Town note
The area was first called Winchester after William Winchester, who purchased 167 acres; the Maryland General Assembly later renamed it Westminster to avoid confusion with Winchester, Virginia.
about 0:06:39Spoilers are covered until your reading preferences load.
FILE 288 / 2 June 2022 / 170 MIN / full
We're going to Westminster, Maryland, but it takes place in Silver Run, which is like a small section of Westminster; this is in Carroll County. about 0:05:25
The area was first called Winchester after William Winchester, who purchased 167 acres; the Maryland General Assembly later renamed it Westminster to avoid confusion with Winchester, Virginia.
about 0:06:39In April 1865 the newspaper editor Joseph Shaw had his presses wrecked and business destroyed, then was beaten and stabbed to death by four men after publishing an anti-Lincoln editorial; the four were acquitted on grounds of self-defence.
about 0:07:08Westminster has held a Memorial Day parade every year since 1868, the longest continuously running Memorial Day parade in the country.
about 0:08:21Rolls of 35mm film wrapped in wax paper, known as the Pumpkin Papers, were found inside a hollowed-out pumpkin on a farm in Westminster during the Alger Hiss and House Un-American Activities Committee affair.
about 0:09:05The area was first called Winchester after William Winchester, who purchased 167 acres; the Maryland General Assembly later renamed it Westminster to avoid confusion with Winchester, Virginia.
about 0:06:39In April 1865 the newspaper editor Joseph Shaw had his presses wrecked and business destroyed, then was beaten and stabbed to death by four men after publishing an anti-Lincoln editorial; the four were acquitted on grounds of self-defence.
about 0:07:08Westminster has held a Memorial Day parade every year since 1868, the longest continuously running Memorial Day parade in the country.
about 0:08:21Rolls of 35mm film wrapped in wax paper, known as the Pumpkin Papers, were found inside a hollowed-out pumpkin on a farm in Westminster during the Alger Hiss and House Un-American Activities Committee affair.
about 0:09:05about 43%
about 0:13:04White 77.3% · Black 8.3% · Asian 3.3% · Hispanic 7.4%
Ethnicity can overlap race.Property crime
▼ a little bit low
Violent crime
▼ slightly under
Two-bedroom, one-bath house price
about 0:15:25Three-bedroom, two-bath house price
about 0:15:58Four-bedroom, five-bath house price
about 0:16:54"18,712"
No direction stated.
As told in 2022 about 0:12:02
"about 33"
Comparison: "national average of about 37". No direction stated.
As told in 2022 about 0:12:22
"23%"
Comparison: "more than twice the national average". Direction: above.
As told in 2022 about 0:12:31
"77.3%"
No direction stated.
As told in 2022 about 0:12:50
"8.3%"
No direction stated.
As told in 2022 about 0:12:50
"3.3%"
No direction stated.
As told in 2022 about 0:12:50
"7.4%"
No direction stated.
As told in 2022 about 0:12:50
"about 43%"
No direction stated.
As told in 2022 about 0:13:04
"a little bit above average"
Comparison: "national average". Direction: above.
As told in 2022 about 0:13:38
"$55,000"
Comparison: "about $54,000 in the rest of the country". No direction stated.
As told in 2022 about 0:13:49
"110"
Comparison: "100 is average". Direction: above.
As told in 2022 about 0:13:56
"$373,200"
Comparison: "not much higher than the national average". Direction: above.
As told in 2022 about 0:14:06
"about $1,300"
Comparison: "about the national average". Direction: about the same.
As told in 2022 about 0:14:38
"$70,000"
No direction stated.
As told in 2022 about 0:15:25
"$364,000"
Comparison: "right about the average price". Direction: about the same.
As told in 2022 about 0:15:58
"$1,250,000"
No direction stated.
As told in 2022 about 0:16:54
"a little bit low"
Comparison: "national average". Direction: below.
As told in 2022 about 0:21:01
"slightly under"
Comparison: "national average". Direction: below.
As told in 2022 about 0:21:14
4.0 / 5 · average of 3
“A nice little town where you can do anything you could ever want, from basketball and skateboarding to piano and mandolin; the people are as nice as can be and the town feels like a second home.”about 0:09:44
“Westminster could be better if the older people would stop trying to remove anything remotely fun in town.”about 0:11:19
“A nice little town, but old, with people who are old and racist and blatant about it; there are a lot of junkies on the streets at night, and it is only nice for people who have lived there forever.”about 0:11:31
Born in 1941, he had built a successful practice, Maryland Business Services, and by the late 1970s he and his second wife, Mary Ruth, owned a twenty-one-acre estate on Turkey Foot Road in Silver Run, with a large house, a seven-acre vineyard, a trailer park in Mount Holly, Pennsylvania, and the North Winds motel in Ocean City. The couple had two children together and looked from the outside like a prosperous, solid family. Behind closed doors they argued constantly, and both used sex as a weapon for control.
She was twenty-nine, had been married four times, had two children, was living in the Hortons boarding house and was facing the loss of her children to the state. She had a record for theft, credit-card fraud and prostitution in California, and her fourth husband, James Marco, was a plumber and mechanic in Florida. On 20 June 1979 her car broke down, and on 10 August he bought her a 1976 Ford Torino, then drove her and her children to his trailer park in Mount Holly.
By mid-August they were lovers. A divorce, he said, would cost him the house and the vineyard.
On 29 August he left his janitor's job early and drove to the Turkey Foot Road house. He let himself in, locked the white poodle in a bathroom and sat in the dark smoking a cigarette. He walked her down to the master bedroom, tore the telephone cord from the wall and told her to lie on the bed and pray. He shot her in the back; when she turned and said he was killing her, he said, "That's right, honey," and kept shooting. She was hit nine times, five shots through the heart and four in the head.
At about four in the morning Maria Paulos took a telephone call at the motel: a voice said the job was done and that he had shot her nine times. Later that morning employees of Maryland Business Services became worried when Mary Ruth did not appear, drove to the house, found the front door open and music playing, and discovered her body with a pillow over her face and a ten-gauge shotgun, a revolver and a .22 rifle nearby.
On 26 September 1979 the two flew to Bermuda and married.
The investigation moved slowly.
The episode closes with her living in the big house in Silver Run.
August 29th, 1979 / her home on Turkey Foot Road, Silver Run
As told in the episode, on 2 June 2022.
Accused
Accused
Accused
early 1979 / California
Public places are marked on the map.
crime scene
about 1:09:05business
about 0:31:10business
about 0:47:45business
about 1:02:06business
about 1:02:53home
about 1:03:05business
about 1:08:04business
about 1:16:41business
about 0:58:21business
about 1:11:27home
about 1:12:54business
about 1:12:54business
about 1:15:09business
about 1:18:16