Mary Frances Creighton

Mary Frances Creighton (July 29, 1899 – July 16, 1936), was a housewife, who along with Everett Applegate, a 36-year-old former American Legion official, was executed in Sing Sing Prison's electric chair, Old Sparky, for the poisoning of Applegate's wife, Ada, in Baldwin, New York on September 27, 1935.[1][2] She had passed out prior to the execution, and was executed in an unconscious state.[3]

While living in New Jersey, Creighton was also suspected of poisoning her mother in-law, Anna Creighton, in 1920, her father in-law, Walter Creighton, in 1921, and her younger brother, Raymond Avery, in 1923. Creighton and her husband, John, were tried for Raymond's death in 1923, but were acquitted due to a lack of witnesses. The Anna Creighton murder trial, which was held in 1923 as well, also ended with Creighton being acquitted, again due to a lack of witnesses, and also due to the testimony of toxicologist Alexander Gettler, who found only a trace amount of arsenic in Anna Creighton's system. After her arrest for the murder of Ada Applegate, who she claimed to have poisoned so that her fifteen-year-old daughter who she had been pimping out to Mr. Applegate could legally marry, Creighton repeatedly confessed to and denied killing both Anna and Raymond.

References

  1. ↑ "Mrs. Creighton Dies For Poison Murder. Applegate Follows Her to the Death Chamber for the Slaying of His Wife". New York Times. July 17, 1936. Retrieved 2010-05-12.
  2. ↑ Jon Blackwell. "Frances Creighton". Notorious New Jersey. Retrieved 2010-05-12.
  3. ↑ Mark Gado. "An Immoral Woman". Retrieved 2012-06-09.
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