The Crimes of Margo Freshwater | 1. The Breakout

The big secret, all savvy shoppers know, Rakuten makes your money go further. Shop with Rakuten to get cash back on top of seasonal sales. Discover fashion, tech, beauty and more at hundreds of your favorite shops. Like boots, eBay and Lego. It's free and super easy to use. Just shop as normal and stack cash back on top of sales and savings. Join for free at Rakuten.co.uk or download the Rakuten app. That's r-a-k-u-t-e-n, Rakuten.co.uk. It looked like any other evening at the Tennessee Prison for Women on the Northeast outskirts of Nashville. It was a fall in line, October 4th, 1970. A line of inmates was heading across the yard under the watch of a single guard. But for weeks, two women in that line had been imagining the moment when routine might crack open. Tonight, they sensed it. We had gone to the church and we were headed back and there was about 20 of us in the group and there was this older guard, gentlemen. They figured in an all-out sprint, they'd be able to beat this guy. They were young after all. And Fe and I were about in the middle of the group. She said, go. Go. The two of them peeled away from the line, cutting through the herd like a sudden current. I took my jacket off and threw it over the barbed wire and I was up and over the fence without any problems. Now she was a lot taller, so I didn't think she would have a problem and she got hung up on it. The guard called out, but the echo disappeared almost instantly, swallowed by a drenneline. I was nervous. I just kept telling her, you know, come on. So she got off the fence and we started running. Flood lights swept across the ground, catching only dust and falling leaves. As we were running through the woods, we could hear the dogs. And we come across this creek. And we waited through the creek for quite a while. The creek ran shallow and black, cutting a thin silver line through the woods. They were wearing blue prison dresses with jeans underneath. The denim clung, soaked in heavy. The colds that'll deep into their bones. And then we got back up on the grass and she stirred sprinkling pepper around. Fe had pocketed a pepper shaker from the cafeteria earlier that day, tucking it into a uniform like contraband. I said, what's the pepper for? And she said, so when the dogs come after us, we'll sprinkle the pepper and that'll throw them off. Then we took off running more and we came to the highway. We ran down the middle of the highway, hoping that would throw off our scent. The two women kept moving, steady rhythm, no words between them. They were all wet and the sounds of pursuit fading behind. And then there was this house and it had some shrubs beside it. I said, let's get on the other side of the shrub, scoot in as close as you can underneath. So we scooted in and I said, keep your face away from the road and cover up your hands. So nothing's showing. They pressed their bodies into damp earth. Birds on foot fanned out across the dark. Beams of light swept wildly through the trees as their voices closed in. In the whole time on praying, while their flashlights are going over the top of us, and we can hear them talking, that seemed like an eternity. And I prayed so hard, please Lord, don't let them find us. And they stopped right there along the road, not more than 50 feet from us. They waited and waited and waited. Finally they said, we don't know where they went and they left. At last there was silence. After we know they're gone for sure, we take off the uniforms and we have on our street clothes. Then headlights broke the dark and the fakes down the truck driver. He pumped the brakes as dust kicked up around them. Faden hesitated. And she gets in the story. She told him that we were sisters and we were out there because my boyfriend was acting up. Believable enough, the trucker bought it. He says, we're going to go to my relatives in Maryland. The truck driver took us to a truck's dump. It found another truck driver that was headed that way. And just like that, two women vanished from the Tennessee prison for women and into the night. One of them, just 22 years old, would stay gone for more than 30 years. What foxing federal agents, leaving behind any trace of who she used to be? People considered her so dangerous. They wanted her behind bars for 99 years. But she rewrote the script. Her name is Margot Freshwater. Or it used to be anyway. From Sony Music Entertainment and Glass Podcasts, this is the crimes of Margot Freshwater. I'm Cooper Mall. Episode 1. The Breakout. When everything feels stacked against you, have you ever just wanted to disappear, to slip out of your circumstances and find a clean slate? I think we all have, at some point, imagined what it would be like to walk away from our lives entirely, to break free. When Margot Freshwater escaped, the Warren Vietnam was raging. The battle for civil rights continued on the streets and in the courts. And in Ohio, the National Guard had opened fire on college students, killing four. It was a time when so many people were searching for a way out, imagining different futures. It was an era marked by unrest and defiance. Everyone wanted change. And Margot chose her own version of it. Only her rebellion began with a prison break. I've met a lot of people who've heard of Margot Freshwater in some way. Like me, they'd seen her mugshot. A black and white close-up of a teenage girl in a striped crew neck, blonde eyebrows plucked to a faint line, a cold dead stare. Her mouth clamped like it's locked and she threw away the key. Richard Knudson first heard of Margot in 1971. He's retired from the FBI now, but back then, he was a newly minted agent. She had dropped out of high school and she had had some problem juvenile-type situations for a while. Kind of like a wild child, you might say. By the time she escaped the Tennessee prison for women, Margot had already learned how to survive by impulse. The only parent she'd ever known was her mother. And she kicked Margot out of their home in Columbus, Ohio when Margot was 18. By then, she'd gotten pregnant out of wedlock and well, her mother wasn't having any of it. So she showed Margot the door. Margot was a fallen girl, a Betty Rizzo you might say. The gal with a short dark hair in Greece who had a pregnancy scare. Except Margot had been pregnant, given birth, given up her baby, all of it. When Margot was out of luck, a friend, a guy named Moush Larith, was one of the only people to stick by her. He took her to appointments, put her up in an apartment, made sure she was eating well. So when Algot locked up in Memphis on an armed robbery charge in October of 1966, Margot wanted to show up for him in turn. But she had no idea how helping a friend would derail her life forever. So she headed nearly 600 miles south to find someone who could help Algot out of jail. And of course, she got hooked up with Glen Nash, who was Algot on the jailhouse type lawyer. Glen Nash was 38. He had the air of a man who had made something of himself. But Margot was just 18. She had no idea how precarious this guy's situation really was. Four years before this, the local bar association in Chattanooga started disbarment proceedings against him. They said he was camping out in hospital emergency rooms, hustling accident victims for legal business the moment they came through the door. Jailhouse lawyer seems generous. Sounds a lot more like an ambulance chaser to me. Everyone's met a guy like this. Shorten stature, big in bravado, five-seven, wierry build, brown hair, blue eyes. Nash was intense, a heavy drinker, someone who could flip from polite to volatile in a heartbeat. Before he could get disbarred, Nash quietly skipped town. So as crazy as it sounds, you could get disciplined in one city and just go set up shop in another city and practice law. That's Attorney Stephen Ross Johnson. If anyone knows Tennessee law, it's him. He's been the president of the Tennessee Association of Criminal Defense Attorneys and he's a professor at the state's College of Law. He knows the lore of Margot Freshwater and Glenn Nash better than most anybody. He goes to Memphis, he opens a law firm, he ran a karate dojo at night. He opened an office downtown but couldn't keep up with the rent. When the landlord finally locked him out, Nash moved his files into his karate school. His wife Ann, who he'd married, divorced and then married again, helped him run karate classes at night. By that point, the chaos in his personal life was catching up to the chaos in his work. The FBI and local police were investigating him in connection with the post office burglary and he was fighting a contemptive court charge handed down by a Tennessee judge. These were the signs of a man sliding toward ruin and as he fell, Margot would fall with him. Here's an 18 year old girl coming down to Tennessee to try to help her boyfriend and gets hooked up with an attorney who turns out to be a net case. What Margot didn't know when she walked into Nash's makeshift office was that her friend Al had made his own kind of deal behind bars, one that would hand her life over to a stranger. He struck a deal with Glenn Nash. I don't have any money to pay you but I've got an 18 year old friend, Margot, in Columbus. Perhaps she could fit the bill? But your why Al would think Margot, who bounced around between babysitting and waiting tables, could afford a retainer. But she had one thing Al didn't have. The ability to hold a job. And by the time she got down there, Nash already had one teed up for her. Margot comes down from Ohio and Nash already has a place for her to live set up with another family. He introduced her to James and Edna Cunio, a local couple who needed a babysitter and the money she earned would go to Al's defense. She told Cunio she'd stick around until Al's trial in January. But over those few weeks, her connection with Nash started to evolve. Little did Margot anticipate that this arrangement would come with some unexpected strings. I don't know about you, but if my mom caught wind I was hanging around some older guy, hundreds of miles away, in order to help her friend get out of jail, she'd personally come down and drag my ass home. But Margot didn't have a family like that. At this moment in her life, Al had been the only person looking out for her. That is, until Glenn Nash came along. And the two of them, incredibly enough, struck up some kind of a relationship. Nash was dropping by the Cunio's place constantly to spend time with Margot. Before long, Margot was spending less time with the kids she was babysitting and more time with Nash. She was also spending a lot of time at Nash's crottie dojo law office. And within a few weeks, they were sleeping together too. Just weeks after Margot moved in, the Cunio's had had enough. They kicked Margot out of the house, but let her keep babysitting. Margot found a small boarding room on Peabody Avenue, not far from downtown Memphis. And Nash followed her there too. She pita rent, telling her landlady he was her uncle. Maybe Margot was just putting up with Glenn Nash, or maybe she'd fallen for him. It was hard to tell. But what was true was she was counting on Nash's help to get out of jail. If she caused a rift, she would lose the one roof of her head, and Al would lose his lawyer. They'd both be screwed. From the moment Nash became Al's lawyer, boundaries and ethics were out the window. He had taken up with his client's girlfriend. He was becoming obsessed with Margot, and she was relying on him to come through for Al. It didn't take long for things to come to a head. Margot was desperate and lonely. Nash was volatile, controlling, and often drunk. Only one month after Margot met Glenn Nash, everything imploded. And they take off on a killings, bringing kill three people. Can't get enough of the story of Margot freshwater. Do you need more than the episodes can provide? Real quick, we just launched a free true crime newsletter and community page to go along with our binge shows, including the crimes of Margot freshwater. And you can access it at the link in our episode description or at patreon.com slash the bench. Carvana is so easy just to click. We've got ourselves a car. See? So many cars. That's a click-tastic inventory. And check out the financing options. Payments to fit our budget. I mean, that's the best way to get a car. And we're going to have a car. We're going to have a car. We're going to have a car. We're going to have a car. We're going to have a car. We're going to have a car. We're going to have a car. We're going to have a car. We're going to have a car. We're going to have a car. We're going to have a car. We're going to have a car. We're going to have a car. We're going to have a car. That's a click-tastic inventory. And check out the financing options. Payments to fit our budget. I mean, that's clickonomics 101. Delivery to our door. Just a hop, skip, and a click away. And what? No better feeling than when everything just clicks. Buy your car today on Carvana. Delivery fees may apply. It was a cool December night in Memphis, 1966. Street lights pooled yellow on the pavement, and the city was settling into its quiet rhythm. Around 6 o'clock, Margot was at the Cunio's house on Peabody, doing her usual babysitting shift. Glenn Nash was there, too. That night, he was drinking. Mrs. Cunio noticed it right away. The smell, the slur, the heaviness in his movements. When she told him to knock it off, Nash didn't put up a fight. When it was time to clock out, Margot gathered her things and left the house. She walked home alone in the dim street light glow, probably thinking she'd seen the last of Nash for the night. For just a few minutes later, he showed up at her door, and the two of them left together in a white Ford Fairlane. They drove off into the Memphis night, no clear destination, just headlights cutting through the dark. Nash, that he needed alcohol, and he goes into the liquor store. Square D liquor, an unremarkable bodega. You can kind of picture this place in your head. Your town definitely has one. Inside, the air smelled of steel beer and linoleum cleaner. A radio murmured behind the counter. The proprietor of the liquor store was Helmand Robbins senior. Helmand Robbins is waiting on customers as they come in. Helmand was 60 years old, a soft spoke in Mempian. The liquor store job was just a favor, a temporary side gig, helping out his friend who owned the place. Helmand filled in a few nights a week, usually working the 6 to 11 shift. When Nash stumbled in, Robbins nodded hello, polite and unsuspecting. Margot waited a bit in the car, but Nash was taking too long, so she went in to join him, and that's when. Nash pulls a gun on him. In seconds, this sleepy liquor store was the scene of a stick-up. He tells Helmand Robbins to get into the back of the store, there's a little backroom. He shows Helmand Robbins against the wall. The bell over the door jingled, a new customer. Nash leaned close to Margot, his voice low enough only she could hear. He tells Margot to go back there, and tells Margot, you get out there and you wait on that man. Behind the counter, Margot kept her hand steady, pretending everything was fine. Like this customer hadn't walked into the middle of a robbery. She was conducting herself like she was working there. Lately, the Lately customers handling money she was giving out liquor. That's Judge John Campbell, a former deputy DA in Shelby County, where this crime all went down. She did not let anybody think there was anything wrong. This was Margot's chance to get out, but she stayed. She then comes to the back and Glinn Nash kicks the back door open, as she's going out the back door pop pop. Nash and Margot beeline toward his white Ford Fairling, idling in the alley, as a pool of blood formed around Helmand's body. They tore off into the night. They had stolen $616.85, hardly worth a man's life. I got the Memphis PD Offense report from that night. This classified as a criminal homicide, defendant, unknown. Here's what went down when they arrived on the scene. A car hop that was working nearby had nipped into D. Squarelicker for a bottle of gin, but nobody answered when he pounded on the counter. Then, from somewhere behind a door in the back, a gurgle broke the silence. The strained gagging jolted him. Something was clearly wrong. He picked up the phone and called for help. Once later, the first patrol car pulled up outside. The neon sign was still glowing. The door unlocked. Lights on inside. But the place was empty. Officers called out to no answer. Then one of them pushed through the narrow hallway to the back room. That's where they found Helmand Robbins senior on the floor. His hands bound with sea grass rope. His body's still. He's been shot several times. Close range. Execution style. There were two guns that were used. A 22 and a 38. The 22 was something that a woman would have. In other words, it looked like Margo had shot Helmand Robbins. Not just her older boyfriend. For the next 12 days, Margo and Nash never stayed in one place too long. They were almost like a Bonnie and Clyde situation. Bonnie and Clyde were depression-era outlaws turned to legends. A couple of kids from Texas who robbed banks, out ran the cops, and went out in a storm of gunfire on a back road in Louisiana. When Bonnie and Clyde hit movies screens in 1967, it turned them into icons, stylish, and in love, standing up to a world they couldn't be. Even now, their name's still me an rebellion, passion, and the thrill of running when you know you probably won't make it far. And when the film became a cultural touchstone, observers quickly pointed out the similarities between the story and the case that was unfolding in the South. For a moment, Margo and Nash seemed to fit that same mold, wild, reckless, and on the run. Being a story that was already starting to sound like legend. They left Memphis the night Hillman Robin Sr. was killed and headed east. First stop, Nashville, where they hold up for the night, laying low, drinking bourbon, and plotting their next move. From there, it was a zig-zag trail across the South. At Lanna, Georgia, then Titusville, Florida, they stayed in sheet motels under fake names. Nothing but stuck. On December 18, 12 days after Hillman Robin Sr. was gunned down in cold blood, they stopped at a convenience store north of Fort Lauderdale in a small town called Oakland Park. What happened next followed the same rhythm as Memphis. Nash and Margo walked into a convenience store and pulled the trigger again. This time, on Esther Bouye, a 45-year-old clerk working the night shift. She was shot twice, both bullets through the back. This wasn't self-defense. This was cold blooded murder. A murder within no witnesses. This was officially a spree. Two people committing random acts of violence. To what end? Was survival the reason? Did robbery keep gas in the car and food in their mouths? Did violence work once? Maybe the fear of doing it again began to fade. Each stop on the map demanded a new way to stay ahead. And the cost kept rising. By late December, the road brought them back to Tennessee. On the 26th, they checked into the Rope Van Winkle Motel in Millington, just outside of Memphis. The two were hungry, restless, and out of money. They'd abandoned the car on Highway 51 North. The two introduced themselves as Mr. and Mrs. Glenn Nash from West Memphis. They paid her the bad check and took a room for the night. Little did they know? While the phony Mr. and Mrs. slept soundly after a rampaging two weeks, the police found their getaway car. It was locked out of gas, a Georgia plate bolted to the back. Inside, maps of convenience stores around Fort Lauderdale. Boxes of 22 and 38 Calibriamo and a dark grey checkered sport coat. The same kind of witnesses said the man who killed Hillman Robin Senior had been wearing that night. Police had found the vehicle they were looking for, but the fugitives were nowhere to be found. Come morning, December 27th, after a night where they slept more soundly than they showed off, they called the taxi in Millington. The driver, C.C. Sirat, was 54, a family man wrapping up his shift. Margot and Nash were his last customers, said they were headed to Mississippi. The cab hummed across the state line. The headlights washed over the bare winter trees. The road empty for miles. Then, two flashes lit the inside of the car. And they wound up killing the Mississippi cab driver. Another execution style killing to the back of the head, while Sirat was still in the driver's seat. Their body count, now three. They fled the scene, came up with fake names, John and Sue Williams from Newark, and the two were back in the wind. After the cab driver, C.C. Sirat's body was discovered by police, witnesses said they spotted a man and woman running across a field and hopping into a truck on Highway 61. Police tracked down the trucker, a guy named Robert Thornton, who said he'd pick them up and drop them in Clarksdale. From there, it looked like they were heading south. By late afternoon, the Mississippi Highway Patrol confirmed sightings of the parent Clarksdale, and word went out to local police. Officers started checking the trailways in Greyhound stations, figuring the fugitives were traveling by bus. The Greyhound manager told them the next one from Clarksdale was due at 7.25pm. Finally, they were apprehended in DeSoto County, Mississippi, which is just one county south of Memphis. Bonnie and Clyde were officially busted. At a Greyhound station, there was no fight and no chase. Only the sharp click of handcuffs, and the flash of police lights outside as they were lightened at the cool Mississippi night. At the station, officers opened Nash's briefcase. Inside, raptured a pair of underwear, was a 38-calibre Italian revolver. It was loaded with four live rounds, and one spent shell under the hammer. The pair were booked into the DeSoto County jail, a narrow hallway of concrete cells and metal doors. The ballistics were clear enough. The 38-calibre rounds pulled from Nash's car, matched the ones that tore through Robbins and Surat's bodies. In Florida, the evidence pointed in the same direction. Nash's fingerprints were lifted from a shopping cart inside the Oakland Park convenience store, and hand-drawn maps of Florida were later found in his abandoned car. But there was a big problem in all these states, putting Nash on trial. During the process, Glenn Nash was found to be insane and was committed. Within months, every jurisdiction that wanted to charge him hit the same wall. I got a hold of a psychological evaluation. The consensus, a diagnosis of paranoid schizophrenia. In Nash's case, doctors at the state hospital in Whitfield said he was in a deep psychotic state. Paranoid and convinced the world was out to get him. They described him as having wild delusions, part fear, part ego, believing he was both being persecuted and somehow important enough to be a target. Remember how Nash had been under investigation in Tennessee for unethical law practice? It turns out, Nash believed Hillman Robbins Sr., an Esther Bouye, were spies for the Memphis Bar Association. In the cab driver, C.C. Sirat, Nash was convinced was a hired gunman attempting to kill him, and that he had shot him in self-defense. All of that was enough for a judge to find Nash incompetent to defend himself. And Glenn Nash was sent to the Memphis State Hospital at Whitfield. All the while, Margo had to go to trial. Glenn Nash would never face a jury for any of the killings. Margo faced more than one. She was tried twice in Mississippi for the murder of the cab driver, Mr. Sirat. There she was facing one count of accessory after the fact. So they didn't think Margo shot anyone, but helped Nash get away. The trials took place in her nando. One in 1967, the other in 68, in the same small Mississippi town where she'd been locked up. She told the jury that Nash was the gunman. Did she fear he'd kill her too? Did she hadn't pulled the trigger in any of the murders? And there was a mistrial, both times. Mississippi decided not to try her again. Then there was Florida. Glenn Nash couldn't be tried if he was found to be insane. They decided not to just pursue the case against her. Investigators couldn't prove Margo had been inside when the clerk was shot, so she was left off the charge sheet. For Nash, the verdict was madness. For Margo, it was limbo. And after nearly two years sitting in the Dissoto County jail, Margo was inextradited to Memphis just across the state line and put to trial. Somebody had to go down for these senseless murders, and it wasn't going to be the lawyer who'd been declared legally insane. Instead, the young woman, what are the odds that she had simply been in the jail? In the wrong place at the wrong time. Three times. And it was a death polychus. All eyes were on Margo fresh water. Y'all, it is the middle of winter, but I still have goals. It's basically my daily struggle. I wake up. Tonight, I'm going to make something healthy, I tell myself. And then the day just happens. And suddenly it's late. I'm wiped, and cooking is the last thing I want to do. That's why factor has made such a huge difference for me. It makes healthy eating easy. They have fully prepared meals designed by dieticians and crafted by chefs, so you can eat well without planning or cooking and all that stuff. What I like the most are these are like real meals, you know, like quality, functional ingredients, lean proteins, colorful vegetables, whole food ingredients, healthy fats, no refined sugars, no artificial sweeteners, no refined seed oils, all that stuff. And they're built to support whatever you're trying to do, you know, like eat healthier, manage calories or just get more protein. Lately, I've really been enjoying the cheddar and poblano shredded beef bowl. It has that fall apart tender shredded beef with roasted poblano peppers, fire roasted tomato brown rice, and a cilantro lime crema. And it packs 29 grams of protein while still being under 500 calories. That's like exactly the kind of meal that works for me, something that's filling and satisfying, but also in keeping with my goals. So factor also keeps things interesting. They have a hundred rotating meals every week. So you never get bored. They have options like high protein, calorie, smart, Mediterranean, GLP1 support. They have ready to eat salads and a new muscle pro collection to support strength and recovery. So you're never stuck eating the same thing over and over. And the convenience of the whole thing is huge. Everything is always fresh, never frozen. It's ready in about two minutes, no prep, no stress, no cleanup. Head to factormeals.com slash binge crimes 50 off. And use the code binge crimes 50 off to get 50% off and free breakfast for a year. Eat like a pro this month with factor. New subscribers only varies by plan. One free breakfast item per box for one year while subscription is active. Want more true crime? Subscribe to the binge to get all episodes of fatal fantasy, add free today and get instant access to over 60 other jaw dropping true crime stories. Plus subscribers get a binge drop of a brand new series on the first of every month, every month. Search for the binge channel on Apple podcasts or head to get the binge.com to subscribe today. The binge feed your true crime obsession. Two years after the killing at D square liquor on February 4th 1969, 21 year old Margot Freshwater was brought to trial at the criminal court for Shelby County in Tennessee. She faced a single count of first degree murder in the death of Hillman Robin Sr. The six year old clerk found bound and shot in the backroom of the shop and another charge for murder and perpetration of robbery. I'm not saying this was the trial of the century or anything, but there was some hype. A young woman accused of an execution style killing alongside her mad lover. Even today the press would eat that up. She made an attractive defendant. She got her hair fixed and her makeup on and nice clothes and stuff like that. She was pretty. And so that drew a lot of attention to her from the very first. Margot Freshwater was very much portrayed as this femme fatale, young, pretty, blonde woman who used her sex and her sexuality to manipulate man and manipulate situations. That was the undercurrent of so much of how she was portrayed and how the case was portrayed. Bonnie and Clyde, except Clyde was, you know, schizophrenic and crazy and Bonnie was the one really running the show. The press leaned into that narrative. They thought she was in charge. She called the shots. Before the jury was even seated, Margot was called the blonde Bonnie. Both men would decide her fate. Not a single woman made the jury. Margot sat at the defense table beside Jay Frank Hall, a seasoned Memphis defense attorney. Across from them, prosecutor Terry Lafferty, a young, hungry and charismatic attorney eager to make his career. Hall built Margot's defense on one idea. Dress. That she hadn't chosen this life on the run. That Nash, twice her age and legally insane, had forced her into it. But the law in Tennessee wasn't so forgiving. It didn't matter who pulled the trigger. If you were in on it, you were in on it all the way. Whether she shot him or not is not going to be the deciding factor. The deciding factor is if she was an accessory before the fact, even if Glenn Nash did the killing, she was an active participant. What Judge Campbell is getting at here is that presence at each crime made her an accomplice under Tennessee law. By Nash's side, she assumed equal responsibility. In the eyes of the court, that put her exactly where Nash stood. Fully culpable. Even if you don't actually do the killing, if you're the look out, if you're the getaway driver, if you're holding other people hostage while somebody else does a killing, you're guilty of the killing. And there was another sticking point. Two guns were used in the murder of Hillman Robbins Sr. Nash's 38 and a 22, the Lady Gun. The state argued that she used the 22 to shoot the victim and Glenn Nash used the 38. To the state, Margot was more than a passenger. She had many opportunities to escape and she didn't. They basically acted like there were husband and wife for a long time. I've thought about this too. This crime spree spanned two weeks across state lines, motel lobbies, gas stations, and crowded highways. Plenty of moments where somebody desperate to get away could have run or asked for help. As the testimony unfolded, jurors watched the young woman at the defense table. She really struck a lot of people as something out of the ordinary. And she didn't come across as someone who is just this weak, vulnerable, manipulated person. Her case rested entirely on convincing the jury that her account of that night was true. And she testified that Nash forced her into the store, that Nash made her way on the customer, that Nash held Hillman Robbins Sr. in the back room, told her that if she said anything or tried to escape or do anything at all, he was going to kill Mr. Robbins and kill her too, and that he forced her out the back door. She heard the pops and then he is right on her with the gun and forces her to drive away. And from that moment on, she claimed she lived in fear, writing shotgun across the south, always under threat. And she was cross-examined vigorously by the prosecutor at trial, by Terry Laffrey. And one of the precise questions that he was hammering her with was, you don't have anyone else who can say that's what happened. You only have your word for that. Terry Laffrey passed away in 2021, but his voice lives on tape. My hopes weren't high that any of it was salvageable. The tapes had been sitting in a dusty Memphis court archive for over half a century now. But astonishingly enough, when I hit play, the courtroom came to life. They tried Mr. Hillman's hands to add his back that made him wait out on the floor. And General M. Durry also, on the proof of this record, chose that this guy's girl went out and waited on a gun. And they made no attempt whatsoever to tell that customer that Mr. Nash was in the back and he had Mr. Robbins on the floor with a gun out there and with Fred Nick Dill. Or even that a hold-up was in process. And she wants you to believe, Dill, that she's in fair, but life is that time. The defense rested without calling another witness. Outside, reporters filed their copy before the press is closed. The words already taking shape in tomorrow's paper. A frightened teenager or a willing partner. February 7, 1969. The air inside Judge Arthur Pachwyn's courtroom was electric. The jury had spent just three days listening to testimony, pouring over photos of the square D liquor store and hearing Margot Freshwater describe a night that had destroyed her life. And the state wasn't just asking for conviction. They were out for blood. All right, gentlemen of the jury have you reached the verdict in the case of state of Tennessee versus Margot Freshwater. We the jury found that the defendant guilty of murder in the first degree as charged in the first count. Judge Fakwyn then delivered her fate. Margot Freshwater, please stand. You'll be delivered to the Lord of the State Foundation for the National. They'll be confined for a period of 99 years. Margot sobbed as the deputies led her away. Outside, the verdict echoed through Memphis. We got this very attractive young girl having to do 99 years and that shooter, they put him in a private mental institution. Just the facts of this were extraordinary. And for Margot Freshwater, unacceptable. She had to do something to change the hand she'd been dealt. And soon, she would. She'd escape. What came next was legend. A manhunt that spans states, decades, and generations of law enforcement who all thought they knew who Margot Freshwater really was. And a revelation that proved no one really knew who they were chasing. For decades, everything known about Margot Freshwater came from prosecutors, defense attorneys, police reports, and the news. Every time she became the kind of criminal that people talk about, the girl who climbed defense and became infamous. More rumor than person. Other people defined her story, her motives, her fear, her guilt. If this was a woman who vanished for half a lifetime, I needed to understand how. I needed to hear from Margot herself. So I went looking for her. My name's Tanya. I was formerly Margot Freshwater. No one has really confronted me. And if they did, I would just say, well, you need to hear what the real story is before you are so quick to judgment. And leave it at that. Unlock all episodes of the crimes of Margot Freshwater. Ad free right now by subscribing to the Binge podcast channel. Not only will you immediately unlock all episodes of this show, but you'll get binge access to an entire network of other great true crime and investigative podcasts. All ad free. Plus, on the first of every month, subscribers get a binge drop of a brand new series. That's all episodes all at once. Search for the binge on Apple podcasts and hit subscribe at the top of the page. Head on Apple. Head to gettheggthegg.com to get access wherever you listen. The crimes of Margot Freshwater is an original production of Sony Music Entertainment and Glass podcasts. It was hosted and reported by me, Cooper Mall. Moral walls is our story editor. Our executive producers are Catherine St. Louis, Jonathan Hirsch, Nancy Glass, Ben Federman, and Andrea Gunning. Design and editing by Anna McLean. Mixed and mastered by Matt Delvecchio. Our theme music was composed by Oliver Baines. We use music from Mib, an epidemic sound. Our production managers are Sammy Allison and Kristen Melcuri. Our lawyer is Michael Belkin. Special thanks to Steve Ackerman, Emily Rasek, and Carrie Hartman. Please rate and review the crimes of Margot Freshwater. It helps people find our show. Sabrina. Karen. I have been listening to a new show from the binge called Fatal Fantasy. I am obsessed. Wait, I need to know more. Tell me everything. Okay, well, it's a very shocking. It's like ultra-weird crime story of a murder for a higher plot. But wait for it. Leverage the dynamics of the underworld and underworld being a medieval fantasy game. Wait, so it's live action role playing Gone Wrong? Horribly wrong. And you can binge all episodes now. Oh, man, that sounds so good. I know what I'm doing on my drive home today. Search for Fatal Fantasy and subscribe to the Binge podcast channel on Apple Podcasts or at GetTheBinge.com. And then once you're done, you can listen to one of the over 60 true crime and investigative podcasts, a part of the channel while you wait for the next month's drop. I really need to know what happens. Selfishly you do so that we can talk about it. So whenever you listen, search for Fatal Fantasy and hit subscribe to the binge to get all episodes all at once. Add free.