Caril Ann Fugate, now known as Caril Ann Clair, lives quietly in Hillsdale, Michigan, in her early eighties. She was paroled from a Nebraska prison in 1976 after serving roughly 18 years for her role in the 1958 Starkweather killings, moved to the Lansing area, worked for about two decades as a nurse’s aide, married in 2007, and was widowed in a 2013 highway crash that also critically injured her. Her final attempt at a pardon was unanimously denied by Nebraska’s Board of Pardons in February 2020, and her attorney said there would be no further attempts.13 News Now. State Denies Pardon for Starkweather Accomplice Caril Ann Fugate Clair
Release From Prison and a New Life in Michigan
Fugate had been sentenced to life at age 14, the youngest female in U.S. history to be tried and convicted of first-degree murder.2Deadline. The 12th Victim Showtime Docuseries On October 31, 1973, the Nebraska Board of Pardons commuted her life sentence to 30 to 50 years, citing “her age at the time of the tragic event.”3Time. Sequels to a Dumpy New Life The parole board granted her release effective June 20, 1976, after a hearing on June 8.4The New York Times. Calm and Very Happy, Caril Fugate Is Freed
She settled in the Lansing, Michigan area and took a job as a nurse’s aide at what is now Ingham Regional Medical Center. She stayed there roughly twenty years.5Detroit News. Michigan Woman Claims Innocence, Seeks Pardon She was discharged from parole in 1981, which ended her legal restrictions but left the felony conviction intact.6Lincoln City Libraries. Starkweather Timeline
For fourteen years she also babysat the daughters of a neighbor, Kathy Ross, in Holt, Michigan. In 1993, when the ABC miniseries Murder in the Heartland was airing, one of those daughters invited her to speak to a ninth-grade class. Fugate told the students she had once thought she “was really hot stuff,” and warned them that one mistake can follow a person the rest of their life.5Detroit News. Michigan Woman Claims Innocence, Seeks Pardon
Marriage, Widowhood, and Family
In 2007 she married Frederick A. Clair, whom she had met at a casino while working in Lansing, and took his name. On August 5, 2013, Frederick Clair, age 81, was killed in a single-vehicle crash on Interstate 69 in Calhoun County, Michigan. Caril was critically injured in the same crash.7Lansing State Journal. Caril Ann Fugate Clair Critically Hurt in I-69 Crash She has four stepsons from the marriage, and they have publicly defended her character and maintained her innocence.5Detroit News. Michigan Woman Claims Innocence, Seeks Pardon
The 2020 Pardon Denial
Fugate first applied for a Nebraska pardon in 1996. It was rejected.8NBC News. Notorious Killer Charles Starkweather’s Ex-Girlfriend Denied Pardon In 2017 attorneys John Stevens Berry Sr. and Linda Battisti filed a second application on her behalf. Berry argued that under modern legal standards she would have been treated as a “victim-witness” rather than a defendant, called the conviction a “miscarriage of justice,” and urged the board to act because it was “the right thing to do.”9Nebraska Public Media. Caril Ann Fugate’s Pardoning Case to Be Heard
The Nebraska Board of Pardons heard the case on February 18, 2020. Clair, then 76 and living in Hillsdale, Michigan, did not attend. In her written application she said the perception of her as a willing participant was “too much for me to bear anymore” and that a pardon might “alleviate this terrible burden.”10Chicago Tribune. Nebraska Denies Pardon for Longtime Michigan Resident
The hearing was brief. Berry was not permitted to speak or present testimony on Clair’s behalf. Liza Ward, the granddaughter of victims C. Lauer and Clara Ward, testified in support of the pardon, saying there was no evidence of guilt beyond a reasonable doubt and that public perception rested on “misinformation and hearsay.” Dave Ellis, a relative of victim Carol King, spoke against it.10Chicago Tribune. Nebraska Denies Pardon for Longtime Michigan Resident
Governor Pete Ricketts, Attorney General Doug Peterson, and Secretary of State Bob Evnen voted unanimously to deny. Peterson said the request was “much, much broader” than the board’s designated role of restoring a felon’s rights, and that the board could not “come in and alleviate the burden that she feels for this case.”8NBC News. Notorious Killer Charles Starkweather’s Ex-Girlfriend Denied Pardon Afterward Berry said he had expected “a tiny bit more” and confirmed there would be no further pardon applications.13 News Now. State Denies Pardon for Starkweather Accomplice Caril Ann Fugate Clair
What She Was Convicted Of
The conviction that still sits on her record came out of an eight-day spree in which Charles Starkweather killed eleven people across Nebraska and Wyoming between December 1957 and January 1958. Fugate, then 14 and Starkweather’s girlfriend, was with him for most of it. Among the dead were her stepfather Marion Bartlett, her mother Velda, and her two-year-old half-sister Betty Jean.6Lincoln City Libraries. Starkweather Timeline
Both were tried for the murder of teenager Robert Jensen. Starkweather was convicted, sentenced to death, and executed by electrocution on June 25, 1959.11Wyoming State Historical Society. The Killing Spree That Transfixed a Nation Fugate’s defense, led by attorney John McArthur, argued she had been held at gunpoint, was unaware her family was already dead, and was interrogated for hours without counsel while heavily sedated.12History Nebraska. Starkweather-Fugate Case Documents On November 21, 1958, the jury convicted her of felony murder in the first degree and sentenced her to life.13KETV. 14-Year-Old Caril Ann Fugate and the Notorious Murder Spree The Nebraska Supreme Court affirmed the denial of her motion for a new trial on December 11, 1959.14Justia. Fugate v. State, 169 Neb. 420
The Innocence Question Today
Fugate has maintained her innocence for nearly seven decades, and the debate over whether she was a willing accomplice or a terrified hostage has picked up again in recent years.
In 1983 she appeared on the syndicated program Lie Detector, hosted by F. Lee Bailey, and by reporting accounts passed a polygraph. She underwent hypnosis in 1989, and audio from those sessions was later used in a 2023 Showtime docuseries, The 12th Victim.15New York Post. New Documentary The 12th Victim That four-part series, drawn from the book The Twelfth Victim: The Innocence of Caril Fugate in the Starkweather Murder Rampage by Battisti and Berry, concluded her conviction was a “major miscarriage of justice” rooted in victim blaming and 1950s-era misogyny.16KQED. The 12th Victim
Also in 2023, true-crime author and attorney Harry MacLean published Starkweather: The Untold Story of the Killing Spree That Changed America, working from trial files kept by the son of Fugate’s original defense attorney. MacLean argued that the interrogation without counsel, her sedation during questioning, and the failure to give her a social evaluation that Starkweather received amounted to serious violations of her rights, and that classism shaped her conviction.17Flatwater Free Press. Revisiting Starkweather Murder Spree Was Personal for True Crime Author Harry MacLean
The opposing view is that Fugate had multiple chances to escape or seek help during the spree and did not, and that Starkweather placed a weapon in her hands during his trial testimony. Dave Ellis, cousin of victim Carol King, has said publicly that he believes she took part in his cousin’s mutilation.10Chicago Tribune. Nebraska Denies Pardon for Longtime Michigan Resident With every direct witness now dead and the pardon avenue closed, the 1958 conviction stands.