Larry Race was convicted of murder in the early 1980's in Duluth, Minnesota. They were in a boat together when it started taking on water and the engine died and wouldn't restart. He put his wife in a raft and then tried to swim to shore. He couldn't make it and then returned to the boat, which somehow started again. His wife washed up dead the next day. They said he swam back and cut her raft which took her life.

His final appeal was featured on UM some years ago. It was a pretty interesting case, especially for me since I live in MN.

They led the local news tonight with Larry and the fact that he will soon be a free man. He has to do a month of work release and then he is out. His family is thrilled as are his late wife's parents, who believed Larry all along.

I'm still mixed on this case. I want to believe him but some of the facts just don't hold water (pardon the pun) for his story.

Those of you that remember this, what do you think?

He's getting out? Was he pardoned or something?

I think he's innocent. If he was going to kill his wife, it's much easier to just toss her overboard than put her in a raft, swim with her for a while, then swim all the way back to the boat, put on scuba gear, then swim all the way back and cut the raft just right with a knife.

I think the raft was defective or hit a rock or something.

In fact, I posted a "Who was wrongly accused or convicted?" thread a year or two ago here, and highlighted the Larry Race case among my top choices.

It just galls me when prosecutors dream up Superman scenarios to put a convenient check mark beside their case, and look no further. If anyone screamed as a Mr. Nobody it was Larry Race. Yet they had him treading water and managing one herculean feat after another. Yet when it's in their best interests, I've seen prosecutors in other cases argue how near-impossible it is for humans to tread water for any length of time.

I was extremely impressed with the parents of the dead wife. "If you only knew Larry..." Every time I see that segment I'm struck by how powerful the family can be. In Jeffrey MacDonald's case, for instance, it is certain that the tunnelvision "fry the bastard!" approach of his in-laws and brother-in-law was almost solely responsible for the trial and conviction a decade or so after the incident.

Hey, thanks for the info! Yes, I always believed he was innocent as well.

I did find an article about it:
http://www.kare11.com/news/news_article.aspx?storyid=79596

I also noticed that he's a blond now. :winkgrin

I am a recent in-law of Larry, and I just wanted to say that it is interesting to hear other peoples opinions. Larry has just recently married my aunt and they are very happy together. And he isn't blond now, he's grey. Lol.

That's excellent news. I'm glad he can live a normal life again. I always believed he was innocent but I have to honestly say I never thought he was going to be released. Thank God I was proven wrong. :D

According to Lifetime's TV schedule this story will be aired on Wednesday 8/31, I think. I will have to set the VCR up to tape it I will be working at that time. I'll just record the whole show. I guess the fact that he is going to be let out soon makes it irrelevent whether he is guilty or innocent, but I always believed he was innocent. Thay never actually found the knife that the prosecutors claimed he used. And he was coopertive with the police from the start.

Did his prosecutor wrinkle anyone's brows with disgust in a manner similar to Stuart Heaton's prosecutor, who many of you have scorned? Why did you not like him anyway, even if you think Heaton was guilty?

Who's Stuart Heaton?

Who's Stuart Heaton?


Another indivudual who had a final appeal case profiled on UM. He was a carpenter in Illinois who was convicted of mudering a 16 year old girl in the summer of 1991. The prosection claimed the cuts on his hands were consistant with the wounds one would get on themselves if they were to inflict the kind of stab wounds on a person that the victum had. He cliams all carpenters have cuts like that as it is part of the trade.

Regardless, many here have expressed a real big disgust for the prosecutor in that case. I can't help but wonder if the prosecutor who put Larry Race behind bars is much different.

Was he ever released?

Not as far as I am aware.

Was he ever released?

No. Stuart Heaton's last request for a new trial was denied in 2003.

Did his prosecutor wrinkle anyone's brows with disgust in a manner similar to Stuart Heaton's prosecutor, who many of you have scorned? Why did you not like him anyway, even if you think Heaton was guilty?

If anything, I would say that the prosecutor struck me as arrogant. I remember him saying that he considered the case to be "not appropriate" for UM. He seemed too confident about his belief in Larry's guilt.

Yes, he was released in May, and got married in June.

I was referring to Stuart Heaton.

Interesting update. This case aired yesterday, and I just did a board search for Larry Race and I found this thread. What do you guys think? Was he guilty or innocent? It's hard to tell just after watching an Unsolved Mysteries segment, since we don't here all the facts regarding the case. But I think it is sad that they brought up his infidelity in prosecuting him. Stuff like that tends to play on the emotions of jury members and could have been a huge factor in convicting him of murder, when it really has little relevance when you're talking about a murder.

I don't know, I'd like to think they set an innoncent man free. What do you all think?

I thought he was innocent. I'm glad he was free. Either way he served his time.

My opinion is the same as the opinions that have already been expressed: I believe Larry Race was guilty of infidelity, but not murder. Frankly, I'm appalled at the methods the prosecution used to get a conviction against Larry Race. While I understand that they raised the infidelity issue in order to impeach the character of Larry Race, I don't understand why the defense didn't raise an objection on the grounds of relevance.

But in any case, I'm glad he has been set free. I still can't believe he was convicted to begin with.

Out in April - married in June??? And just where did he meet his new bride? Or was she one of his MANY conquests while he was married? My info is not from hearsay - but from actual knowledge. I once lived in the town where he lived his two-faced life. Appeared to be a good church going respectable man - but at work was another story. The men at the mines saw another side of him. He was not a respected co-worker by any means. Did he kill his wife - no one knows but he and God. I'm guessing he did...just from what my husband used to come home and share with me after a day of working with Larry at the mines. I later met one of his "conquests". What some women do for attention. Yuck! I can only pray for his new wife and advise her to not go for any boat rides. Just remember - there are always two sides to every story. Hum...

Out in April - married in June??? And just where did he meet his new bride? Or was she one of his MANY conquests while he was married? My info is not from hearsay - but from actual knowledge. I once lived in the town where he lived his two-faced life. Appeared to be a good church going respectable man - but at work was another story. The men at the mines saw another side of him. He was not a respected co-worker by any means. Did he kill his wife - no one knows but he and God. I'm guessing he did...just from what my husband used to come home and share with me after a day of working with Larry at the mines. I later met one of his "conquests". What some women do for attention. Yuck! I can only pray for his new wife and advise her to not go for any boat rides. Just remember - there are always two sides to every story. Hum...

You didn't give us nearly enough of your side of the story. What did your husband share with you? You stick that in the same sentence as an opener that you think Larry Race killed his wife. Did what your husband say have anything do do with the death/murder, or the affairs?

Was there anything in the local press, or local speculation, regarding the boat ride, something that UM didn't mention? Local knowledge is always appreciated here. All we have to work with is one 10-15 minute segment.

I don't think anyone here is denying Larry Race as a cheating scumbag. And many people get married while in jail. It's hardly a stretch he met someone thru correspondence while in prison, then they got married two months after his release.

Yes a lot of women write to guys in prison and marry them either while they are still in prison or shortly after their release. That is nothing new, happens all of the time. Yeah, I am not denying and no one is denying Larry Race cheated on his wife pretty much everytime he got but that doesnt make him capable of murder. Larry Race had cheated on his wife before and never murdered her over it so why would this be different? It just seemed like the prosecution's case was very circumstancial and it didnt seem they had enough to convict Race beyond a reasonable doubt. So what do they do? They destroy his character completely and it was enough for the jury to buy it apperantly. Race I think was denied parole the first few times he was eligible. Race was sentenced to life but I think at that time if you were sentenced to life that you were eligible for parole after 18 years for a life sentence for first degree murder and I believe you were eligible for parole after 12 years for 2nd degree murder. Race was released in 2004. I am glad he was released and I hope he is doing something with his life. He still lives in Minnesota, in Hennepin County according to the Minnesota Department of Corrections.

However in Minnesota at the time if you pled guilty to those type of crimes they were easier on you. There was a guy who pled guilty to first degree murder back in 93, he had shot and killed a Minneapolis police officer in September of 92. Because he spared the taxpayers a trial they gave him a good plea bargain where he didnt get sentenced to life but he got sentenced to 30 years in prison. However he was released after serving just 6 years of the 30 year sentence. After that I think they passed a law where you had to do a mandatory amount of time for a first degree murder sentence before you could be released. I think now you have to do a mandatory 30 year sentence for first degree murder.

Well I do know that Scott Peterson has received several marriage proposals before he was found guilty. Not sure about afterwards though.

Regarding Race, I started a thread a little while back that was titled "Cases you're split 50/50 on", and this was my initial post. The prosecuter they interviewed was arrogant, saying that "this case was inappropriate for Unsolved Mysteries." While I'm split 50/50 on the case, I think there is a chance Race is innocent so I think the prosecutors statement is outlandish.

Regarding the infedility, Race himself admitted in the segment that he was guilty for it. Like others have said, he's guilty for that. But murder, I don't know.

Well I do know that Scott Peterson has received several marriage proposals before he was found guilty. Not sure about afterwards though.


Crap! How did you guys find out about my marriage proposals to Scott Peterson?! ;)

I had no idea that he had been getting those, Wiseguy182. Thanks for giving me more reason to question the human race. :) (Although... now that I think about it, Richard Ramierez, Erik Menendez, and Albert Fletcher all got married while in jail,)

Dont forget Lyle Menendez he was married while in prison too. Erik Menendez's wife is from Minnesota but moved out to California after her 1st husband died unexpectedly. She actually had begun writing to Erik before her husband died. Supposedly he knew that his wife was writing to Erik but thought she was just being pen pals with him. She said her husband didnt care and even used to joke about it. Maybe. But I am sure he didnt think his wife would after he died marry a guy who helped his brother kill his parents because they were too strict and sometimes abusive. Although I do believe Erik was always the most remorseful out of the two. He had at least tried to act remorseful while Lyle supposedly showed no remorse at all, but of course Lyle got the worst of the abuse out of the two. Their father was a jerk and you will pretty much hear that from all sides but he didnt deserve to be murdered. Richard Ramirez is still married but I heard his marriage is basically non existant. They were interviewing a prison guard at San Queintin and the guard said that Ramirez's wife hadnt been to the prison in a couple years. He said that Ramirez's wife would come to the prison every week when they were first married and then she started to get mad at him because Richard would still write back and forth to other women and she was also mad at him over an incident where he attempted to expose himself in the visiting area. When they got married in 96 his wife was supposedly a 44 year old strict roman Catholic that was a virgin. Not a bad looking woman but why marry Richard Ramirez? She just seemed like she was looney she said "I have always wanted to be Mrs. Richard Ramirez since I first saw him in 85 on TV." She said she lost her family and most of her friends over it. Nice. Tex Watson of the Matson Family got married in prison and had 4 kids through conjucal visits. Conjucal visits in California were banned in the late 1980's for life sentence in mates because of him.

Woww... lots of interesting tidbits there. Thanks. :)

I just watched this (thanks to Crystaldawn :)) and I dunno... after first watch in many many years I lean towards him being guilty. What about the knife marks found on the bottom of the raft? And they can't find the knife used..it's most likely lying on the bottom of the lake..if he did it :D

Found something interesting and serendipitiously while surfing the net. If you go to www.wikipedia.org and check out the page for Scott Peterson, it mentions the following:

"Like some other high-profile criminals judged physically attractive by society's standards, Peterson receives large amounts of fan mail and wedding proposals in prison."

I find this absolutely disgusting. I wonder if Scott's admirers would still admire him if he was deemed unattractive. Probably not. It's so unfair that the actions of, shall we say, plain looking people get scrunitized to the tiniest details while people like Scott Peterson can do whatever they want and (apparently) alot of people (I assume mostly women in this case) don't care.

well that's life.

Scott Peterson maybe getting fan mail from low life idiots, but he's still in jail and if any of the population ever get their hands on him, he'll be a play toy.

I wouldn't trade places with him, would you?

No

Scott Peterson maybe getting fan mail from low life idiots, but he's still in jail and if any of the population ever get their hands on him, he'll be a play toy.

Idiots indeed. Maybe they need another death row icon now that Tookie Williams is dead. :crazy:

I wouldn't trade places with him, would you?

I wouldn't trade places with him for any reason. And I would certainly never trade places with any of his admirers, either.

Well I looked it up and Stuart Heaton is still in prison serving a life sentence at the Menard Correctional Facility in Illinois. I have never seen this segment but is this guy innocent? What were the details of this case. A carpenter having cuts on his hands would not be unusual. The problem with prosecutors is they are out of control. A famous prosecutor once said that prosecutors dont deal in guilt or innocence they deal in convictions. He claimed that prosecutors really dont care about if someone is guilty or innocent but that they will do whatever they can to get a conviction so they can drive up their conviction rate so they can look good to the public and so they can seek higher office. Prosecutors can be very arrogant and when they do find out they are wrong and in some cases they e ven know a person didnt do it but fight to convict them anyway they often will try to block the person who was wrongly convicted from ever being released because it would make them look bad. Some states are worse than others when it comes to this. Florida and Illinois are two of the worst ones. Florida has actually released more innocent people from its death row than any other state. I want to say at least 20 people have been released from their death row that have been found to be innocent. Illinois released 13 from their death row and many more inmates from their general prison population. I believe Illinois and Florida have released about 100 or so inmates from prisons because they were innocent.

Well from watching the UM segment about Stuart Haeton, I got the feeling he is innocent. He just has this innocent demeanor about him. However I think it was reported here DNA evidence has now linked him to the crime?

Well I looked it up and Stuart Heaton is still in prison serving a life sentence at the Menard Correctional Facility in Illinois. I have never seen this segment but is this guy innocent? What were the details of this case. A carpenter having cuts on his hands would not be unusual. The problem with prosecutors is they are out of control. A famous prosecutor once said that prosecutors dont deal in guilt or innocence they deal in convictions. He claimed that prosecutors really dont care about if someone is guilty or innocent but that they will do whatever they can to get a conviction so they can drive up their conviction rate so they can look good to the public and so they can seek higher office. Prosecutors can be very arrogant and when they do find out they are wrong and in some cases they e ven know a person didnt do it but fight to convict them anyway they often will try to block the person who was wrongly convicted from ever being released because it would make them look bad. Some states are worse than others when it comes to this. Florida and Illinois are two of the worst ones. Florida has actually released more innocent people from its death row than any other state. I want to say at least 20 people have been released from their death row that have been found to be innocent. Illinois released 13 from their death row and many more inmates from their general prison population. I believe Illinois and Florida have released about 100 or so inmates from prisons because they were innocent.

Stuart Heaton has kind of gotten a bad rap on this board and maybe deservedly so...I dunno, I tend to lean more towards his guilt than his innocence but maybe thats because he doesn't come off as sympathetic as say Michael Scott Martin does in his appeal.

Heaton seems too cocky or too self righteous at times for his own good.

Who is this Michael Scott Martin? Where is he serving his time at? What was his case about?

Who is this Michael Scott Martin? Where is he serving his time at? What was his case about?

He was convicted of a gas station robbery in Texas in 1979 and was serving life with parole in 20 years. Someone posted here not so long ago claiming that they were a relation of Martin's and that he is out if I remember. The getaway car which was stolen was parked near Martin's old residence, the attendant "Doyle" picked Martin out of a photo and his probation officer (from a previous offense) also spotted him speeding away. His defense was that 5 people near his home town 70 miles away spotted him at and around the time of the robbery.

That is interesting.

Back in 1998 I was working for the MN Ombudsman for Corrections and Larry Race was one of my clients. I had many opportunities to talk and get to know Larry and, based on my work with other inmates, I tend to believe his story and there is not many of the inmates that I worked with that I would make such a statement. Most of you don't know but Larry could have been released four years before his actual release date. I attended his "lifer" hearing and all he would have had to do to be released back then was to admit to his crime. He said that he could not admit to a crime that he didn't commit and he spent another four years in prison for it. During the time of his incarceration, Larry receive several college degrees and eventually receive a Doctor of Divinity in preparation to become an ordained minister.

He did this and he missed all the important things that happened in his children lives such graduations, weddings and other passages of time that we take for granted. Worst of all for his children, they not only lose their mother but were robbed of their father presence when these important events happened in their lives.

Never during that time did I ever hear him complain about his lot in life and what he has been dealt. He was always up beat and inspiring in his dealings with others.

So, don't think the worst of Larry Race.

Thanks for posting sundance. Always interesting to hear from someone who knows a person profiled on UM. Personally I never thought Larry Race killed his wife and am glad he's out of prison and has been able to start over somewhat.

I had leaned slightly towards Larry Race being innocent, but after reading that he spent an additional four years in prison by refusing to admit to the crime, I am now strongly leaning towards that he is innocent. He did seem pretty sincere in his UM interview, and I do give him a little credit for fessing up to being an unfaithful husband.

Yes I agree, I thought Race was innocent but after hearing he spent an additional 4 years in prison because he would not admit the crime is incredible. In Minnesota we have a unique system where we operate by sentencing guidelines. Lifers I am assuming have different guidelines for their parole but I believe if a prisoner has a clean record and admits to their crimes they will be released after serving the minimum amount of time. Usually it seems a person gets paroled after the first hearing or for sure after their 2nd hearing. At the time Race was sentenced people in Minnesota sentenced to life became eligible for parole after serving 18 years of a life sentence. We still have some prisoners that have been in prison since the 1970's but I am assuming those are ones that commited multiple murders or ones that havent cleaned up their acts. I am glad Larry got released after serving 22 years of a life sentence and I am glad he got to resume his life.

The Jenny Lee (which was the name of their boat) definitely did appear to have problems. It nearly sank the year before, and the person that they had check it said that it would have intermittent starting problems.

You know what is something that really cinched it for me? Debbie's parents sticking up for Larry. It's one thing to see the kids doing it, or the parents, but the parent's of the woman he is accused of killing? That is rare, but telling. Imagine your son in-law mistreating your daughter the way Larry did with the affairs. That would tick you off, it might give you a smeared image of the man. Butthey obviously forgave him and have stood by him. They have more reason than anyone to think he was guilty yet they did not. I always liked that

You know what is something that really cinched it for me? Debbie's parents sticking up for Larry. It's one thing to see the kids doing it, or the parents, but the parent's of the woman he is accused of killing? That is rare, but telling. Imagine your son in-law mistreating your daughter the way Larry did with the affairs. That would tick you off, it might give you a smeared image of the man. Butthey obviously forgave him and have stood by him. They have more reason than anyone to think he was guilty yet they did not. I always liked that