Ep 9: The Timid Widow

Minnie, a mild-mannered widow from Atlanta, had a lot of explaining to do after the body of a missing housewife was discovered stuffed into a trunk in her basement in 1941.

Minnie Lee Griffin

Did she take the fall in order to protect her troubled teenage son? Or was the timid widow a twisted, cold-blooded killer?

Perry Williams, an insurance salesman from Atlanta, last saw his wife, Mildred, when he kissed her goodbye on the morning of November 21, 1941. Mildred worked late that day at the shoe store where she was employed as a saleswoman, and she was supposed to return home shortly after 10 o'clock that evening. Perry didn't panic when his wife didn't come home, as she frequently spent the night with her mother, Mrs. Allen, who lived on Lee Street.

In the morning, Perry Williams telephoned Mrs. Allen, who told him that Mildred hadn't come over. Next, he called the shoe store but learned that she hadn't showed up for work the previous day. Now he began to grow frantic. He called family friends and local hospitals, but no one knew of Mildred's whereabouts. And then, a terrible thought filled him with dread. Had she decided to leave him? Perry couldn't imagine why; for they were happily married and on the best of terms. Had she found another man?

He tried to go about his day as best as he could, believing that the matter would resolve itself in its own time. But weeks passed, and still no word from Mildred. Now that he was convinced that his wife had been stolen from him by a romantic rival, Perry packed his belongings and moved into a small apartment. When he was unpacking his boxes, he discovered something he had overlooked-- Christmas presents which Mildred had purchased shortly before her disappearance.

Mildred and Perry Williams

Although Perry had notified the police, they were of the opinion that his wife had simply abandoned him. There was no reason to suspect anything more than that. But then an aunt of Mildred Williams, Mrs. J.T. Neal, reported that she had received two mysterious phone calls. The first time she answered, she heard nothing but a gasping noise. The second call had come from a woman of some education and refinement, who asked if anyone had ever searched the basement of the Griffin home on Stewart Avenue. This was the home where Perry and Mildred had rented a room in the early days of their marriage. Two detectives, acting on the theory that Mildred had been kidnapped, went to the Griffin home and searched for clues, but none were found.

On Sunday, March 15, 1942, nearly four months after Mildred's disappearance, a storm struck the neighborhood and flooded the basement of the Griffin home, which was occupied by a widow named Minnie Lee Griffin and a son, known as J.W. The basement was flooded with six feet of water. Three days later, one of the widow's grown sons, Tom Griffin, hired workmen to pump the water out of the basement. They carried out old pieces of furniture, which they dumped in the rear yard. And then, they reached a trunk-- and old-fashioned steel automobile trunk, upside down in a pile of ashes in the corner.

The workmen opened the lid... and found Mildred Williams.

Mildred Williams

When the detectives and coroner's physician, Dr. Blalock, arrived, they discovered a rope from a window sash wound around her neck and tied under her knees. Mildred was a tiny woman, who weighed under 100 pounds and detectives theorized that she had been suspended by the rope and then beaten like a pinata. A sledgehammer, also found in the basement, appeared to be the murder weapon. Mildred's skull was fractured in two places, three of her teeth were missing. The body was positively identified at the mortuary by her mother, Mrs. Allen. When Perry Williams arrived to view the body, he collapsed in a dead faint.

The investigation turned to the occupants of the Griffin home--49-year-old Minnie Lee Griffin, a timid, harmless-looking woman whose husband had died five years earlier, and her 17-year-old son, J.W. Two of her other sons and a daughter, Ruth, had grown up and moved away. J.W. was a high school dropout who worked across the street stocking shelves at a grocery store. Back when Perry and Mildred Williams were newlyweds renting a room at the Griffin house, Minnie Lee's daughter Ruth and her husband, Kenny Hubert, often came home to visit. The two couples became friends, though, at least to one person, relations between Mildred Williams and Kenny Hubert seemed a little too cordial. One day, Mildred received an anonymous letter accusing her of being too friendly with Ruth's husband. Enclosed was a clipping from a newspaper advice column about the danger of girls chasing after married men.

Mildred never told Perry about the letter, but she showed a friend, who wondered if Minnie Lee Griffin had sent it. Mildred admitted that Mrs. Griffin had been acting strangely toward her. When Mildred finally showed the letter to her husband, Perry vowed to get to the bottom of it, one way or another. He confronted Minnie Lee, but the shy and timid widow denied having any knowledge of it.

A few days after this incident, Mildred found the fur collar of her winter coat ruined by some sort of acid. Mildred and Perry suspected Mrs. Griffin, and that's when they decided to move out, renting a home around the corner on Maryland Avenue. They remained friends with Ruth and Kenny Hubert, however, and over time, even their relationship with Minnie Lee Griffin improved.

Just days before her disappearance, Mildred Williams ran into her former landlady at the hospital, where Tom Griffin-- the grown son who would later hire workers to pump out the flooded basement-- was about to become a father for the second time. When Mildred mentioned that she was going to buy a present for the baby, Minnie Lee had an idea. "Let's put our money together and get something really nice for the baby." Mildred thought it was a wonderful idea, and Minnie Lee suggested that she come to her house in the morning to collect the money.

That turned out to be the day that Mildred failed to show up for work.

Four persons of interest were taken into custody. Minnie Lee Griffin, her sons Tom and J.W. and Kenny Hubert. Tom and Kenny were questioned and released. The police were leaning heavily toward the 17-year-old boy being the killer, and several times he was marched past his mother's cell on his way to the interrogation room. Each time, Minnie Lee became extremely nervous.

"What are you going to do to him? Where are you taking him?" she demanded. Was this simply the instinct of a protective mother kicking in? Or was there something more? Minnie Lee's behavior attracted the notice of Chief Detective McKibben. He came up with a plan.

When Minnie Lee was brought to his office, she found McKibben casually flipping the pages of a Bible. He began quoting verses about eternal damnation and repentance, about protecting sons who commit murder.

"Don't say that!" exclaimed Minnie.

"Don't say what, ma'am?"

"Don't accuse my baby of anything! Why, he's just a boy."

"Mrs. Griffin, what else can we do?" asked the detective. "He is the logical suspect, after all."

"No! That's not true! He had nothing to do with this. He's not to blame for anything."

"Alright, Mrs. Griffin. Suppose you tell me then just who is to blame? I reckon you'll feel better about it afterwards. Trust me, ma'am, I've been doing this job a mighty long time. Now, what'll you suppose will happen if a jury decides that J.W. is guilty? How will you live with yourself, Mrs. Griffin?"

Minnie Lee Griffin

According to Minnie Lee, she was sweeping the living room floor when Mildred knocked on her door. She let Mildred inside and then Mildred apologized for her husband's behavior.

"I asked her if she really was going out with Kenny Hubert and if she was planning to break up my daughter's home. With that, she jumped up and said that it was none of my business, and that if I ever mentioned it again she would brain me. I grabbed the broom and hit her over the head. She fell down, then got up and ran down to the cellar. I followed her. I picked up a heavy object and hit her over the head several times. I lost my mind, detective. I can't remember how many times I hit her."

According to Minnie Lee, she put the body in the trunk and covered it with newspapers. Then she poured ashes and cinders all over the trunk in an attempt to cover it. She said that J.W. wasn't even home at the time. Strangely, she never mentioned anything about the rope which had been wrapped around Mildred's neck and tied to her ankles. Was it possible that Minnie Lee took the blame in order to keep her youngest son out of prison?

It seems hard to believe that a timid, soft-spoken widow had either the strength, or the personality, to truss up an active and healthy woman half her age and beat her so savagely. And for what? To teach her a lesson about being too friendly with her daughter's husband? That seems like quite an overreaction-- especially considering that there was no evidence at all that she was having an affair with Kenny Hubert.

But, then again, there's also no evidence that Minnie's teenage dropout son had anything to do with the crime, either. Sure, he may seem like the ideal suspect-- a brash young man who was perhaps filled with lust over the petite, young housewife of Perry Williams-- but, like they say in the movies, the killer always turns out to be the last one you'd expect.

Minnie Lee Griffin went on trial on July 1, 1942, and was convicted of first-degree murder. She was sentenced to death, but the sentence was later commuted to life imprisonment by the governor. She was eventually paroled from Tatnall State Prison and died on January 8, 1966, taking her secrets-- and possibly her delusions-- to her grave.

But there's another interesting and morbid detail to the story of the murder of Mildred Williams, courtesy of her husband, who was interviewed by a newspaper reporter after Minnie Lee Griffin's trial.

Perry Williams was an insurance agent, and a few days after his wife's disappearance he sat in the Griffin home writing an insurance policy for one of Minnie's sons-- completely unaware that his wife was dead in a trunk beneath his very feet.

"Just think...I was sitting there in the living room, while all the time Mildred was.... "

Perry couldn't finish the sentence.