The Circleville Writer: Less Bizarre Than it Appears

[bell83]

Originally Posted by TheCars1986

He also said that the story about Ron Gillespie going out to confront the letter writer may have been embellished by the family to make his death seem more heroic. He also said that the police were never able to determine whether or not Ron fired his weapon on the night of his death, or if it had been fired in the days (or weeks) prior to the crash.

So that tracks with what I said, above. Honestly, at this point, I'm not convinced a shot was ever fired that night.

[JannTosh]

Wait, apparently the 48 Hours episode concluded that Freshour was the writer?

[TheCars1986]

Originally Posted by JannTosh

Wait, apparently the 48 Hours episode concluded that Freshour was the writer?

It had a handwriting expert who said she was 100% convinced that Freshour wrote all of the letters she examined, and that she would swear over a bible in a court of law about it, as well as a podcast host who said she believed based off of everything she had seen that Freshour was the Circleville Writer. Keep in mind that the handwriting exemplars that the expert was looking at could have been from the police files (in which Freshour was instructed to write as close to the original letters as possible, which was confirmed at his trial), and that the podcast host repeatedly referred to Freshour as "Freshowser" throughout her podcast series. She also seemed to scoff at the notion that Paul's ex wife would have wanted to go through such lengths to set up him after a nasty and bitter divorce and made no mention of David Longberry in her series (in fairness, I have made it through 5 episodes thus far, and the website only has transcripts for 7 out of the 8 episodes, and I did a CTRL+F search for "Longberry" in the transcripts and found nothing, so it is possible that he is brought up in episode 8), nor did 48 Hours make any mention of him at all.

Paul Freshour had no criminal history prior to his conviction or after his conviction. He had no connection to Gordon Massie, or the school system for which Mary Gillespie worked. He was also the uncle to Ron and Mary Gillespie's children, of whom one of the daughters was repeatedly the target of the harassing signs that were left around town (one of which said that the daughter would frequently perform oral sex on Gordon Massie). It seems inconceivable to me that Paul Freshour would go through such lengths to not only care about an affair his sister-in-law was carrying on, but be that much in depth with the details about it. The letters even referred to the bus number that Mary drove.

Meanwhile, David Longberry was a bus driver who worked for the same school as Mary Gillespie, and he did have a criminal history, including rape of an 11 year old, of which he eluded capture before committing suicide. Kenneth Reid, a fellow school bus driver and good friend to Longberry, was one of the witnesses who testified against Freshour at his trial and said that he saw a sign with the word "Gillespie" on it at the intersection where Mary Gillespie ultimately found the booby trap between the hours of 11:30 a.m. and 12:00 p.m. that day. Longberry would have known about the comings and goings within the school system, as well as the affair between Mary and Gordon Massie. As for Kenneth Reid, I do not think there was some grand conspiracy to frame Paul Freshour, mainly because I believe that David Longberry wrote the letters and that Freshour's ex-wife Karen was the one who set up the booby trap to frame Paul Freshour, but I do believe that he could have lied in an effort to deflect attention away from Longberry (who could have had an alibi during the time in question) to protect him from suspicion.

Either Paul Freshour is guilty, and could hide his psychotic nature from everyone for the entirety of his life, who also just so happened to luck into having the man initially suspected by the Gillespie's of writing the letters (Longberry) turn into a sick POS of whom he could then blame as the convenient scapegoat, or, Freshour was in fact innocent of what he was convicted of, and a pre-social media "cancel culture" crusade by a 1977 incel turned into the perfect frame up in a bitter divorce happened. I'm willing to bet on the latter.

[TheCars1986]

Marie Mayhew's podcast, Whatever Remains Podcast, can be accessed here. She was featured in the 48 Hours show about the case. On Episode 7, titled "Stolen Treasure", Marie goes over the relationship issues and divorce proceedings between Karen and Paul Freshour. Here are some key excerpts (some of which I had never known before):

-Multiple signs accusing Karen of being a lesbian with a fellow coworker began to pop up at her place of employment in the parking lot in early 1983.

-Karen had told a coworker (the head of security at her job) that her car had been shot at and that Paul had called this coworker to arrange for a meeting between the coworker and a private investigator that Paul had hired. Apparently, Paul hired the PI to find the person who shot Karen's car. Law enforcement were never able to substantiate the claim that her car was shot.

-Karen's coworker told the police that she told him about finding several letters around the home she was sharing with Paul at the time.

-When Karen was interviewed by police she told them about their relationship problems, abuse, and eventual divorce proceedings:

Karen then recounts that for the first few years that they were married, Paul had beaten her up a few times. But then she stood up to him, filing for divorce, only later to decide to drop it. For a long period of time, about 17 years, there were few problems. Then, in the early 80s they began to argue. He accused her of running around with someone else. She told him that she thought he was sick, refusing to get into a car with him.

The City Police Department was called, and an investigation was made at the time. The police got her out of the house, and she spoke with a night prosecutor at the city prosecutor's office, but nothing further was done. Karen went on. She said that they had been separated for about seven months, she had left him about a week before the Fourth of July of 1982. Karen said that Paul had beaten her up in October, broke a soda bottle and held it to her face, threatening to cut her up so bad that her own mother wouldn't recognize her. This description matches the divorce proceedings.

From the report of the referral officer, the Court of Common Pleas of Franklin County, "Upon consideration of matters before the court, the court referral officer makes the following finding of fact. Both parties were present with council on November 22, 1982. The parties have two children and the defendant alleges physical beating by her husband on October 5th, 1982 and showed pictures of a blackened eye with four stitches. The plaintiff has gone to counseling since the incident. The plaintiff went to counseling because he feels bad about what he did. The defendant claims the plaintiff has a violent temper and she left because of being struck."

-Karen also relayed to law enforcement about Paul's hatred for Mary Gillespie:

Karen said Paul had thought a great deal of Ron and Mary Gillispie before Ron died. But after his death, Paul grew to hate Mary. Hated her over the Massie deal, and used to discuss it quite a bit. Saying things like, "Why don't they just go out of state?" Or calling her, "A goddamn slut who slept with Massie." But Karen Sue believed that before Ron died, Mary had nothing to do with Massie whatsoever. Mary told Karen that Mr. Massie impressed her, and she had told her husband that there was nothing going on between them. In fact, both Ron and Karen told Paul this, that there was nothing going on. There was no affair. If Karen and Ron, Mary's husband, believed this to be the truth, that there wasn't an affair, then why couldn't Paul Freshour? What could of possibly mattered to him so much that he would not only take the word of his ex-wife, but of Ron Gillispie, someone that Paul had admired and viewed as a close friend?

When they started to talk about the anonymous letters, Karen told Detective Brown that about two summers ago while house cleaning, she had found a letter hidden between the mattress and the box spring of their bed. The letter was addressed to Anheuser-Busch in St. Louis, Missouri and the writing had the same look as some of the other ones that had been sent to Mary. When she asked Paul about this, he told her that he had written the letter as a work reference for someone. When she checked the next day, the letter was gone. She had also found a letter in the toilet. Her son had gotten it out with a coat hanger after the toilet had stopped up. She told Detective Brown that it had been addressed to some church in a nearby town but didn't have a stamp on it. Karen had tried to piece it together when Paul was not at home.

She said she could make out the name Gillispie on the letter. She often found envelopes like this left in odd places in the Freshour home, where she could make out the name Gillispie written on the letter inside. Karen went on to say the night prior to his fatal accident, Ron Gillispie called Mary before she and Karen Sue had left for their trip for Florida. And told his wife he thought he had the matter "figured out". Karen said a short time after Ron had died she had found four letters in white envelopes in the trunk of her husband's car. They had not been mailed and Paul had told her that Ron wanted him to mail them, but strangely enough even though they had stamps on them, they had not been mailed. Karen ended the interview with Detective Brown by talking about what she told Mary Gillispie. She said that, yes, she did believe that Paul was behind the letters and she did tell Mary Gillispie that.

-Marie Mayhew brings up a solid point, in that the Freshour's divorce proceedings began in October of 1982. It wasn't until May if 1983 that the divorce was granted in favor of Paul Freshour because "defense offered no testimony". Paul Freshour was charged with attempted murder in February of 1983. If Karen indeed was the person setting him up, why did she not bother to mention any of this during their divorce proceedings? She brought up physical abuse, but absolutely nothing about the Circleville letters or the attempted murder charge.

Maybe the reason Karen Sue Freshour didn't defend herself was because she made a decision that it was more important to try and defend her children. She recognized that there would be no winning, no gaining emotionally or financially from bringing the letters into their divorce. Karen Sue did not want for her children to hate their father. She saw what was coming, the stories in the newspaper, the attention, the gossip. And she didn't wanna put her children in front of that. Even if on the witness stand one of her daughters said something against her. Even if not hating him meant her daughter would end up hating her instead. What Karen Sue told others like Trainor and Detective Brown shows a more measured restraint in describing her ex-husband than what we've been led to believe. She says that he was abusive, and she believes that he is the letter writer, but she does not seem to take the opportunity to put the proverbial nail in his coffin. She could have. She could have gone to the press, called him a monster or told the judge presiding over her divorce proceedings that he was crazy and that he was dangerous. But she didn't.

-The episode goes over several letters that Paul had written, to the judge in his divorce proceeding, to his attorney, and a local newspaper. In every one, he essentially buries his ex-wife's reputation, and discusses several suicide attempts in years prior.

-Here is how Marie Mayhew ends the episode:

For our story to resolve, the hero must be vindicated. And the villain defeated, relegated to only being remembered as such. But what happens to the story of the Circleville letter writer if our villain isn't as bad as we want her to be? What if she is just another person going through life? If Karen Sue Freshour is not as bad as we thought, then what does that say about our hero? The man wrongfully accused, telling us this story. Author William Congreve famously once wrote, "Hell hath no rage like love to hatred turned, nor hell a fury like a woman's scorn." Which if you believe Paul Freshour and his story of Circleville, does neatly sum up the character of Karen Sue.

I would ask you to instead consider a different quote by the same author. While it is not as well known or popular, it may closely more resemble the truth, "He that first cries out stop thief, is often he that has stolen the treasure."

Marie Mayhew had brought up several points I had never considered before. However, she also ignored the multiple people in and around Circleville, who knew Karen, who had described her as vindictive. She also seems to rely too heavily on giving the benefit of the doubt to Karen, and that her actions were done solely with the interest of protecting her children. She does not consider the possibility that the reason why Karen brought nothing up at the divorce proceedings involving the attempted murder charge was because she very well may have been involved with setting him up. The divorce was finalized in May of 1983, but Paul's trial did not start until October of 1983. And despite the contentious divorce, and the fact that Paul made some comments about Karen in various letters that were unfavorable about her, none of it matches the vitriol found in the letters written by the Circleville Writer to Mary Gillespie.

I recommend listening to the podcast to get a different perspective, because virtually everything about this case has been from a pro-Freshour slant.

[JannTosh]

Originally Posted by TheCars1986

Marie Mayhew's podcast, Whatever Remains Podcast, can be accessed here. She was featured in the 48 Hours show about the case. On Episode 7, titled "Stolen Treasure", Marie goes over the relationship issues and divorce proceedings between Karen and Paul Freshour. Here are some key excerpts (some of which I had never known before):

-Multiple signs accusing Karen of being a lesbian with a fellow coworker began to pop up at her place of employment in the parking lot in early 1983.

-Karen had told a coworker (the head of security at her job) that her car had been shot at and that Paul had called this coworker to arrange for a meeting between the coworker and a private investigator that Paul had hired. Apparently, Paul hired the PI to find the person who shot Karen's car. Law enforcement were never able to substantiate the claim that her car was shot.

-Karen's coworker told the police that she told him about finding several letters around the home she was sharing with Paul at the time.

-When Karen was interviewed by police she told them about their relationship problems, abuse, and eventual divorce proceedings:



-Karen also relayed to law enforcement about Paul's hatred for Mary Gillespie:



-Marie Mayhew brings up a solid point, in that the Freshour's divorce proceedings began in October of 1982. It wasn't until May if 1983 that the divorce was granted in favor of Paul Freshour because "defense offered no testimony". Paul Freshour was charged with attempted murder in February of 1983. If Karen indeed was the person setting him up, why did she not bother to mention any of this during their divorce proceedings? She brought up physical abuse, but absolutely nothing about the Circleville letters or the attempted murder charge.



-The episode goes over several letters that Paul had written, to the judge in his divorce proceeding, to his attorney, and a local newspaper. In every one, he essentially buries his ex-wife's reputation, and discusses several suicide attempts in years prior.

-Here is how Marie Mayhew ends the episode:



Marie Mayhew had brought up several points I had never considered before. However, she also ignored the multiple people in and around Circleville, who knew Karen, who had described her as vindictive. She also seems to rely too heavily on giving the benefit of the doubt to Karen, and that her actions were done solely with the interest of protecting her children. She does not consider the possibility that the reason why Karen brought nothing up at the divorce proceedings involving the attempted murder charge was because she very well may have been involved with setting him up. The divorce was finalized in May of 1983, but Paul's trial did not start until October of 1983. And despite the contentious divorce, and the fact that Paul made some comments about Karen in various letters that were unfavorable about her, none of it matches the vitriol found in the letters written by the Circleville Writer to Mary Gillespie.

I recommend listening to the podcast to get a different perspective, because virtually everything about this case has been from a pro-Freshour slant. I am definitely coming around to the idea that Paul Freshour wasn't some "golly gee why did this all happen to me" offer you the shirt off of his back nice guy, and that the guy had a lot of demons. In fact, this post by someone claiming to be Freshour's grandson confirms a lot of the things mentioned on the podcast. The bit about signs being found at Karen's place of work in early 1983 is very damning, IMO. The signs targeting Mary Gillespie and her daughter also started up in early 1983. It's interesting that the UM segment mentions the letters stopping after the Freshour's and the Gillespie's wrote the letter to the person they suspected of sending the original letters (who I believe to be David Longberry) and that the letters stopped. It was only after Ron's death that the letters started up again. It seems entirely possible that David Longberry stopped writing letters after he was confronted, and then angry over Ron's death and the Sheriff ruling it an accident, as well as Mary Gillespie starting a relationship with the man she was accused of cheating on Ron with, Paul Freshour was the one who took up the moniker and started sending various letters critical of Mary Gillespie and the Sheriff. Just read his 164 page report he sent to the FBI years after he was paroled. Guess who he is highly critical of throughout? Mary Gillespie and Sheriff Radcliffe.

[TheCars1986]

Look at how close in relation to the spot where Ron Gillespie crashed (Greenlawn Community Church on the map) to where the booby trap was found. It was definitely deliberately put there, IMO, not only because it was on Mary Gillespie's bus route, but also because of how close it was to where Ron Gillespie crashed.

[Hortense Hathaway]

Circleville is in Ohio, not far from where Dot Wacker lived.... just sayin’.

[schmave]

About 150 miles or so. But they could have vacationed outside Columbus ...

[TheCars1986]

Some other nuggets of information I've stumbled across:

-Freshour initially plead guilty by reason of insanity on August 8th, 1983. After the judge ordered Freshour to get a psychiatric examination and received the results, Freshour changed his plea back to not guilty.

-Mary Gillespie was mailed a Christmas card in December of 1982 saying that taunting signs would soon be placed along her bus route.

-Freshour was sold the gun found in the booby trap 4 months before Mary Gillespie discovered it.

-The jury deliberated for less than 3 hours before convicting him.

-In the defense attorney's closing argument at Freshour's trial, he did not deny that Freshour wrote the letters to Mary Gillespie, just that she was never threatened in any of the letters.

-Only 39 of the letters were introduced as evidence at Freshour's trial. The judge said that if Freshour took the stand, the thousands of other letters would be allowed to be admitted into evidence. Freshour never testified at his own trial.

-On the known letters written by Freshour, he would often use a slanted ":" in place of a period for punctuation. This is the exact same thing the letter writer did.

[JannTosh]

Wait so Freshour was the writer after all?

[TheCars1986]

Originally Posted by JannTosh

Wait so Freshour was the writer after all?

I'm starting to think he was.

[LooksLikeCRicci]

Originally Posted by TheCars1986

I'm starting to think he was.

Which.... that in itself has just knocked me on my butt, as you were one of the biggest supporters of Freshour's innocence! (No judgment here, just a comment! I'm not questioning you bc you've done so much more research on this case than I have!)

[Killarney Rose]

Originally Posted by TheCars1986

I'm starting to think he was.

You’ve got me on the fence. I’ve always believed he was innocent.

[TheCars1986]

Originally Posted by Killarney Rose

You’ve got me on the fence. I’ve always believed he was innocent.

The kicker for me was the signs being placed at Karen Freshour's job accusing her of being a lesbian with a fellow coworker. And then less than a month later, Mary Gillespie started to see signs about sex acts her daughter was doing with Gordon Massie all along her bus route. There is only one person who would have the motive to place the signs targeting Karen and that's Paul Freshour. The odds that the signs placed along Mary Gillespie's bus route being a mere coincidence would be astronomical.

[TheCars1986]

Originally Posted by LooksLikeCRicci

Which.... that in itself has just knocked me on my butt, as you were one of the biggest supporters of Freshour's innocence! (No judgment here, just a comment! I'm not questioning you bc you've done so much more research on this case than I have!)

I used to believe that Karen framed Paul, until I learned that during the divorce proceedings, she never once brought up the attempted murder of Mary Gillespie, the signs at her work, or the hundreds of Circleville letters that were written. If she was trying to make him the fall guy, I'm 100% convinced all of this would have been brought up at what was described to me by Martin Yant as a "very contentious divorce".