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Speaker 1: Hmm. Was America's first female serial killer just the victim

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Speaker 1: of fake news. I'm Patty Steele, executed thanks to public opinion.

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Speaker 1: Next on the backstory, We're back with the backstory. Well,

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Speaker 1: we're all experts on fake news these days, right, But

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Speaker 1: that's really been a thing from the time news was invented.

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Speaker 1: It's called marketing. Somebody has an agenda, and there's nothing

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Speaker 1: better than mass media to get your point across, even

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Speaker 1: if it's a crock of well, you know, victims of

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Speaker 1: fake news have included everybody from Julius Caesar to Marie

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Speaker 1: Antoinette to pretty much every US president on both sides

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Speaker 1: of the aisle. And then there are people who are

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Speaker 1: falsely accused of crimes who pay the price, only to

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Speaker 1: be found not guilty, sometimes years and years after the fact.

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Speaker 1: That's where the Innocence Project gets involved. Now here's a

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Speaker 1: story somewhere in the middle, has a lot of shades

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Speaker 1: of gray in it. Journey takes us to the early

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Speaker 1: nineteenth century to Charleston, South Carolina, Lavinia. Fisher and her

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Speaker 1: husband John are accused of highway robbery, a crime punishable

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Speaker 1: by death at that time, but she was also suspected

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Speaker 1: of being America's first female serial killer. She and her

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Speaker 1: husband were hung. But were they simply victims of an

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Speaker 1: anxious press, hearsay, or even a flawed justice system. The

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Speaker 1: year is eighteen twenty. Charleston was a powerful city, a

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Speaker 1: hub of commerce, second only to New York City at

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Speaker 1: that time. Lavinia Fisher was a gorgeous young woman twenty

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Speaker 1: six years old, who, along with her husband, John Fisher,

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Speaker 1: ran the six Mile Wayfarer House, an inn for travelers

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Speaker 1: located just outside Charleston. But there's a problem in this

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Speaker 1: comfortable inn. Some crazy stuff is happening. Legend has it

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Speaker 1: Lavinia was also a cold blooded killer. There was talk

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Speaker 1: that she would charm the guests, talk to them about

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Speaker 1: their travels and gather information about their possessions. Night would fall,

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Speaker 1: she'd continue to chat with them and then serve them

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Speaker 1: some warm tea before bed, But that tea was laced

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Speaker 1: with an herb that would send them into a very

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Speaker 1: deep sleep. Gossip had it that the traveler, now fast asleep,

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Speaker 1: would be laid on a bed that, with the pull

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Speaker 1: of a lever, would open a trap door and drop

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Speaker 1: the body into a pit, maybe one lined with spikes.

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Speaker 1: To finish the job. One person at the Fisher's trial

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Speaker 1: testified that she had offered him some tea, but he

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Speaker 1: wasn't a fan of tea. Not wanting to seem rude,

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Speaker 1: he took it, but he dumped it out when she

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Speaker 1: wasn't looking. He said he was nervous about her and

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Speaker 1: her husband and decided to sit all night in a

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Speaker 1: chair propped against the door of his room rather than

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Speaker 1: get into bed. Then in the middle of the night,

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Speaker 1: he said he heard a loud crash and he watched

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Speaker 1: his bed fall through the floor. But here's the question,

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Speaker 1: how much of this is true. Historical records show that

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Speaker 1: Lavinia and John Fisher were arrested, but actually not for murder.

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Speaker 1: They were snagged on charges of highway robbery, which in fairness,

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Speaker 1: again was a serious crime in those days, often ending

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Speaker 1: in execution, and nobodies were ever found, nor were any

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Speaker 1: tunnels underneath the bedrooms found while they were locked up.

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Speaker 1: Gossip about the Fisher's crimes grew morphing into a crazy

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Speaker 1: story of robbery and serial killings. Now, the problem is

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Speaker 1: the trial that followed was less about factual evidence and

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Speaker 1: more about the kind of theater of public outrage and

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Speaker 1: fear kind of reminds you of the Salem witch trials. Right,

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Speaker 1: once the gossip grew loud enough, everybody wanted their pound

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Speaker 1: of flesh. Anyway, that's likely what happened to Lavinia and

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Speaker 1: her husband bad press. But were they bad folks, Oh

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Speaker 1: you bet they were? Were they killers? Probably not. Records

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Speaker 1: from the trial are pretty nonexistent, and again no bodies

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Speaker 1: were found at the six mile wayfarer house or many tunnels. Ultimately,

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Speaker 1: they were found guilty of highway robbery. After a very

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Speaker 1: fast and tumultuous trial. There was an appeal, but no surprise,

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Speaker 1: Lavinia and John Fisher were finally sentenced to hang. So

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Speaker 1: why was Lavinia Fisher remembered as a serial killer. Most

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Speaker 1: historians think she was absolutely a criminal, but likely not

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Speaker 1: a killer. You see, forensic information in the early nineteenth

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Speaker 1: century was very different from what we have today. And

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Speaker 1: as far as the news goes, we have instant access now.

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Speaker 1: Back then you really only had two options for taking

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Speaker 1: in the news print like newspapers and pamphlets. And after that,

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Speaker 1: word of mouth gossip was huge. And let's not be

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Speaker 1: too judgy. Today we may have a million different sources

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Speaker 1: of information, but did you ever stop to think how

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Speaker 1: many of those stories feed off the same source. The

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Speaker 1: problem is, just like today, stories could get blown way

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Speaker 1: out of proportion, and again, just like today, public opinion

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Speaker 1: could sometimes sway the justice system and the outcome of trials.

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Speaker 1: So what's Lavinia's real story? Well, we do know she

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Speaker 1: was a member of a big gang of highwaymen outlaws

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Speaker 1: who terrorized the area with targeted robberies. Apparently, the six

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Speaker 1: Mile House that's the inn owned by Lavinia and her

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Speaker 1: husband was a notorious hangout for outlaws in the Charleston area,

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Speaker 1: and the couple definitely targeted travelers for robbery. Funny enough,

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Speaker 1: Lavinia and John Fisher thought they were going to get

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Speaker 1: out of this mess right up until the end. Housed

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Speaker 1: in the same tiny cell they plotted and escape late

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Speaker 1: one night using bed sheets tied together, John slipped out

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Speaker 1: of the window in their cell and made it most

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Speaker 1: of the way down to ground level until the sheets

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Speaker 1: tour trapping Lavinia above us to leave without her and

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Speaker 1: was caught. After that, they were held more securely. Eventually,

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Speaker 1: John found god, Lavinia not so much. She still thought

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Speaker 1: she'd find a way out as they headed to the

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Speaker 1: gallows with a crowd of two thousand watching the festivities,

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Speaker 1: John begged for mercy. He told people he was not guilty,

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Speaker 1: that they were making a mistake. He had a reverend

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Speaker 1: read a letter to the crowd in which he said

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Speaker 1: he was a Christian and simply the victim of a

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Speaker 1: flawed justice system, although he then sort of contradicted himself

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Speaker 1: by asking for forgiveness for what he'd done. As for Lavinia,

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Speaker 1: she stayed coldly composed, but in her final moments, as

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Speaker 1: the noose was slipped around her neck, her last words

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Speaker 1: were kind of scary. She said, if you have a

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Speaker 1: message for the devil, tell me now, for I shall

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Speaker 1: be seeing him shortly. I'm Patty's Tear. The Backstories a

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Speaker 1: production of iHeartMedia, Premiere Networks, the Elvis Duran Group, and

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Speaker 1: Steel Trap Productions. Our producer is Doug Fraser. Our writer

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Speaker 1: Jake Kushner. We have new episodes every Tuesday and Friday.

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Speaker 1: Feel free to reach out to me with comments and

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Speaker 1: even story suggestions on Instagram at real Patty Steele and

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Speaker 1: on Facebook at Patty Steele. Thanks for listening to the

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Speaker 1: Backstory with Patty Steele. The pieces of history you didn't

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Speaker 1: know you needed to know