
barfield dealt with the situation just as she'd done previously.
She began to poison 80-year-old John.
That same way of thinking is in velma's mind.
These two are in danger of revealing me
for what I truly am.
And so, John Henry Lee, I'm afraid she decides has to die.
In an attempt to cover up her crimes,
velma barfield had once again taken a life.
But official records stated
that John Lee had died of a heart attack.
It's so calculating,
so scheming, so ruthless
that it almost takes my breath away.
She doesn't hesitate for a moment.
And yet there's still this cycle, this spiral going on in her life.
She's still grappling with her own demons.
And yet she chooses to solve the demons by killing,
not by admitting it, not by saying anything to anyone,
but just sustaining this corrupt agonising lifestyle
by her actions.
Barfield was stuck in a vicious circle
of addiction, theft and murder
and she was getting away with it.
By October 1977, she had killed four people,
but her next potential victim would be a step too far.
Velma barfield's life of crime was about to be exposed.
By the Autumn of 1977,
velma barfield had killed four people
including her own mother
in an attempt to cover up her fraudulent crimes.
The 44-year-old was addicted to painkillers
and theft was the only way to pay for her habit.
In October,
barfield began dating a man named Stuart Taylor.
When we look at Stuart Taylor's background,
he'd had quite a turbulent time.
So, his first wife had died,
he'd been married another couple of times after that.
And those relationships hadn't worked out.
I think this was a guy who wanted
that long term, committed, stable relationship.
And I think barfield really sensed that in him
and she saw here another vulnerability
that she could prey on.
Velma decides that
this is the perfect relationship for her.
Yet again, a Mark, someone be taken advantage of,
someone who can look after her
while she sustains this outrageous,
but secret life of drug addiction and stealing.
56-year-old Stuart had no idea he was getting involved
with an active serial killer.
From all accounts, Stuart Taylor was a very kind,
nice, genuine man.
But he got together with barfield,
and her version of the relationship would be very different indeed.
She was a magnet for drama.
And when that drama wasn't present, she would create it.
Nothing could have been more dramatic
than barfield's plot
to make Stuart Taylor fall for her.
She staged an attack on herself.
Police are called, a man's broken in,
she's tied up, she's been attacked.
And of course, Stuart Taylor not realising
that this is an incredible piece of manipulation,
falls for it and says, "oh.
"Well, I want to protect you.
"You can come and live with me in my house."
It wouldn't take long
before barfield was up to her old tricks again.
In November 1977,
she began forging cheques in Stuart Taylor's name.
Barfield writes some checks from Stuart's account
and they're for quite small sums of money.
She uses one to pay a bill,
she uses another one for some prescription drugs.
And she's taking this money because she feels entitled to it.
She feels that she has this man under her control now.
And this is a pattern that we've seen before with her.
She would just take what she feels is owed to her.
This time however, barfield was caught in the act.
Stuart had come across this check that he knew he didn't write
and with her forged signature to it.
And had told her better not happen again
or he would turn her into the police.
He wasn't going to have her stealing money from him.
Sensing the game might be up,
instead of walking away from Stuart Taylor,
barfield instead decided he had to be silenced.
And so, in February 1978,
she starts to poison Stuart Taylor.
She uses arsenic and rat poison.
Taylor starts complaining of all kinds of pain and difficulty.
And he's not an old man. It's not like John Henry Lee.
He's comparatively young. He's not even 60.
Just as she'd done before,
barfield began lacing Stuart's food with the deadly poison.
Poisoning requires close access to your victims.
It requires you to be in a relationship with them,
it requires that regular contact.
But it's also quite a remote form of murder.
So, it's not one that involves a huge amount of physical violence.
And women on the whole are generally weaker than men.
So, it is quite an advantageous method
for a female multiple murderer.
In February 1978,
Stuart Taylor and velma barfield attended a gospel meeting,
but the 45-year-old's intentions were far from holy.
When they get to the event,
Stuart starts feeling incredibly unwell.
He's got terrible stomach pains. He starts feeling really nauseous.
So, what happens then
is that barfield has to drive them home in the car.
And the whole time,
Stuart is becoming increasingly unwell.
And when they get home,
one of Stuart's friends actually calls for an ambulance,
because they're so concerned at how unwell he is.
And he goes to hospital,
but unfortunately he dies not long afterwards.
Just like barfield's other victims,
there was no obvious sign of foul play.
But unlike the others,
Stuart Taylor was just 56 years old when he died.
It was thought that
it was likely he died of gastroenteritis,
but alarm bells during this time because he's a young person.
You don't expect a young man
to succumb to that sort of problem in the way
that somebody who's older with other health problems might.
Doctors asked Stuart's family if they'd like an autopsy
to find out the underlying reason for his death.
They all agreed it was a good idea,
including his partner velma barfield.
And this would appear to be a really bizarre thing to say,
because clearly she knows how he died.
But her performance as the grieving girlfriend
is the most important thing to her at this point in time.
She has to maintain this facade.
So, if she was the one saying, "no.
"I think an autopsy is a bad idea," that would raise suspicion.
So, while she's going along with it,
there is still the chance
that she could get away with his murder.
I think that velma believed
that she could probably tough it out,
that she could probably say, "fine, conduct an autopsy.
"I'm perfectly innocent."
While the family awaited the results of the autopsy,
the funeral for Stuart Taylor took place.
And front and centre was his grieving partner.
They treated her very much as another family member,
a grieving family member over the death
to the point that at the funeral,
the family invited velma to ride in the family car
to the grave site.
She seems to be at the heart of this family.
And that's where she wants to be
because that's where she's in control.
That's when she's finding out information
that the family might know about him, about his death.
And it is that need for power, that need to be dominant,
and that need to be right in the middle of everything.
I think the worst thing
that she could do at this point in time
is to distance herself from this family.
Because then, that cuts off her knowledge,
that cuts off her information.
And that is what she's thriving on.
I never could quite get my mind around that as a reporter,
because that to me is the sort of thing
that's awfully cold
to be able to sit with people and grieve with people
when you know in the back of your mind
that you're the reason they're grieving.
I'm not sure I could do that.
On march 6, 1978,
the pathologist who carried out the autopsy on Stuart Taylor
revealed his findings.
The autopsy reveals
that Stuart Taylor has been given arsenic,
and attention turns for the first time in this case
to velma barfield.
I talked to people who were in the emergency room
when Stuart Taylor died.
And the pathologist I had talked to said,
"this is a particularly painful and gruesome way to die."
It's not neat, clean poison where you go to sleep
and you just don't wake up again.
This is eating away your insides slowly
and nothing you can do about it.
And he died screaming for his life.
Four days later, on march 10, 1978,
velma barfield was brought in for questioning
by the robeson county sheriff's department.
She would never be free again.
Velma is charged with the murder of Stuart Taylor,
first-degree murder.
The evidence is compelling. There's no doubt about it.
Barfield confessed her crimes to detectives
and was sent off for a psychiatric evaluation
to see if she was fit to stand trial.
A court order led to the exhumation of the bodies of John Lee,
dollie Edwards and Lillie bullard.
All three were found to contain traces of arsenic.
Arsenic will stay in your system for a very long time indeed.
It will be incorporated into hair and nails as they grow
and it won't disappear
until that hair is cut or that nail is clipped.
Here is a woman who is,
I think one of the coldest hearted killers
I've ever really looked at.
She has ice in her veins.
She is concerned about no-one but herself.
She is fierce and fiercely protective of herself.
Barfield is one of these female multiple murderers,
who will create a dynamic of care
and of nurturing and of looking after people.
And then, will completely destroy that.
She will use that position of trust to kill
the people who are within her care.
And the fact that she does this time and time and time again
shows that she is addicted to those feelings of power.
The 45-year-old killer
didn't confess to the murder of her second husband
Jennings barfield.
But after his body was exhumed in may 1978,
it too indicated that arsenic was present.
The facade barfield has created for herself
is beginning to fall apart.
She is revealed for what she has always been,
which is a ruthless merciless killer.
Psychiatric evaluations ruled that barfield was fit to stand trial
for the first-degree premeditated murder
of Stuart Taylor,
a guilty verdict could lead to a death sentence.
The tables had turned for velma barfield,
suddenly it was her life that was on the line.
(Dramatic music)
In November 1978,
46-year-old velma barfield was on trial
for the murder of her partner, Stuart Taylor.
If found guilty,
a death sentence would be a real possibility,
especially considering the formidable district attorney
she was up against.
The fellow who was the prosecutor Joe Freeman britt, at the time,
was listed in the guinness book of world records
as the deadliest da.
He had put more people in the death chamber
than any other prosecutor in the world at that point.
Barfield's defence was somewhat bizarre.
Although only on trial for the murder of Stuart Taylor,
she openly admitted to killing three other people,
John Lee, dollie Edwards and her own mother Lillie bullard.
Barfield claimed that all their deaths were
an unfortunate accident.
At trial, she all but confessed on the stand
about how she didn't really mean to kill these people.
She just meant to make them sick.
Well, you know, that's pretty close.
I don't know much closer you could get to saying, "I did it,"
without saying I did it.
I have never been swayed by that argument
and neither was the jury.
She wasn't trying to make them ill,
she was trying to kill them and she succeeded.
This is the work of a heartless, wicked woman.
On the December 2, 1978,
velma barfield was found guilty of the murder of Stuart Taylor.
She has never been tried for the murder of her mother
or of the people she was paid to take look after.
The guilt factor for the families was horrible,
because they had gone out and hired this woman.
And some of them I know, I talked to them years later
and they'd say, "if I had not hired her,
"I don't know how much longer my mother might've lived."
And it was just an unknown for them.
And even getting a conviction,
I'm not sure that would have relieved
that kind of guilt.
The judge recommended the death sentence
for velma barfield
and the jury rapidly agreed.
And it took the jury very little time,
a couple of hours, if I remember right.
They came back and sent her to the death chamber.
Capital punishment had been reintroduced
in the us in 1976.
Barfield was in line to be the first woman
to be executed in decades.
The woman the press had dubbed 'the death row granny'
awaited her fate at the north Carolina
correctional institution for women
under the watchful eye of warden, jennie Lancaster.
You're responsible for everything that happens.
The buck stops with the warden.
So, needless to say,
the idea of even having the possibility of an execution
of the first female inmate in the United States
in almost 40 years was pretty overwhelming,
but it was also unheard of at that point
for any state in the United States.
And that's the position north Carolina was in.
While on death row,
barfield reconnected with her Christian faith
and presented herself as a model prisoner.
During the years that barfield is in prison,
she seems to do a complete 180.
So, she becomes the prison grandmother.
She is the inmate who others go to for advice.
She mentors the young women
who find themselves in prison with her.
So, it appears that she's completely reformed.
She's been involved in christianity throughout her life,
but now it serves a very real purpose.
She wishes to try and convince the authorities
that she should not face the death penalty
and the way she chooses to do so
is to present herself as, "oh, I've discovered my sins.
"I am a new woman,
"and I should not face the ultimate penalty."
I hope that she indeed had a change
and made a change in her life and a spiritual change,
but any change that was made in prison
really didn't make up for what she had done before that.
It didn't countermand a jury who had convicted her and said,
"this woman deserves to die."
Due to appeals and legal wranglings, execution dates came and passed.
Barfield's plight became infamous across the us.
Here's a woman and a grandma,
and it drew just worldwide,
nationwide attention.
A lot of the bigger city urban folks were of course
so absolutely convinced
that her death sentence would be commuted.
By 1984, barfield's legal team were running out of road.
As another proposed date loomed,
the 51-year-old gave an interview
from central prison in Raleigh, north Carolina,
where she had been moved to in preparation for her execution.
I'm sorry for the hurt that I've caused...
So many people.
Today, if it were possible,
I wish that I could take every bit of hurt on myself.
It is enough to send a shiver down your spine
because she presents as though she's everybody's favourite granny.
"Oh, I may... may have done dreadful things,
"but I've seen the errors of my ways."
I think velma told me once or twice,
"I don't want to die, but I understand.
"I am guilty."
By late 1984, barfield was out of options.
Her execution date was set for November 2,
and journalist Dennis Patterson was in attendance.
It is, I can tell you a very daunting feeling
to walk into a room
knowing full well that when you walk out
somebody's going to be dead.
You have to have a certain mindset
and a professional view of things in order to be able to do that.
It's not your everyday type of assignment for any reporter.
Behind the scenes,
warden jennie Lancaster tended to barfield's last requests.
Dignity's important for both male and female inmates
and dignity for her meant,
and I had to get permission from the very top,
some people laugh,
but she wore her pink pyjamas and she wore a bra.
She had a choice then in north Carolina
of either cyanide gas or lethal injection,
and she chose lethal injection.
And so, when we're standing at the back of the witness room,
and all of a sudden the curtains just pull open
and she is there on a gurney with a sheet over her.
Just after 2am,
velma barfield became the first woman in us history
to be executed via lethal injection.
Our rule is there has to be five straight minutes uninterrupted
have no heartbeat.
Five.
If it's four minutes and 55 seconds,
you have to start the count again.
There has to be no action of the heart
for five straight minutes.
There was no reaction or anything that you could tell.
Just her breathing got slower and slower,
and the sheets going up and down and then it just stopped.
And the colour, what colour there was,
drained slowly away from a pinkish to a grey.
Once it's a flat line, then the medical professional says,
"this is a flat line."
The warden goes around to the witness room.
They pull the curtain where the inmate is.
The warden goes around and says, "the execution is over.
"Ms barfield died at 2:15am."
I can't say I would shed a single tear
for velma barfield.
I've always been reticent about the death penalty,
but there is something about the sheer wickedness
of these killings
that literally leaves me speechless.
A person died
because of her actions and died horribly.
And she paid the penalty for that.
And that to me sounds like justice.
Velma barfield, the so called 'death row granny',
had been executed.
She was 52 years old.
The killer had paid the ultimate price for her crimes.
What makes velma's crimes all the more chilling is that
she pretended to be a carer when actually she was a killer.
They weren't people she was looking after,
they were her victims.
So, here is an individual with no compassion,
with no remorse.
And had she not been caught, more people would have died.
Barfield may have played the role of a godly grandmother behind bars,
but she killed at least five people including her own flesh and blood
to get what she wanted.
She was a drug addict who could have asked for help,
but instead she decided to cover up her own sins
by eliminating the people around her,
which confirms velma barfield's status
as one of the world's most evil killers.
Captioned by ai-media ai-media. TV