Very Scary People (2019–…): Season 5, Episode 10 - The Black Widow: Part 2 - full transcript

[narrator] It was a case
of twisted greed.

She wanted something
she didn't have.

She wanted to be somebody
she wasn't.

She found a way to do it.

And she was not going to quit
until she was stopped.

Welcome to Very Scary People.

I'm Donnie Wahlberg.

Those who knew Judy Buenoano
describe her as larger
than life.

She had a beautiful home,
thriving business, and a taste
for the finer things in life.

But there was a dark side
to Judy's story.

terrible things seemed
to happen to those closest
to her.



In 1971, her husband died from
a mysterious illness.

Seven years later, her live-in
boyfriend suffered
the same fate.

Then shortly after, her oldest
son fell ill.

But it wasn't until her fiance
was nearly killed in
a car bombing,

that authorities started
to suspect these tragedies
were no accident.

Here is part two of
The Black Widow.

[Simmons] I was working in
the Sheriff's department.

And I heard that there was
this bombing of this car that
happened downtown Pensacola.

[explosion]

[Rick] It was at the parking
lot next to a restaurant
called The Driftwood.

I got there and I saw
the car bombed out.

Police, fire, everybody
was there.

Checked in with the first
officer on the scene. Asked
him what happened.

He told me the victim was
John Gentry.



John Gentry was a man who was
successful. He had his
own business.

And he was in real bad shape.

I remember my mom coming in
and saying, "Hey, I need you
to wake up. Get dressed.

We gotta go to the hospital."

My uncle. He's been hurt.

[Mike] My uncle was a happy
person and brought everybody
else to a happy mood.

Just an all around
good guy to me.

[Paula] We couldn't imagine
anybody that wanted to hurt
him.

The investigation determined
it was two sticks of dynamite.

It was placed right behind
the left side of the rear
backseat.

And then wired
to the tail light.

So that when he turned
the lights on, the bomb would
explode.

This was done
to kill this guy.

The first time I met John
Gentry,

I met him when he was
with Judy Buenoano.

She also owned a successful
business.

A nail salon called
Fingers 'N Faces.

She had children, she had
a family.

[Belvin] They started dating.
He was smitten by her.

And from all indications, he
fell madly in love with her.

[Paula] She was really
super nice.

Kinda ritzy. She had money.

She had money
and she wasn't afraid
to throw it around.

[Mollye] She carried herself
like a queen.

Seems like she had a need
to prove herself.

She was the one in control.
She was the important one.

[Ted] It was her attitude.
High and mighty, "I'm better
than everybody else."

So I too, right off the bat,
I said,

I'm gonna look into her.

[Mollye] The police are now
taking a closer look. This
isn't an isolated event.

[reporter] People around her
kept dying or being injured.

[Rick] It was really strange
that she had so many men in
her life die,

under such strange
circumstances.

Her first husband, James
Goodyear was in the Air Force.

[Belvin] James Goodyear.

He loved his wife, he loved
his children.

And he was a caring man.

[Mollye] When he married her,
he was in it for the long haul
and then Vietnam came.

He was sent off to war.

[Belvin] He came home
perfectly healthy.

And within days of
his arrival,

Sergeant Goodyear got sick.

[Rick] It was in three months
he was dead.

And the doctors never could
figure out what was wrong
with him.

[Simmons] He got sick and he
died and she got the insurance
money.

And then, a boyfriend got
sick and died.

And she got the insurance
money.

[Belvin] Bobby Joe Morris was
a very successful person
in Pensacola.

Met Judy, and Bobby fell
in love with her.

[Meghan] She was with Bobby
Joe for six years.

But they didn't get married.

[Mollye] They lived here
in Pensacola
for a couple years,

then he moved out of state
to Colorado.

And I often wondered if
it wasn't, like, to get away
from her.

She immediately follows him
up there.

And it's not long before he
dies.

It was so unusual. So unusual.

[Ted] The doctors up there
felt there was something
wrong.

They felt it was something
wrong with this case.

Two years after Bobby Joe's
death,

Judy's son Michael begins
to get very sick.

[Belvin] There's, like,
a pattern here going on.

Michael Goodyear was a child
that was born out of wedlock.

[Meghan] This was her first
born and it seemed like she

always just thought he was
baggage.

He was unwanted baggage
for her.

She did not like that child.

[Nancy] He wasn't perfect. And
he wasn't bright.

And she just didn't want him
so she began trying to get him
in the army.

To get him away.

[Ted] Michael gets into
the army.

He gets out of basic training.
And he goes home for
two weeks

and all of a sudden, he starts
getting real sick.

[Meghan] Michael, he was
experiencing the nausea,
the headaches, the vomiting.

And nobody can understand why.

[Ted] He got medical care in
the military that determined
he was poisoned by arsenic.

[Meghan] They did determine he
was suffering from arsenic
poisoning.

This might've raised
red flags.

But Michael had been working
in a water purification lab.

[Russell] Where they use
arsenic in water purification.

It was considered, then,
maybe an accident.

[Nancy] That didn't kill him
but instead,

it paralyzed him.

[Joey] Doctors fitted Michael
with heavy metal leg braces.

So that he could steady
himself and walk with
crutches.

[Ted] He ended up being
discharged from service.

[Mollye] By the time he is
discharged, he goes

immediately back to live
with his mom.

And sadly, he didn't ever
get a chance to recover.

[Meghan] The day after Michael
comes home, Judy suggests
a family outing.

She suggests that they take
a canoe on the river close by
and they go fishing.

[Simmons] Judy thought it
would be a good idea to take
Michael,

get him out, and take him
for a canoe trip.

[Mollye] And by all reports,
he was excited about it.

Northwest Florida is
a beautiful place.

So we have a lot of natural
streams and bayous and rivers.

And a lot of places where
people like to fish and canoe.

She picked a spot that was
North of a community called
Navarre.

Back then, it was relatively
remote. Very woodsy.

The weather was nice and it's
gonna be Judy and Michael and
his younger brother, James.

[Ted] James was in the canoe
with her.

Kimberley, she leaves on
the bank, by herself.

Now, Michael, he's got
leg braces.

He couldn't walk well and he
couldn't use his arms well.

Judy actually gets a lawn
chair and finds a way to wedge
it into this canoe.

So he could sit there and
be comfortable.

[Meghan] I think she's
suggesting it to lift
Michael's spirits.

The family will be together,
everything's gonna be okay.

But it wasn't.

They're not in that canoe for
very long at all and suddenly,

an accident happens.

[water splashing]

[telephone ringing]

My dad got a phone call
at our business.

and all I could hear was

a voice screaming and crying
and it was unintelligible.

And then I remember,

Daddy got off the phone and
I said what's going on?

He said, "Just get in the car
and drive.

Drive fast."

I said where are we going?
He said Novar.

We get there and I saw a lot
of chaos going on.

And I could see Judy pacing
on a pier.

I didn't know what happened.

Judy had taken her family, her
sons Michael and James,

and her daughter Kimberley
to the East River so that they
can all go canoeing.

[Nancy] Michael had been
discharged from the military,

He was back home with his mom.

And she says, "Hey, let's go
for a canoe ride."

[Ted] It's a winding, winding
river. Like a snake.

It's really a nice place to go
visit.

[Meghan] Michael's got 15 lbs
leg braces on both of
his legs.

And he was in the canoe with
his mother and younger brother

while his sister was kind of
sunning herself on the shore.

And all of a sudden the canoe
capsizes.

[water splashing]

Judy says that she's
frantically searching for
her younger son, James.

[Ted] She said that James
had hit his head when it
overturned.

[Meghan] She's able to rescue
him.

[Ted] They ended up in this
one spot when this motorboat
pulls up.

And this young man that was in
the boat, put him in his boat
and took him to shore.

[Mollye] She and James make
it to shore, but somehow
Michael is trapped underwater.

There's no attempt to save him
by any account.

I was the lead diver for
Sheriff's county search and
rescue at the time.

That day I was told there's
a boy in the water.

And he fell out a canoe.

We got dressed.

Put our gear on.

And we found glasses.

Somebody said they came from
the boat.

So we decided there's
the point we gon' start from.

We was in the middle of
the river and I backed into
something.

And I go take a deep breath,

reach over there, and that's
when I felt the braces
of the foot.

Michael drowned.

[Joseph] I pulled Michael in.

I was thinking it's a tragedy.

But I had questions.

It doesn't make any sense.

[Joseph] Michael was in
a patio chair

and he had two leg braces on.

And the canoe overturned and
he fell out.

Anybody deals with a canoe,

if you put center of gravity
above the level of the canoe,
it's gonna turn over.

It's just inevitable
for that stuff to happen.

You don't take someone
in a canoe, put him
in a lawn chair up a river,

who can't swim.

Judy was telling me,
it was just
a terrible tragedy.

[Judy speaking]

It was a terrible tragedy
that the canoe tipped over,
that they tried to help him,

that they couldn't get him,
that the water was too swift.

Those are all
the things she told me.

But it couldn't have happened
the way that Judy said it did.

Judy gave these explanations
for what had happened
when the boat capsized.

She told some people
that a snake got in the boat.

I was told that
they were by a bank and
a snake fell into the boat,

and they caused
the boat to turn over.

But something didn't sound
right to investigators.

[Nancy] Her description
of where Michael went under

and where he was found
were so totally different.

Couldn't have happened
the way that Judy said it did.

[Ted] Where the body
was found was up river,

about half a mile,
in the middle of the river.

Wasn't on either side
what she said,

the snake dropped in the boat
and the canoe overturned.

No. The body was right
in the middle of the river.

Somebody with braces on,
gonna sink straight
to the bottom.

They're heavy. You can't move.
They lock in place.

If you're in the middle
of the river,

if you fall in there,
you're gonna stay there.

I'm suspicious.

All of the debris of the canoe
was in an area
where she was found,

half a mile from where
her son was found
drowned in the river.

Judy Buenoano said
that she was pushed
downstream by the current,

very strong current.

Yet, there was no
current that day.

Could not have happened
the way she explained it.

[Mollye] When the police
arrived, she was sitting
on the shore,

I believe, drinking a beer.

I don't know why
that didn't alert them
to maybe something strange.

Within couple of years,
after Michael died,

somebody finally started
asking the right questions.

And I believe, it was
Assistant State Attorney,
Russ Edgar.

[Russell] I looked
at the reports and I
realized that, Judy Buenoano

had a very poor
relationship with her son.

And he had become sick
while he was at home on leave.

And at that time, she obtained
an insurance policy on him.

But there was something wrong
with the insurance policy.

[Russell] I reviewed
Michael Goodyear's
military records.

I reviewed all the records
that I could find on him.

And I noticed one thing
was very peculiar about him.

He always misspelled
his first name.

Instead of Michael,
M-I-C-H-A-E-L,

he put an E on the end.

The insurance policy
did not misspell his name.

Why all of a sudden did he
spell his name correctly?

I'd knew there was
something wrong there.

[Ted] And when the guy
come over
with the insurance policy,

Michael was never there.

The guy never saw Michael.

Never saw him
sign anything.

But the forms get signed.

[Russell]
It's not his signature.

And a expert concluded
that she had forged it.

When we obtained
the insurance policies,

I knew it was a murder.

He came home and she
drowned him for the insurance.

And that's just chilling.

[Mollye] Judy and Michael,
and his younger
brother, James,

they were in this remote place

at the tip
of then Florida
Panhandle.

It's a beautiful place.

And suddenly something
horrible happened.

That sadly,
the canoe turned over,
and Michael drowned.

But Judy made it out alive.

[Russell]
They ruled it accidental.

But, the circumstances
were so obviously suspicious.

We found out, she's had all
kinds of insurance
policies on Michael.

For Judy, Michael's death
meant $125,000
in insurance money.

[Ted] She had an opportunity
to get a lot of money from it.

And benefits
from the military,
and she took it.

[Pam] My dad said,
she used him
like a boat anchor.

That's what she thought
of Michael. He's her
boat anchor.

[Russell] It was only after
the bombing attempt,

we then began to look
at all the insurance records.

And, discovered that there
were multiple policies on him,

and multiple policies
on the others.

James Goodyear,

Bobby Joe Morris,

and John Gentry.

It was in multiple states,
multiple years.

[Rick] She kept moving
her locations around,
Colorado, Florida.

Different insurance companies.

Nowadays with the technology
they have,

most insurance companies
will probably pick up
on that pretty quick.

Back then,
we didn't have that.

[Russell] When we obtained
the insurance policies,

we realized that we had
a pattern of killing.

[Belvin] You got three
separate men,

and you had a motive.

Insurance money.

[Meghan] The difference
usually between female
and male serial killers,

is their purpose for killing.

Male serial killers
usually kill
for some type of

sexual gratification
or power and control.

Whereas female serial killers,

usually there
is a utilitarian purpose.

Meaning,
they're gaining something,

and that's usually money.

She's looking
at these people
as income.

[Pam] She tried to buy
life insurance,
not only on my dad,

but on me
and my two sisters.

I mean, it was just
so bizarre.

[Russell] She funded
a nail shop.

She bought a house
in Gulf Breeze.

She bought cruise tickets.

Various gifts for friends.

[Nancy]
I didn't know back then.

But, I attended a cruise,

because her son died,
and she used the money,

from his insurance to pay
for that cruise I was on.

I don't like that.

[Ted] She loved money.

Money was a big thing to her.
That was a main thing.

She had to have money,
and she had to live
that lifestyle.

The only one that knew
that there was insurance
at all on her, was Gentry.

The other folks had no idea.

[Meghan] With John Gentry,

they had decided to get
insurance policies
on each other.

But their insurance policies
were for about $50,000.

But Judy went ahead
and changed that policy,

increasing it from $50,000
to $500,000.

[Ted] Gentry thought
it was originally $50,000.

And then,
she ups it to $500,000.

And then she tells him,
that the policies,
she cancelled them.

She's not making
payments on 'em.

So that's why he didn't think
she had anything to gain.

She had intended
to kill him for the insurance.

Judy was crafty in getting
people to sign
over insurance,

and when they didn't,
she would just do it for them.

She had taken out three
life insurance policies
on Bobby Joe Morris.

[Ted] In Bobby
Joe Morris' case,

every time the insurance guy
would come to get the things,

she'd say he's working,
he's busy.

"You give 'em to me.

I'll have Bobby Joe
sign 'em, and I'll bring
'em back to you."

That's what she did.

And Bobby Joe Morris
had no idea.

[Meghan] She was with Bobby
Joe for about six years.

She had invested
all this time in him.

She was gonna make sure
she got something

out of the relationship
before it ended.

The people in Judy's life,
they're just...
they're disposable.

Judy's being discovered
at this point.

It's being revealed
piece by piece,

that she is likely
the person who is responsible

for murdering
her family members.

It appeared that we
had an investigation
that needed to be done.

[Joey] Proving that these
cases were murders

and not just
accidental deaths,

could be very challenging,

particularly since it had been
a number of years.

Investigators knew
that Michael Goodyear

suffered from
arsenic poisoning,

which they originally
thought was just
an accident from work.

So they decided to see

whether any of Judy's
other alleged victims

had arsenic in their system.

And that meant
exhuming the bodies,

literally digging up evidence.

[Belvin]
Arsenic is a chemical.

You can't find it in just
a routine toxicology screen.

You had to specifically
test for arsenic back then.

It's gonna remain in hair.

It's gonna remain
in your organs.

So, we had to exhume
Sergeant James Goodyear.

Because we had to find out
whether or not

was he poisoned.

We need the evidence
to prove the case.

[reporter] James Goodyear's
death certificate

says he died
of heart failure in 1971.

But law enforcement
authorities don't believe
that anymore.

James Edgar Goodyear
was exhumed from his grave,

so investigators
could look for arsenic.

[Belvin] Sergeant
Goodyear died in 1971.

The autopsy was in 1984.

So that's approximately
13 years.

[Russell] The longer it gets,
the more difficult it is.

You do not have that sort
of evidence that you need.

[Belvin] We didn't think
there was nothing
left in that casket.

That the body
had just totally
disintegrated.

And, I was totally surprised

when the medical examiner
opened the casket up.

And, there was a fully
intact body.

It showed arsenic levels
that were lethal.

[Belvin]
He was so well preserved,

because of the amount
of arsenic that he
had in his body.

[Nancy] He escaped Vietnam,
but he couldn't escape Judy.

She was evil.

She was evil.

Welcome back
to Very Scary People.

It looked like the walls
were finally closing
in on Judy Buenoano.

Twelve years after
her husband's death,

the body of Sergeant
James Goodyear was exhumed.

Massive amounts of arsenic
were found in his remains.

The medical examiner
changed his cause of death

from natural
causes to homicide.

It was one more
piece of the puzzle

that authorities
needed to try and bring

the suspected
Black Widow to justice.

Sergeant James Goodyear
died of arsenic poison.

[Ted] They were able
to get the body exhumed.

And, I think that he was
in the ground for, like,
I think, 12 and a half years.

Then they found arsenic levels
of lethal amount with him.

[Joey] When Sergeant Goodyear
came back from Vietnam,

Judy was making
all of these
home-cooked meals.

So it's believed
that the arsenic
found in his body

is connected to all those
meals that Judy was preparing.

Arsenic is a good poison,
because you can't
taste it or smell it.

So you can put
it in any drink.

You can put it in any food.

And it is undetectable
to the person
who is ingesting it.

[Belvin] And no one had any
reason to suspect

that his loving wife,

the mother of his children,

would just sit there,

and watch him suffer and die.

Now you have to ask yourself,

what type of human
being is that?

That led to investigations

of the homicide
of Bobby Joe Morris.

[Russell] We were able
to exhume Bobby Joe Morris
and get the samples from him.

And it showed arsenic
levels that were lethal.

He was loaded up to killing
at least 12 people, they say.

James Goodyear,
Bobby Joe Morris,

all of 'em, every single one,
even Michael,

it was arsenic poisoning.

And they were put through
really so much pain

and anguish before they died.

They were dealing with
a cold blooded killer.

[Belvin] The one mistake
that she did make,

was she didn't have
any of them cremated.

There was one of Judy's
alleged victims that survived,

John Gentry.

Investigators found
wiring in her house,

connecting Judy
to the car bombing.

And a poisonous substance
at her nail salon,

that tied her to John's
mysterious illness.

[reporter] Of all the people
Judy Buenoano
was accused of poisoning,

John Gentry is the only
one who lived.

He became ill from some
pills she gave him.

She told him they were
vitamin C tablets.

[John speaking]

[Mollye] John Gentry
was complaining
of a little bit of a cold,

and she started giving
him these vitamins.

And instead,
it made him feel worse.

[Rick] So he just
quit taking 'em.

He put a couple aside.
He said,

"Well, maybe one day,
I'll have 'em checked.
It's just to see

maybe if I'm...
if it has something
in it that I'm allergic to."

He put 'em in his briefcase,

and we got 'em,
and we actually
send 'em off to the FBI.

And they came back
a few weeks later.

Said it was a substance
called paraformaldehyde.

Comes powdered.

And it's a disinfectant.

But it's poison.

The pills were
supposed to contain
Vicon-C,

which is a very
strong vitamin C.

She had emptied the pills,

put the paraformaldehyde
in the pills,

and given those to him.

We feel it was with the intent
of killing him over time.

Judy, obviously, she got tired
of waiting on the end result,

and speeded it up
with the dynamite.

[Mollye] Finally
investigators had this piece
of hard evidence

that they could use
to potentially...

show what her intentions were.

[Rick] I think what bit her
in the end was

not killing Gentry.

If he had died,

there would've been
some suspicion

but he was the key.

[Meghan] It was July 27, 1983
in Pensacola, Florida

when Judy Buenoano
was arrested

for the attempted murder
of John Gentry.

[Ted] The very first time that
she was arrested

was for the attempted murder

with the Vicon-C tablets
on Mr. Gentry.

She got out on a $50,000 bond.

And then we turned around
and we arrested for, uh,

the murder of her son.

That's something
she didn't expect.

[Nancy] When we had gone
to arrest her,

she pretended like
she passed out.

She acted like
she was paralyzed.

[Nancy] You can't
believe that.

She wasn't sick.

[Pam] I think everything
was a game.

I found out real fast

everything was
for her benefit.

[Meghan] Judy was
an experienced liar.

She lied easily at will.

She told many stories
about her, her background

and her accolades.

So she told people

that she was the heir
to the Goodyear throne.

[Mike] Her name when she was
married was Goodyear.

Then her name,

at some point,
changed to Buenoano,

and which is Spanish for...
for good year.

[Russell] She claimed
that she was

the great-great-granddaughter
of, uh, Geronimo.

She told people that
she had doctorates

in multiple disciplines.

She told everybody
she was a doctor.

A doctor, they don't do
nail salon.

[Pam] When you addressed her
professionally,

it was Dr. Judias Buenoano.

[Nancy] Judy said she's also
a forensic pathologist.

I think pretty quickly
I knew she was lying to me.

She did not know I was
a police officer at the time.

So I said to Judy,

"I hear you're
a forensic pathologist.

Well, I'd love to talk to you
about that.

I'm a crime scene officer."

And she immediately avoided me
from that time on.

[Meghan] But also, remember,
Judy lied about

every one of the deaths
in her family.

She had to lie to cover up
everything she had done.

So she told people that

James Goodyear died of cancer.

And she said, you know,

that Bobby Joe Morris
died of heavy drinking.

She said Michael got killed

in a training accident
in military

when he didn't.

She lied through her teeth

every time she talked
to somebody.

[Nancy] She told me,
"I would never hurt my son.

I would never hurt anyone."

But the truth was she did.

[newscaster 1] Judy Buenoano
walked into court today

looking calm and relaxed.

But when prosecutors
talk about

the 42-year-old's
murder charges,

it's like something
out of Hitchcock.

[Joey] Judy's first trial
was for the death
of her son, Michael.

She was accused
of poisoning him with arsenic,

and then when he was paralyzed
from the arsenic,

of drowning him
on the canoe trip.

Judy said, "This was terrible.
Oh, my poor son.

I was just trying to take him
out for a canoe ride and...

and this terrible thing
happened."

And it was all an accident.

And... I have never met
a person who believes that.

But Judy sticks to, maintains

that she is
a respectable woman

and that
she is absolutely innocent.

[Russell] When I looked
at the military records
of Michael Goodyear,

he had lines
on his fingernails,

and you can use those
to trace back or relate back

to the time which a person
might've ingested arsenic.

And these lines showed that

he would've ingested poisoning
about the time he was home.

So my conclusion was that...

she had him come home
for leave,

she poisoned him,
poisoned to kill him.

It did not work.

He survived.

And then she finished it

by taking him out in the canoe

and drowned him.

[Belvin] It's just
mind-boggling,

to watch your son

sink like a rock

and drown.

Only an evil person
would do that.

[newscaster 1]
The Black Widow's case,
as it came to be known,

rocked Pensacola, Florida.

Russell Edgar
prosecuted Buenoano

for her son's drowning.

I likened her
to a black widow who...

...fed on her mates
and her young,

and the name stuck.

She took the life of her son,

she took the life
of her husband

and the life of people
who cared about her.

She killed for financial gain.

At one point,
the defendant called
the whole thing a witch-hunt.

[Russell] She started
yelling at me.

She would just say, "I didn't
do it. It's not murder.

I've been framed.
You're on a witch-hunt."

And that was basically
her mantra.

Defamation, assassination
of character and the person.

They turn you into
a vile monster.

There was no attempt

to assassinate
anyone's character.

Uh, we deal with facts.

We deal with evidence.

[Meghan] Judy said
she's never been anything

but a good mother.

The ten men and two women
of the jury

will have a chance to make
that determination themselves.

[Joey] Prosecutors showed
the heavy metal braces

that Michael was wearing
when he drowned,

and people could not believe

that a mother could possibly
do that to her son.

The trial lasted nine days

before jurors came back
with a verdict.

[juror 1] We, the jury,
find the defendant

guilty of murder
in first degree...

She was sentenced
to life without parole

for 25 years.

She wasn't happy.

And in front of the jury,
she lost it.

[Ted] She was walking out
and I...

said "bye-bye" to her
like that.

Well, actually, it was ta-ta
and, uh...

she tried to come over
the rail [laughs] after me.

Her and I didn't get along
at all.

[Meghan] I think that the mask
probably slipped,

the facade probably broke
a little bit,

because she was
actually convicted.

In the eyes of the law
and everyone else around,

she's no longer
a woman with status.

And that probably,
really broke her.

It's almost like her face
just changed

and she became the killer.

It was very interesting.

[Paula] Her outburst,
her anger, her...

And that was a Judy
I didn't know.

But once I saw those,

we knew that she was evil.

She was flat evil.

[Joey] Six months later,
Judy was back in court.

This time, she was facing
attempted murder charges

for attempting
to kill her fiance,

John Gentry.

[Belvin] She had two counts of

attempted murder on Gentry
by poisoning

and by trying to blow him up.

[newscaster 2] Judy Buenoano
conferred with council
several times

during the testimony
of her former boyfriend,
John Gentry.

A friend testified

that at that time Buenoano
told her

Gentry was suffering
from a terminal disease.

She was talking about
taking her staff

on this cruise
along with her family.

But Old John wouldn't be there

'cause John was dying.

Judy told me that
John had cancer

and was going to die

and he really didn't want
anyone to know that.

[newscaster 2] Gentry did not
have cancer

but did come close to death.

[Joey] The jury deliberated
for just two hours

and handed down
a guilty verdict.

Another 12 years was added
to her sentence.

And there was one more trial
to come.

[Belvin] And then after that,
we started the trial

for the murder of her husband,
James Goodyear.

We sought the death penalty
in that case.

It was not an easy case.

She had this ability
to charm men.

[newscaster 3] Judy Buenoano
greeted spectators
with a smile this morning

as the first day of testimony
in her murder trial
got underway.

Authorities say she killed
her husband

with arsenic poisoning in 1971

and they say they have
autopsy results to prove it.

You know, you hear the phrase,
someone is the "ice queen."

She was just a very cold,

calculating individual.

The evidence has shown

that this woman was unhappy
in her marriage.

She... wanted out of it.

The case was built around
the fact that

Judy made admissions
that she had killed Goodyear.

She said he was no
help to her so she killed
the son of a bitch.

"He didn't deserve to live."

[Mollye] She told people
that he got on her nerves,

that he wasn't a help,

that she was doing
all the work

and he wasn't supportive
of her.

But he had not been back
very long

before she started
poisoning him.

So I don't know
how much of that was true

or how much of that was just
justification in her own mind

to justify what she wanted
to do.

[Meghan] We call it the
techniques of neutralization.

When it comes
to criminological theory,

people tend to neutralize
their own guilt

by making excuses.

So there's justification.

She's denying
that he's a victim,

and she is really the victim.

[Belvin] She told
another young lady

that "If you wanted to leave
your husband,

don't divorce him, kill him."

She went to the grocery store

and showed them where they
could purchase the poison.

Judy said to me
that what I should do

was kill the SOB.

She said,
"If you want to do it,

we can get... get a poison

out here in the grocery store

in the fly bait
department."

Said it has arsenic in it.

That's how Judy told me
that she killed James.

And you had a motive,
insurance money.

Prosecutors still have
more witnesses to call,

and already Buenoano
has a lot of explaining to do.

She took no responsibility.

She denied everything.

[Judy] We had basically
a good marriage.

She had no reason to kill him.

She had loved him.

And they all basically had
bad luck.

And I can vividly remember
doing closing argument

and echoing the fact,
"Yes, they did have bad luck."

And I wheeled around
and pointed at her and said,

"And there sits
their bad luck.

That's the bad luck."

[Joey] It was 1985
and Judy Buenoano

was facing
a first-degree murder charge

for the death of her husband,
James Goodyear.

She had already been convicted

for attempting to kill
John Gentry

and for the first-degree
murder of her son.

[newscaster 4] Judy Buenoano
has already received

a life sentence
for her son's death

and could receive
the death penalty

if convicted this week.

[Belvin] If there was any case

that would warrant
the ultimate sanction
of death,

it was that case.

She showed no mercy,

and I submit to you
that she deserves no mercy.

[Joey] Judy maintains
her innocence throughout,

but the judge and the jury
weren't buying it.

[juror 2] We, the jury,
find the defendant

guilty of murder in
the first degree as charged.

The jury convicted her

and the judge imposed
a death sentence.

You shall be put to death
by means of electrocution.

May God have mercy
on your immortal soul.

Once they read sentencing,
we were happy.

She was sentenced to death.

[Belvin] She murdered him,

all for the love of money.

[Russell] Judy killed
at least three people

and tried to kill another one.

Nobody suspected
any foul play.

[Russell] I think if she just
stopped after her son,

she would've
never been arrested.

I think she would've gotten
away with it

if she hadn't, uh,
tried to kill Gentry.

[Belvin] But for the miscue
of John Gentry,

who knows the trail of death

that she would've left.

[Bob] For Judy,
for many years, crime paid.

Kill somebody...
get an insurance check.

And it seems like for her,

the lives ruined
in the process

were just simply
collateral damage,

'cause after all
her life got better.

[Belvin] Cadillac, vacations.

And then when the money
got low, another victim.

[Bob] As I recall,
she collected

in the area of $250,000
for her crimes.

[Belvin] If she would've been
able to kill John Gentry,

she would've added
another half a million-plus.

[Bob] Her greed finally
caught up with her.

That and her lack
of a conscience.

[newscaster 5]
Fifty-four-year-old
Judy Buenoano

is a grandmother.

She is also
inmate number 160663,

a convicted killer.

[Rick] She was never charged
with Morris's murder.

I think if she hadn't been
sentenced to death in Florida,

I think Colorado would've
probably picked up on it.

But she would never
get out of jail in Florida.

[Bob] She maintained
her innocence

all the way to the very end.

...because I'm innocent.

There was no remorse.

[Nancy] It was not her fault.

I don't believe she ever
accepted responsibility

for what she did.

If this state thinks
I am guilty

and they wish to execute me

and that's
the final judgement,
then so be it.

[Mollye] To the end,
she was the victim.

"I will not admit to this.

I've done nothing
but build a life for myself,

and you've taken that
away from me."

[reporter] After 13 years
of maintaining her innocence
on death row,

Buenoano wants to be
remembered as a good mother.

So anything
I want to be known for...

is a good mother.

Until we meet again.

[newscaster 6] Judy Buenoano
was executed

just six days shy
of her 55th birthday.

[Belvin] It was like
writing the final chapter.

When she walked
to the death chamber,

you could see the fright...

on her face.

[Bob] She was terrified...

being seated...

and then being asked,
"Do you have any final words?"

And she closed her eyes
and looked up and said,

very loudly, "No, sir."

And that was it.

We were all willing
to turn our electricity
off for the day

just to make sure
they had enough juice
if they needed it.

[newscaster 7] She was
pronounced dead
at 7:13 this morning.

[Joey] Judy was
the first woman executed
in Florida in 150 years.

As a born-again Christian,

I don't have any fear
about where Judy is right now.

Judy Buenoano, she is going
straight to hell.

Judy Buenoano was executed
in Starke, Florida

on March 30, 1998,

on what would've been her son
Michael's 37th birthday.

All told, she collected nearly

a quarter of a million dollars
in insurance payouts

in the deaths
of her loved ones.

Since this case,
insurance laws have changed.

Today, if a life insurance
policy is taken out
on someone,

that person is alerted

to help prevent the type
of fraud Judy committed

for more than a decade.

I'm Donnie Wahlberg.

Thanks for watching.

Good night.