To family, friends and neighbors, Patty and Bill Prewitt appeared to be the ultimate all-American couple.
They were high school sweethearts, had five children, ran a successful lumberyard business and lived on an isolated 40-acre farm in Holden, Missouri.
Then, during a thunderstorm on the night of February 18, 1984, their seemingly happy world fell apart when Bill, 35, was found brutally slain in their bed.
He had been shot twice in the head with the couple’s .22 caliber rifle, which was found dumped in a shallow pond on their property.
A week later Patty was arrested for murder. Despite pleading her innocence, she was painted by prosecutors as an adulterous monster, found guilty and thrown in prison, where she remained for 38.5 years until her shock release in December 2024.
Now, speaking exclusively to the Daily Mail for the first time since returning home, she has shared chilling new details about what she claims really happened that terrible night – and who she believes may have been responsible.
Patty, now 75 and a great-grandmother who raised five children, recalled how the couple had been out with friends earlier that evening and were sound asleep when she was ‘awakened violently’ to a scene out of a horror movie.
The phone lines to their five-bedroom property had been cut, the power shut off and a masked intruder was looming over her in the darkness of the bedroom.
‘I was pulled out of bed by my hair and slammed onto the floor between the bed and my dresser,’ Patty said.
‘A man was on top of me tearing at my pajamas. He raped me as he held me down with his body and a knife to my throat.
‘He growled something like “I hate it when they cry.” I never saw his face, but felt his belt buckle and smelt cigarettes and some sort of petroleum product, like motor oil.’
Patty Prewitt in happier days with her husband, Bill, and their five children. He was shot in the head twice while in bed at the family’s farmhouse in Holden, Missouri, in 1984. Prewitt has always maintained her innocence, insisting an intruder killed Bill and attacked her
Marks on Prewitt’s neck, which she says were caused by a knife used by an intruder
Jane Prewitt Watkins, left, hugs her mother while they celebrate Christmas at home following her release from prison. Behind them are Jane’s son, Jayce, 36, her husband John, 58, and Prewitt’s son, Morgan, 47
She added that she didn’t recognize the man’s voice, describing it as ‘robotic, almost non-human’.
‘When he jumped up, I rose and climbed across the bed to locate Bill. The room was pitch dark. I could hear Bill’s ragged breathing, but he wouldn’t wake up,’ she continued.
At this point, Patty explained that her memory is more shaky and she cannot remember exactly what she did next.
But she recalled trying the lights and telephone in their room, which wouldn’t work.
Next she ran to the children’s bedrooms where she saw her four youngest, Sarah, 12, Matt, 10, Carrie, 8 and Morgan, 6, were alive and still asleep. Her eldest, Jane, then 14, was away at a sleepover with a friend.
‘I ran out to the truck and fetched a flashlight,’ Patty said. ‘In the country, especially during a storm, it’s dark. There are no street lights. The house was pitch black.
‘I had to get the kids out of the house to safety, so I woke Sarah up first since she was the oldest in the house. I told her we had a little fire, and needed to get the kids up and out. She started crying, but we had drilled on how to exit in case of fire’.
But while frantically getting coats and shoes on the sleepy kids, she didn’t notice Sarah and Carrie had run into the living room to retrieve their beloved flute.
She had no idea then that this seemingly inconsequential detail would turn out to be critical when trying to prove someone else could have been in the house.
‘Much later I found out that the girls had seen a flashlight under the basement door and thought their dad was down there doing something about the fire,’ Patty explained.
But at this point, Bill was already dead.
‘After I got the kids into the car, I felt compelled to go back into the house and check on Bill. Is this logical? No, but I was out of my head in shock. When I got to Bill, I realized he was dead and stumbled back out to the car to get the kids to safety,’ Patty said.
Patty fled with her terrified brood to the home of neighbor Clifford Gustin who alerted police and later retrieved Jane from her playdate.
She had no idea then that the nightmare was only just beginning.
Patty Prewitt and husband Bill happy together at Christmas in 1983
The Prewitt family home in Holden, MO, where Bill Prewitt was killed as he slept
Evidence collected by police following brutal murder of Bill Prewitt
The knife Patty claimed was used in the attack
Investigators zoned in on Patty as the main – only – suspect. They refused to believe her account that an intruder had entered their home
Lead detective Kevin Hughes, then 27, was considered inexperienced with homicide cases – there had only been five murders in Johnson County in the previous five years.
Patty’s family claimed he never looked for other potential suspects and was determined to pin the heinous crime on her from day one.
They have since slammed the investigation as ‘shoddy’, telling Daily Mail it was carried out by ‘amateur police with tunnel vision’ who they insist ignored exculpatory evidence.
Speaking of Hughes, Patty said: ‘He came in with a sneer. The snotty attitude of Hughes caused me to shut down.
‘I didn’t tell him that I’d been raped because he didn’t ask. No one did, and no one made me feel like I could tell them such an intimate horror.
‘No women were on the police force. It took me a long time to confess the rape to my lawyers, who immediately were very angry at me for not telling. The police had already made up their minds before they even saw me.’
Patty claimed she even heard Hughes comment at the time: ‘It’s always the wife.’
The detective took a picture of her throat where she said the killer’s knife had injured her, but later claimed it looked like she had made horizontal cut marks herself with a razor blade.
‘My tender-aged children and I were interrogated for hours by gruff men at the Holden police station that day. Hughes swabbed my hands to see if I’d fired a gun recently,’ Patty said.
‘I only found out much later that the nitrate test for gunpowder residue proved that I had not fired a gun. That scientific fact did not deter the police from their quest to convict me of a murder I did not commit.’
‘Thunder cracked all night, so I’m not sure if I heard the gun fire. That was another sticking point with the police, but it’s the truth,’ she added.
Patty said Hughes did not record her interrogation, which she claims gave him ‘leeway’ to alter her responses.
‘The police didn’t take fingerprints where they should have,’ she claimed. ‘They didn’t look at tire tracks or footprints either. There was no actual investigation.’
Hughes did, however, remove 12 Alfred Hitchcock novels from the home after spotting one of the covers mentioned ‘the perfect crime.’
He also retrieved Bill’s life insurance policy document, believing it could be a motive.
One shell casing was discovered by a detective 11 hours after the crime scene was secured, which had dislodged when he sat on a wicker love seat next to the bed.
A second shell casing was found behind the love seat after the crime scene was released by investigators.
On February 21, seven days after the murder, the family’s rifle used to kill Bill was found in a shallow pond on the property that had been drained by detectives.
They also claimed to have found a pristine boot print in the muddy bed which they said matched a pair of Patty’s shoes. She was arrested the following day.
‘Their theory is that I threw the rifle into the pond, then leaped into the pond with one foot while not sinking into the deep mud,’ Patty explained.
‘No one in their right mind would believe such a theory, but the jury did. There were boot prints all over the farm, both big and little which were disregarded.’
Patty claimed she even heard Hughes comment at the time: ‘It’s always the wife’
An aerial image of the Prewitt’s 40-acre family farm – the murder weapon was found in a pond in the grounds
The Prewitts’ .22 rifle police said was used to kill Bill
Patty Prewitt claims there was break-in at the remote family home on the night of the murder
Patty’s rubber-soled boots which police said matched a print found in the bed a pond on the Prewitt property where the murder weapon was located
Pajamas worn by Prewitt on at the time she says she was raped by an intruder
Following her arrest, she was processed at police station in Warrensburg, the seat of Johnson County, where Patty said a female officer who searched her was ‘appalled at my horrid black bruises’.
‘I was bruised black from my lower ribs, hip bones, pelvic bone, down to my knees front and back. These were the most painful bruises I’ve ever had. She was the only one who saw my body except for my oldest daughter, Janie,’ Patty recalled.
Her daughter Jane Prewitt Watkins, 55, added: ‘When we were getting ready for the funeral I saw mom’s bruised body. She was bruised from her hip bones down to her knees. She had clearly been hurt. That always stuck with me.’
During the subsequent four-day trial, the prosecutor said Patty was motivated by ‘lust and greed.’ He portrayed her as unfit mother because she had affairs with three different men – five years prior to Bill’s murder.
Over the years authorities twice denied her request to test evidence, including the bloody sheets, for DNA.
‘They just pinned it right on mom and never looked for anyone else,’ Jane said. ‘There were theories over the years but the police never investigated anything.’
Those theories included Bill having a connection with local drug dealers, Patty said.
A neighbor, Ethel Juanita Stitches, testified she had told the sheriff she noticed a suspicious vehicle facing the Prewitt’s property two hours before the murder.
There was no indication the lead was looked into and the sheriff denied he had received the information about the car even though the report was logged in the court records.
There was also the mystery of the banging from the basement heard by Sarah, along with a light visible from under the door as Patty and her children were fleeing the house.
When the family eventually returned home they found cigarette butts under a basement window that faced the driveway.
No one in the family smoked. Prosecutors, though, dismissed Sarah’s statement, claiming her mother pressured her give it.
Both Patty and Bill had affairs years before the murder, and had briefly lived apart.
Bill had been upset at times but she claims the couple had patched things up and the marriage was solid.
One of the men she had a relationship with, Ricky Mitts, was interviewed by investigators and admitted to having an affair with her between 1975 and 1979.
The relationship produced a son, Morgan, who was raised by Patty and Bill. Today, Morgan and Mitts are estranged.
Mitts claimed that in the summer of 1982 Patty had offered him $10,000 to kill Bill and later testified to this effect in court.
He said Patty suggested he set fire to the barn on her property and then shoot Bill when he came to check on it.
After making his statement to Detective Hughes, Mitts immediately suggested to Patty they should marry so he would not have to testify against her.
Patty claimed Mitts was late to work the morning of the murder, and believed that his offer of marriage was ‘odd’. Daily Mail has attempted to contact Mitts for comment.
‘We all hoped the DNA would give us answers about who the killer was but the court denied testing it,’ she added.
Patty was offered a plea deal that would have allowed her to spend much less time behind bars if she confessed to the murder.
But she refused and was sentenced to life in prison after a jury found her guilty. An appeal was denied and she entered prison aged 34 on April 29, 1986.
Elated great-grandmother Patty Prewitt, 75, was released on Jan. 20 from the Women’s Eastern Reception, Diagnostic and Correctional Center in Vandalia, Missouri , after 38.5 years behind bars for murdering her husband
Prewitt, center with family terrier Milo on her knee, surrounded joyous family members at home on Dec. 21, the day following her sudden release from prison after nearly four decades
Prewitt relaxing at home wearing a new pair of socks she was given for Christmas – which she much prefers than the tube socks she had as part of her prison uniform
It was there, almost four decades later, that inmate 082667 learned she was going to be released.
Sitting at a small table with her daughter Jane in the visiting room, forbidden to touch apart from a fleeting hug, they were approached by a male official who asked them to follow him.
Patty said: ‘He called me by my first name which they never do. I thought, “Oh, god, what is going on?”’
They were ushered into an office in the Women’s Eastern Reception, Diagnostic and Correctional Center in Vandalia, MO, where Warden Angela Mesmer and her deputy, Todd Francis, were waiting with a representative from the state’s governor on the phone.
Patty was informed officials were formalizing her clemency application – originally submitted to the Missouri governor’s office in 2010 – and she was being set free the same day.
Gov. Michael Parson had commuted Patty’s original sentence of life with parole possible after 50 years to life with parole, meaning she could be released immediately.
Describing her time in prison, Patty said she would wake up at 4am every day in time for the 5am roll call, followed shortly by ‘chow time’. She said prison food ‘sucks’ which she describes as ‘one carb on top of another.’
She shared a cell with five other women and had a ‘Cadillac’ bunk – prison slang for a single bed without another bunk above.
Patty said she witnessed violence and drug use in prison but it was people smoking around her that she disliked most.
She revealed her lowest point came in 1992 when her son Matt, 19, died from a gunshot wound, which was later deemed suicide despite his family’s doubts he took his own life.
‘That was the most horrible, horrible time,’ said Patty. ‘I cried so much that my eyes swelled shut. I had four other kids and my parents and I could not just keel over. I fell into a deep, dark hole but I had to pull myself out of that.’
She was not allowed to attend Matt’s funeral, nor funerals for her parents and siblings. ‘It never gets easier, said Patty, who would pen poems for Jane to read at each funeral.
Relieved Patty Prewitt is savoring her freedom as she eases into her new life
The rear of the Prewitt home showing outbuildings and the family truck
Det. Hughes removed 12 Alfred Hitchcock novels from the home after spotting writing on one of the covers that mentioned ‘the perfect crime.’
Patty said her biggest regret to this day was turning down the plea deal, which could have seen her released in as little as three years.
‘I had no idea what juries do. I didn’t know how things worked,’ she said.
She thought she would be found innocent because, she insists, she was.
‘I was the eternal optimist and I thought for sure it would all work out,’ she added. ‘When I came to prison every convict said to me “Good god woman, why didn’t you take that?”’
Jane recalled: ‘She didn’t want to miss our childhoods – but she ended up missing most of our entire lives.’
Fast forward 38 years and on that December 20, Patty was allowed to exit prison via the front door, a privilege not usually afforded to released prisoners.
At 2.30pm she stepped out into the crisp air still wearing her khaki prison uniform, new Balance sneakers and a pink coat purchased from a Land’s End catalogue 20 years ago.
She held hands with her daughter as they walked to Jane’s black Toyota Tacoma truck, then the pair headed west 190 miles home to Greenwood near Kansas City.
Since her release, Patty has started studying for a driver’s license, taken trips to Walmart and Dollar Tree and had Thai food for the first time.
‘Inmates were only allowed to watch PG-rated movies’, said Patty, adding, ‘It’s R rated all the way for me now!’
She said she has watched A Quiet Place: Day One – and ‘loved it’ – as well as A Complete Unknown, with Timothee Chalamet as Bob Dylan.
Patty has also been getting used to the essentials of modern living – including car seat belts, self-flushing toilets and Alexa – and aims to continue studying through Washington University. In addition, she is working on a book called Trying to Catch Lightening in a Jar, based on letters to her children from prison.
Prewitt’s son Matt, 19, who died while Prewitt was locked up. It was deemed death by suicide despite his family’s doubts that he took his own life.
Prewitt with her son Morgan, who was six when his father Bill was killed, and daughter Jane
Prewitt and granddaughter Abbey, 23, on her first evening after being released from prison. The former inmate’s nine grandchildren had only seen her behind bars until her she was set free on Jan. 20 when Gov. Michael Parson finally approved her request for clemency
Hewitt no longer has to wear the drab khaki prison garb that was her daily uniform for decades. Here she holds family terrier Milo, 10, while wearing pajamas she received as one her many Christmas gifts which also included a new laptop computer
Prewitt would wake up at 4am every day in time for the 5am roll call, followed shortly by ‘chow time.’ She says prison food ‘sucks,’ describing it as ‘one carb on top of another.’
The Order of Release on Parole allowing Prewitt to be released from the Women’s Eastern Reception, Diagnostic and Correctional Center (WERDCC) after nearly four decades behind bars
The list of Missouri inmates, former and current, who were granted pardons and commutations last December by Gov. Michael Parson
Missouri Gov. Michael Parson, who stood down on Jan. 13, granted Patty Prewitt clemency
Patty fought to overturn her conviction with the help of the Midwest Innocence Project and attorney Brian Reichart.
Under the conditions of her release, she still remains on parole for the rest of her life. Her next step is to seek a full pardon from Missouri’s new governor.
Easing into a new life, she dismisses any thought of dating, saying: ‘Old men are either looking for a nurse or a purse – and I’m neither one.’
Attorney Reichart told DailyMail.com: ‘I am thrilled that she is finally home with her family. Justice was delayed, but ultimately it was not denied’.
David Mayhew, Chief of Holden Police Department, declined to comment on the specifics of the case as he was not police chief at the time, but added: ‘The facts of the case speak for themself, she was found guilty, with the conviction being upheld’.
