Stacey Castor was an American woman from Weedsport, New York who appears in Forensic Files's episode "Freeze Framed", which is an account of how she became a Female criminal. In 2009, she was found guilty of intentionally poisoning her then-husband David Castor with antifreeze in 2005 and attempting to murder her daughter, Ashley Wallace, with crushed pills mixed in with vodka, orange juice, and Sprite in 2007.
Case[]
Stacey Castor contacted Onondaga County emergency response in August of 2005 to report their her husband had locked himself in their bedroom, and hadn't come out for 24 hours.
When paramedics arrived, Stacey requested they break down the bedroom door.
Her second husband David Castor was dead. He stretched out on their bed with large amounts of vomit on the mattress as well as the floor.
A glass of green liquid was on the couple's nightstand, and a container of anti-freeze was found sticking out from under the bed.
Stacey told investigators that they'd been fighting recently, though nothing violent, and that David's behavior had been erratic for a month. His death was ruled suicide.
Investigators suspected it wasn't suicide from the start, but they needed to build a case to prove it. They found it suspicious that the glass on the nightstand that contained anti-freeze only had Stacey's fingerprints on it.
It was also considered odd that the carpet all around the anti-freeze container was coated in vomit, but not the container itself, which might suggest it had been placed there after David became sick.
This would mean that Stacey's story of David locking himself in their bedroom a day before wasn't true, but investigators would have to prove it.
A final piece of evidence was taken from the kitchen trash can. It was a turkey baster that contained a few green droplets that looked like anti-freeze.
The county crime lab had confirmed that only Stacey's fingerprints were on the anti-freeze glass. They also discovered that David Castor's DNA was only on the tip of the turkey baster, but not the handle. It looked like someone had used the turkey baster to force feed David more anti-freeze when he didn't die from the initial dose.
Investigators placed cameras at the local cemetery, where both David Castor and Stacey's first husband Michael Wallace were buried. She had buried her two deceased husbands next to one another.
Investigators wanted to see if Stacey ever showed up at the cemetery in the days following David's funeral. They suspected she was a sociopath, so wanted to see if she ever visited the graves and showed any kind of grief. She didn't...
They also suspected Stacey had murdered her first husband Michael Wallace, but there had been no autopsy performed on the body.
The doctors said he'd died from a heart attack after Stacey told them he suffered from heart problems. Stacey in turn used that medical opinion to turn down an autopsy. At the time, it hadn't looked too suspicious.
Investigators successfully petitioned a judge to let them dig up Michael Wallace's remains. A forensic autopsy was performed, which showed the presence of ethylene glycol crystals in Michael's kidneys and liver.
These crystals are produced by the body after ingesting anti-freeze, and do not break down for several years, even after death. They all the culprit in antifreeze deaths, because they cause the kidneys and other vital organs to shut down within a number of hours.
Investigators now had a case to move forward in charging Stacey for the murder of two husbands, but then something unexpected happened.
911 recieved an early morning phone call from Stacey Castor. She said that her daughter Ashley was unconscious in her bed and wouldn't wake up. Her youngest daughter Bree had found Ashley in this state. She'd also found what appeared to be a suicide note on Ashley's nightstand.
The suicide note had been typed on the family computer. It appeared to be a confession from Ashley that she had murdered her father Michael, and then her mother's second husband David.
Ashley Wallace was rushed to the hospital. If she had gotten there just ten minutes later- she probably wouldn't have survived.
When she awoke, Ashley told investigators she hadn't typed any suicide note, and denied killing her father or stepfather.
A computer analyst was called in to determine the origin of the suicide note, if it were at all possible.
When he examined the Castor family computer, he discovered through it's memory logs that the suicide note had been typed using Microsoft Word. Microsoft Word's auto-save feature, which keeps a backup of even deleted documents- showed that the letter had been typed using Stacey's user account, and not Ashley's.
Further, the memory logs showed earlier versions of the note, meaning that the author had done several drafts before deciding on the final product.
The memory timestamps also proved that Ashley could not have written the note because she'd been away at her first day of college when it was completed and printed. Her alibi was rock solid and confirmed by campus staff.
Ashley told investigators she had called her mother Stacey that day upset because investigators had visited her at school and asked her if she'd killed her father. Stacey invited her over for some alcoholic drinks to help calm her nerves.
Ashley said that the alcoholic drink was 'nasty-tasting', but she trusted her mother and drank it. Immediately, she says she became extremely drowsy and went to bed. Bree found her unconscious the next morning.
Ashley's blood carried high amounts of pain killers mixed with the alcohol.
With all the evidence they'd collected, and the attempted framing of her daughter- investigators were ready to try Stacey Castor in court.
The press dubbed Stacey as another 'black widow killer'. The case recieved considerable media coverage in the State of New York.
The defense tried to argue Stacey's version of events. Particularly, that Ashley had in fact written the suicide note confessing to the murders. They also speculated that Ashley had struggled with mental problems her entire childhood, but had no proof.
The jury found Stacey Castor guilty of the murder of her second husband, and attempting to murder and frame her daughter Ashley. She was sentenced to a minimum of 50 years in prison without parole.
This made it seem unnecessary to try Stacey in the death of her first husband Michael Wallace, so she was left uncovicted of that murder.
She was found dead in her prison cell on the morning of June 11, 2016; at just 48 years old.
Stacey's death was ruled a heart attack, with no signs of foul play or suspicious circumstances present.
Post-Episode Notes[]
Ashley Wallace declared on the witness stand that she hated her mother, and neither she or her younger sister Bree had any further dealings with her until the day of her death.
Several people continued to maintain Stacey Castor's innocence- including her mother, who blamed Ashley, and members of extended family from both husbands.
The prosecutor in her case observed that there is no word in the English language for someone evil enough to murder two husbands, and attempt to frame her daughter by killing her.
External links[]
- Stacey Castor on Wikipedia