She Used Poison

By Sarah Thompson

A True Crime anthology centering around women who used poison to kill their victims...Holly McFeeture was sent to prison for slowly poisoning her fiancee by giving him daily doses of antifreeze into his beverages. But did she do it? Wrongful convictions in the United States seem like such a rare occurrence. One might think that if a case has gone to trial, and a jury has made a decision, then the person must be guilty. In a perfect world, the jury would have all the evidence they needed to make a decision beyond a reasonable doubt. However, in 2015, in the United States, a record number of 149 people were exonerated of crimes that they didn't commit. While the number may seem low in comparison to the number of rightful convictions, it was higher than any other year.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Trellis Publishing
• Release date: Jul 11, 2021
• ISBN: 9798201631260

Sarah Thompson

Sarah S. Thompson is a freelance writer living on Seneca Lake, where she and her husband plan to open a small winery. Sarah writes about food, wine, science, and news for Cornell University and regional publications. The photographs in this book were selected from collections kept by local wineries, farmers, libraries, historical societies, and museums.

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SHE USED POISON

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SARAH THOMERSON

TABLE OF CONTENTS

SHE USED POISON

LYNN TURNER

TILLIE KLIMEK

ANNA MARIE HAHN

ANNA MARIE HILLEY

KIM HRICKO

LOUISA MERRIFIELD

BLANCHE MOORE

Wrongful convictions in the United States seem like such a rare occurrence. One might think that if a case has gone to trial, and a jury has made a decision, then the person must be guilty. In a perfect world, the jury would have all the evidence they needed to make a decision beyond a reasonable doubt. However, in 2015, in the United States, a record number of 149 people were exonerated of crimes that they didn’t commit. While the number may seem low in comparison to the number of rightful convictions, it was higher than any other year.

For a phenomenon that people are sure doesn’t happen, it’s a staggeringly high number. That’s just under 150 people whose lives were put on trial and displaced. When it comes to wrongful convictions, any little detail that is misused or misrepresented to the jury could be a factor. While a person may have committed a crime, if they were not granted a fair trial, it could be considered a wrongful conviction, and a new trial should be granted. When someone is convicted on the word of a key witness, the court and jury must be given all the information they can about that witness. And if something were to be amiss... It changed the entire case.

There’s controversy around women who kill already. But, there’s even more controversy around the idea of a woman who is convicted of murder, but wrongly convicted. Of course, when it comes to things like this, the only people who know the truth are the murderer, and the murdered. We can speculate the details all we want and come up with our own conclusion, but it will be just that: our own conclusion. In the case of Holly McFeeture, there’s just enough suspicion for many people to believe that she should be granted a second chance at defending her freedom.

On July 20th, 2006, Matthew Podolak began experiencing lower back pain. It was so severe, that his fiance, Holly McFeeture, called 911 to assist him in getting to the hospital. It’s easy to assume that Podolak was no stranger to being roughed up. After all, he was an outdoorsman. Podolak loved fishing, and he was an avid hockey player. The sport itself was well known for being rough on the body. But all the same, the pain in his lower back seemed to be getting worse and worse. When he showed up at the emergency room, doctors were confused. Podolak was in extreme pain, He was vomiting, disoriented and confused. Doctor’s weren’t sure what to make of his symptoms and quickly began trying to figure out what had gone wrong.

Finally, after searching for the source of the pain, doctors concluded that something must be wrong with his kidneys. Kidney pain can cause severe pain in the lower back since that’s where our kidneys are located on the inside. Podolak wasn’t new to illness. In fact, Podolak had been chronically ill for some time. Not only that, but he had fallen into a depression in the weeks leading up to his death. Despite all of the doctor’s efforts in flushing out his kidneys and keeping Podolak alive, he didn’t make it out of the hospital.

Later that same day, Matthew Podolak was already dead. The doctor’s found that there was a chemical in his system. No one was sure how it got in there. Podolak was a factory worker. He worked at Phoenix INdustrial Finishes, which was a company owned by his uncle. Perhaps he had been exposed to chemicals there. Conditions in factories are notoriously dangerous, and exposure to strange chemicals isn’t as uncommon as we want to believe. As they attempted to figure out the exact cause of his death, doctor’s began to place blame on an accidental exposure at his job. This was the conclusion, up until an autopsy was performed on Podolak that revealed an even more sinister cause.

The autopsy found traces of ethylene glycol in Podolak’s system. Ethylene glycol is a chemical found in antifreeze, and it’s incredibly toxic to humans. The reason that the doctors were having such a hard time pinpointing it, is because the toxic chemical causes symptoms that can often be mistaken for other illnesses. The pain in Podolak’s kidneys, however, was right on par with ethylene glycol poisoning, since death by kidney failure is most common. While the autopsy found this chemical in his system, that wasn’t the most surprising fact. Rather than finding evidence that Podolak had drunk, or been administered, a large amount all at once, the autopsy showed signs of chronic poisoning to his system.

The news of Matthew Podolak’s death and the cause was devastating to his family - as well as his fiance at the time, Holly McFeeture. Holly was a well-loved woman. She and Podolak lived together in Cleveland, Ohio. The couple met in 2003 and began dating not long after. It wasn’t long, either, until they moved in together, getting a home in Cleveland. Podolak was, according to friends and family, more than pleased to be settling down. Holly didn’t seem to mind it, either. Together, they began their seemingly perfect, suburban family.

They had two children together. Their daughter, Samantha, was two at the time of Podolak’s death, and their son, Joshua was only six months old. Holly also had a daughter from a previous relationship. Despite eight-year-old Michaela not being Podolak’s biological daughter, he took her in like his own.

According to Dennis Owen, one of Podolak’s closest friends, there was something off about the relationship. Owen had been there the night that Podolak and Holly first met, and he described feeling bad vibes about the whole situation. According to Owen, he had tried to talk to his friend about his bad feelings when it came to Holly McFeeture, but Podolak would hear nothing of it. He continued on with the relationship, and within a year their first child had been born.

By 2005, just two years after their relationship began, Podolak and Holly were already having trouble. According to family members and friends, the relationship was strained and argumentative. Russell Hersey, another one of Podolak’s close friends, described how Podolak would spend many nights over at his house in an effort to escape the stress of his home life. According to Hersey, he often tried to get Podolak to leave the relationship. Even though it was strained, and Podolak clearly had many issues to work out with Holly, he continued to go back each time. During the times that Podolak would come and stay with him, Hersey described his friend as angry upset, crying upset, sometimes fearful". Due to the trouble at home, and the children in the house, Hersey told Podolak that he should remove any guns in the house, just to be safe.

Several weeks before his death, Podolak took Hersey’s advice. He showed up to Owen’s house one day, and brought his guns and asked Owen to keep them. According to Owen, when Podolak showed up he was very confused, scared and troubled. But Podolak’s close friends weren’t the only ones who testified that the relationship between Holly McFeeture and Matthew Podolak was troublesome. Even Podolak’s plant manager, Sharon Smith, said that she, too, tried to convince Podolak to end his relationship with Holly. According to those that knew Holly McFeeture and Matthew Podolak closely, Podolak had a 401(k) plan, as well as a life insurance policy, that Holly happened to be the beneficiary of. As the relationship became more and more toxic, Podolak’s friends all encouraged him to remove Holly’s name from those plans.

In 2006, around springtime, Podolak’s friends and family began to notice that his health was deteriorating. He had begun to gain weight and had difficulty moving around. As an avid outdoorsman and hockey player, Podolak was quite physically fit. But as winter turned into spring that year of 2006, Podolak’s health began to take a shift. Hersey told Podolak that he should go see a doctor, and when Podolak called Hersey to ask where the doctor’s office was, Hersey said that he had heard Holly screaming in the background, calling Podolak stupid for not being able to find the doctor’s office.

Still, Podolak did manage to go see a doctor in July of 2006. He was diagnosed with kidney stones and was given some medication to help with the pain while they passed. He went to the doctor on July 26th, and by July 31st, Podolak was dead. In the days leading up to his death, Podolak’s friends and family had contact with him several times.

The day before Podolak passed away, he had spoken with his father about a family outing that he had planned. Despite all of the contention in his relationship with Holly, he still wanted to make his family work. That same evening, Podolak, Hersey, and Owen all hung out together. Podolak wasn’t fairing very well. He was in extreme pain and had seemed to have gained even more weight than the last time Hersey had seen him. Seeing their friend in such terrible condition worried both Hersey and Owen, and they even tried, once more, to get Podolak to drop Holly from his life insurance and 401(k) plane.

When Podolak returned home, Holly seemed immediately worried. She called Podolak’s father to tell him that she had called 911 and that she was worried that there was something seriously wrong with her fiance. It was at the hospital, there, that Podolak finally passed away, a day after being admitted to the emergency room.

While the police immediately suspected Holly, there were other suspects to look into, as well. Not to mention, there wasn’t any evidence that would lead to Holly’s definite arrest. As police investigated the murder, there was some evidence that led back to the factory that Podolak worked at, specifically a jealous co-worker. But nothing became of it. Suicide had been ruled out, but the manner in which Podolak was poisoned was definite cause to suspect murder.

Mark Podolak, Matthew’s brother, was insistent that it was someone close to home. He didn’t believe that this was a slow suicide, or a poisoning by a co-worker, or even an accident from his brother’s job at the factory. Someone clearly wanted Matthew Podolak dead and had the access to him every single day to make sure that it happened. Mark Podolak suspected Holly McFeeture as well. It seemed like the families were split at a crossroads: Podolak’s family was insistent on Holly’s guilt, and Holly’s family didn’t believe she could have done something so horrific to her fiance.

In the days and weeks following Podolak’s death, several of Holly’s closest friends had the opportunity to observe her behavior. Rebecca Vega, a friend of Holly’s, reached out in support during the