PHOTOS: Arizona's 17 notorious female murderers
DOB: 1978
Date of Murder: 12/25/2013
Victim: 13-year-old daughter
Murder weapon: Strangled
"I was just stabbed by my ex-wife. I'm heading to the hospital," said Adam Villa Connie's ex-husband. Later that Christmas Day Connie was found to have suffocated her oldest daughter when the girl wouldn't take prescription narcotic drugs. The other children, ages 3, 5 and 8, were treated at a hospital and released. Police say they had trace amounts of opiates in their systems. She's been sentenced to life in prison.
DOB: 7/24/1956
Date of Murder: 11/24/2009
Victim: Husband
Murder weapon: Gun
Tobyne was arrested after shooting her husband, then dismembering him and dropping his remains in three Arizona counties. She then used and Dwight Tobyne's cell phone and e-mail to make it appear he was still alive. After family members reported him missing, Shari said he had gone to Mexico, but police located his abandoned vehicle in Phoenix. Shari later told police that she was trying to commit suicide when Dwight was shot trying to stop her. She later pleaded guilty to the murder.
DOB: 11/25/1975
Date of Murder: 8/5/2009
Victim: Stranger
Murder weapon: Tire Iron, knife
Simpson lured Terry Neely, a disabled man, to her apartment promising drugs and sex. She then tortured and murdered him by pulling Neely's teeth out, driving a nail into his head, bashing him with a tire iron, stabbing him 50 times, and strangling him. Then she chopped up his body and threw the pieces in a trash can, which she lit on fire. Heely's charred remains were found in a dumpster after the fire department responded to a trash fire. Simpson believed Neely was a "snitch."
DOB: 6/16/1967
Date of Murder: 8/5/2007
Victim: Husband
Murder weapon: Handgun
Jessica Riggins was convicted of shooting her husband in the back, killing him, in their Flagstaff home. After the murder, she went to California where she gave family members a credit card with about $30,000 on it, to care for her children. She was arrested entering the U.S. from Mexico, after spending several days there. She maintained that she was assaulted the night of the murder. Riggins and her husband were in divorce proceedings at the time of the murder.
DOB: 1958
Date of Murder: 11/1/1996
Victim: Ex-husband
Murder weapon: Pipe Bomb
Pamela Phillips was sentenced to life in prison without parole after hiring a hit man to kill her ex-husband. Gary Triano was killed when a car bomb exploded as he was leaving a Tucson area County Club. Phillips paid $400,000 to an ex-boyfriend to carry out the hit. When Triano, a real estate developer, lost his money, Phillips divorced him and moved to Aspen. Prosecutors said she was planning to cash in on Triano's $2,000,000 insurance policy. Phillips still maintains her innocence.
DOB: 7/29/1952
Date of Murder: 1/23//2000
Victims: Husband
Murder weapon: Gun
Pape, a Scottsdale hairdresser, pleaded guilty in 2002 to second-degree murder in the death of her husband, 60-year-old Ira Pomerantz, whose headless and legless torso was found in a trash container behind a Mesa grocery store in January 2000.
Pape admitted to shooting Pomerantz during a fight but has said nothing about how he was dismembered or where the remains are.
She was released from prison in 2016 after serving her 16-year sentence and was deported to France.
DOB: 10/29/1961
Date of Murder: 9/8//2004
Victims: Husband
Murder weapon: Gun
In September 2004, Orbin reported her husband Jay as being missing. His torso was found in a 55-gallon plastic container in North Phoenix. The body was frozen after death and cut up with a saw. He was identified through DNA testing. The former Las Vegas showgirl was said to have had several affairs and wanted to keep them a secret until she could inherit her husband's money from his business as an art dealer.
DOB: 1968
Date of Murder: 3/22/2007
Victims: 5-year-old autistic son
Murder weapon: Hands, Cold Medicine
Diane Marsh was convicted of negligent homicide and child abuse for the death of her 5-year-old Autistic son. She admitted to giving her son 12 Tylenol PM tablets. She was also accused of scalding her son for punishment. The autopsy report concluded that the boy had a skull fracture and died of blunt force trauma. She was sentenced to 10-years in prison but was released in September of 2012.
DOB: 1/29/1905
Date of Murder: 10/16/1931
Victims: Friends
Murder weapon: Handgun
Judd shot and killed two friends because they were interested in the same man. She stuffed the victims in two trunks, a valise, and a hatbox, dismembering one of them. Judd boarded a train to L.A. with the trunks. After smelling the foul odor, the trunks were tagged to be searched. The bodies were found, but Judd had escaped. She surrendered five days later. Judd was convicted but found mentally incompetent. She was paroled and released in 1971 and died in 1998.
DOB: 1970
Date of Murder: 7/30/2012
Victim: Mother
Murder weapon: Knife
Carol Hatley was convicted and sentenced to 22 years in prison for murdering and dismembering her mother. On July 30, 2012, Officers arrived at the home as 73-year-old Deborah Hatley was being dismembered. Hatley claimed she was wrapping her mother in plastic to take her to the hospital. Police found several large garbage bags in the home.
DOB: 3/26/1989
Date of Murder: 9/5/2007
Victim: Roommate
Murder weapon: Knife
Harrison was selected to be part of a program at the University of Arizona for Native American students. Soon after being paired with Mia Henderson she was accused by Henderson of stealing her Social Security card and campus debit card. Harrison admitted to taking the items and cashing a $500 check from Henderson bank account. On September 5, Harrison stabbed Henderson several times in her sleep. She then penned a suicide note in Henderson's name.
DOB: 12/6/1967
Date of Murder: 5/30/2009
Victims: Father-Daughter
Murder weapon: Gun
Forde and two others dressed as law enforcement officers and forced their way into a home in Arivaca, Arizona about 10 miles north of the Mexican border. They shot a woman and fatally shot her husband and their 9-year-old daughter. Forde was the leader of the Minutemen American Defense border watch group. Their plan was to steal money and drugs from the home to fund their group. She was sentenced to death in 2011.
DOB: 1878
Date of Murder: 1/1927
Victim: Former employer
Murder weapon: Ax
Dugan worked as a housekeeper for Andrew Mathis, a chicken rancher in Pima County. After being fired, Mathis was missing and his money and car were stolen. Dugan was found and convicted for vehicle theft. Mathis body was later found and it was determined that Dugan had killed him with an ax. Known as 'Cheerful Eva' she paid for her own coffin by giving interviews and selling embroidered handkerchiefs.
Her hanging in 1930 resulted in her decapitation and led Arizona to switch to lethal gas.
DOB: 11/6/1977
Date of Murder: 1/14/2009
Victim: Husband
Murder weapon: Hammer
On January 14, 2009, Devault beat her husband Dale Harrell with a hammer while he slept. He died several weeks later. Devault initially claimed another man struck Harrell with the hammer to protect her as she was being attacked by Harrell. She later confessed to hitting him with the hammer multiple times before the other man took the hammer from her. Her claims of abuse were not substantiated. She was sentenced to life in prison.
DOB: 2/4/1962
Date of Murder: 10/25/1996
Victim: Her elderly mother in law
Murder weapon: Knife
In October 1996 Carlson and her two roommates drove to a nursing home where her mother-in-law, Lynne Carlson lived. One roommate stabbed the wheel-chair bound victim multiple times, severely injuring her. Lynne suffered for six months before succumbing to her injuries. Carlson and her husband were in financial trouble and plotted to kill his mother for the insurance money and inheritance.
DOB: 8/6/1970
Date of Murder: 10/8/2000
Victim: Her terminally ill husband
Murder weapon: Knife and barstool
When Joseph Andriano got cancer, his wife Wendi began plotting on how to profit from his death. She had counterparts pose as her husband so she could get a life insurance policy. She also began to slip sodium azide into his drinks. In October, she stabbed him in the neck and beat him with a barstool, claiming it was self-defense. Authorities showed that Joseph was too weak from the poisoning and chemotherapy to attack her. She remains on death row.
DOB: 7/9/1980
Date of Murder: 6/4/2008
Victim: Ex-boyfriend
Murder weapon: Knife, gun
Arias was convicted in May 2013 of killing her ex-boyfriend Travis Alexander. He was found in his shower with multiple stab wounds, his throat slit and he had been shot. The trial and Arias 18-day testimony gained worldwide media attention and was followed live via the internet. The trial was later made into a TV movie called: Jodi Arias: Dirty little secret.