Grace Goode

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Grace Goode (born November 12, 1913) was a repeat killer.

Grace was one of five children raised in a motherless home in Tarrant. She attended Jefferson County High School as a member of the class of 1927. She was a member of the school's Amica Literary Society and was chosen to present a speech on "Franklin and the Constitution" to a panel of judges which included Hugo Black, George Bailes, and Wyatt Hale. After her junior year, her father moved to Oneonta to work on a farm and she continued to attend school there.

Grace married Joseph Kennedy on October 28, 1928 as a way to get out of the house, but separated from her husband in July 1929 and went by her maiden name. She took a job serving at a cafe in downtown Birmingham. She and a sister became regulars at a dance hall on 2nd Avenue North at 23rd Street. She resided then just four blocks away, at 601½ 23rd Street North.

It was there on Monday February 1, 1932 that, according to Grace's story, another teenage girl, Margaret Allen picked a fight with her by repeatedly stepping on her foot. Other witnesses say that Allen's younger sister, Katherine Maddox, accidentally stepped on Goode's foot, and that Goode responded by slapping her face, and that Goode had been asked to leave the premises. Later, according to witnesses, Goode and a male companion met Allen with her sister and another male outside and renewed their dispute. One of the males was knocked to the ground and Allen was stabbed in the abdomen with a pocket knife. She was taken to Hillman Hospital for treatment.

Goode was arrested by officers Propst and Ratliff later that same night, and charged with assault with attempt to murder. She was indicted on that charge on Friday February 5 and subsequently released on $300 bond. Though initially expected to recover, Allen, who had two young children, developed an abscess. She died on March 21. Goode was taken back into custody to face a murder charge. Judge H. B. Abernethy ordered her held without bond at the Jefferson County Jail. She began serving her time on Easter Sunday, March 27.

On April 12 another suspect, Wallace M. Meshad, who had been picked up on suspicion of passing a bad check at a hotel, was identified as Goode's companion on the night of the assault and was charged with Allen's murder. He was accused by homicide detective Conrad Austin of giving Goode the pocket knife used. He denied being present. Both were indicted by a grand jury empaneled in May, with trial set for the first week of October. During her detention she was visited weekly by a boyfriend from Coalburg. Her father brought her magazines, which she read through along with two Zane Grey novels. She exercised daily and enjoyed the music from the rooftop dances on the nearby Ridgely Apartments.

In late August she sent a request to Sheriff James Hawkins that she be allowed out under supervision to buy new clothes for her court appearance. Hawkins denied the request. A woman she befriended in the jail was released earlier and bought clothes for Goode, such that she managed to appear "prettily attired in a blue dress and modish black hat" for her arraignment on September 24. She pleaded not guilty.

The day before her trial began, Goode was interviewed by Birmingham News reporter Ralph Hurst, who described her as "probably the youngest white girl to face a first degree murder charge in the county," and "certainly...the most attractive." She told him that she expected to be acquitted and promised to waste no time getting out of town to her father's place in Oneonta.

Judge John McCoy presided over Goode's murder trial. The prosecution brought testimony from Allen's mother, Bessie Lindbaugh and sister, Katherine Maddox. The sister said that after the initial scuffle inside, Goode and Meshad were ushered out. Around a half hour or an hour later, she left with her sister and their companion, R. C. Harrison, but encountered them again outside. She said Meshad asked Harrison for a cigarette, and then struck him down. When Goode and Meshad ran down the street, Katherine began to follow and saw the knife in Goode's hand, but was called back by her sister, who was wounded. They revived Harrison and walked to the L & N Station where they hailed a taxicab for Hillman Hospital. Detective Ratliff testified that Goode admitted that she "cut her" at the time of her arrest.

Taking the stand in her defense, Goode was described as "Smart, in a new green ensemble, brown shoes and hose, and a chic brown hat and veil half hiding her newly-dressed blond hair." She denied stabbing Allen, and said that Meshad was not present. She acknowledged having an argument with Allen inside the dance hall, but said that after being asked to leave she went to a hotel on 24th Street to make a call to a friend in Fairfield. When he didn't answer she returned toward her home, but passed back by Allen and her companions on the street. Goode said that Harrison appeared intoxicated and called her "a vile name", and that the two sisters then came after her. She said they fought on the street for several minutes before Harrison pulled one of them off and broke up the fight. She said that she stopped by her house, and then visited Hillman Hospital to see another friend, not knowing that Allen had been injured or was there. She returned home and was awakened hours later by police.

Goode was represented at trial by Thomas McDowell and Tom Rowe who brought character witnesses to draw a picture of Goode as "a Sunday School and church-goer, perhaps a step from the conventional path long enough to taste the bitter sweets."

In his closing argument, assistant solicitor Jim McK. Long countered the image of Goode as an innocent young woman, saying "She has been up and down the line. She's as brazen and bold and cool as any moll that ever congregated at a public dance hall," and warned, "Unless jurors abandon and cleanse themselves of maudlin sympathy, it won't be safe for officers to traverse the streets, let alone arrest individuals." He closed by shouting "Birmingham—the homicide capital of the world. Human life—the cheapest commodity in Birmingham."

In their closing, McDowell and Rowe reminded jurors that the prosecution's case rested mostly on the testimony of the victim's sister, which they claimed was inconsistent. They characterized the prosecution as a "loose-jointed attack". For the second and closing day of trial, Goode was described as wearing "a chic blue hat with dark shoes, hose and suit," in contrast to the brighter colors she wore on the stand the first day, which the prosecution labeled "glad raiment."

After four hours of deliberation, the jury found Goode guilty of 1st degree manslaughter and recommended a sentence of 10 years in prison. Judge McCoy affirmed the sentence and remanded her to the custody of the state.

Two weeks later attorney Albert Boutwell, now representing Goode alongside McDowell, field a notice of appeal. Her sentence was suspended and she was released on November 7 on a $2,000 bond pending the outcome. On October 22 The Birmingham Post published her letter to the editor complaining of seeing her "name and character molested and degraded beyond belief." She made reference to the higher judgement of the Almighty as the source of her assured smile, and expressed that she would not suffer even if kept in prison, because she was sure of her innocence. In a second letter to the editor, published on November 9, she expressed a wish that the suffering of others emanating from the case could be borne by her alone. She said she was relieved that her mother had not lived to see her imprisoned and hoped that time would be merciful to her aging father.

Meshad's trial, meanwhile, was also delayed. Judge H. P. Heflin presided at that proceeding beginning on January 18, 1933. Though he had earlier told police he was at a different dance on the night of the incident, his defense brought a witness to testify that he was at his home in Avondale that night. Nevertheless, the jury found him guilty of 2nd degree manslaughter and he was fined $500 and sentenced to 1 year at hard labor on a county road crew.

Goode's application for appeal was dismissed in May, and Boutwell filed for a rehearing before the Alabama Court of Appeals. At the rehearing, Judge James Rice agreed to hear Goode's appeal in the fall. The appeal was then dismissed a second time by the Alabama Supreme Court, and Goode surrendered to Kilby Prison on January 30 to begin serving her original sentence. She was soon transferred to the Wetumpka State Prison. Her former boyfriend from Coalburg, whom Goode later described as her only true love, married another woman.

In February 1935 Goode's father, described as "a Tarrant foundryman," petitioned assistant solicitor Jim McK. Long to recommend that Grace be granted parole. He argued that Meshad, whom he believed to be just as guilty, had only served 1 year. Her parole was granted, but then revoked in July by order of Governor Bibb Graves. She was arrested again in Tarrant and returned to prison. She applied again for a parole in November, but was unsuccessful. In January 1936 Joseph Kennedy filed to formally divorce from Grace.

After winning parole on October 2, 1936, Grace married Roy Scott and was hired as a waitress by Nick Mailliway at the New Deal Cafe at 320 20th Street South. In June Mailliway swore out a warrant against her for grand larceny, accusing her of stealing $30 from the cafe. A month later, Grace was again taken into custody to answer for a letter she had sent to a friend in which she appeared to implicate her husband and two accomplices in a robbery and murder of a night watchman at the Howard Cleaning Co. plant at 907 3rd Avenue North, which detectives believe was accomplished by the same group that broke into the Fairfield Bakery on June 30. In a lengthy confession Roy Scott insisted that his wife had not been involved in the crime. Detectives questioned her further, but she was released from the Fairfield City Jail without being charged.

In January 1939 Goode was living at 1313 19th Street North. Neighbors reported a disturbance and she was arrested and charged with disorderly conduct aggravated by drunkenness. She was represented by Roderick Beddow at a bench trial and was fined $5 by Judge Henry Martin. A review of her police file then showed several other arrests for vagrancy and disorderly conduct. She was brought back before Martin two weeks later on another disorderly conduct charge after a waitress at a downtown restaurant accused her of throwing glasses at her. She was given a 30-day jail sentence and she and her companion, Ross E. Hicks, were each fined $25. Birmingham Police Chief T. A. Riley notified Governor Frank Dixon of her growing list of violations, and he revoked her parole again on February 20.

By July of that year, Grace had married Walter Owen Wright and moved with him to Chicago, in violation of the terms of her parole. She waived an extradition hearing and submitted to being returned to Alabama to serve out her sentence at Wetumpka Prison. While there she founded a magazine entitled The Walled Off Editorial, featuring her own poems, stories, jokes and illustrations. She mailed a complimentary copy to officers Propst and Ratliff who had first arrested her in eight years earlier. In 1941 her husband, Roy Scott, who was serving a 15-year sentence for the night watchman's murder at Speigner Prison, escaped from a construction detail near the Wetumpka prison where Grace was held.


During her third parole, she was involved in a fight defending her second husband, and stabbed his assailant. They later divorced.

In 1947 Grace asked Wright for a divorce, but he refused. She claimed that he had beaten her, and threatened to continue. They fought in a booth at Nick's Barbecue Stand on the evening of October 4. According to her version of events, he pulled a gun which went off when she grabbed for it. He died from his injuries. Grace Goode Wright was convicted of 1st degree manslaughter and sentenced by Judge Alta King to 5 years in prison.

Columnist Allen Rankin credited Grace with helping protect other inmates from mistreatment by guards, and tending to their pains when they were beaten.

In 1952 Goode was paroled to receive treatment at the Jefferson County Tuberculosis Sanitorium.

References

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