It was your typical storybook romance …
Cynthia Coffman met James Marlow after his release from prison, they started smoking crack together, then got married. It was her 2nd and his 7th. In celebration, Cynthia got a tattoo saying “Property of the Folsom Wolf,” after Marlow’s nickname from his previous abode.
The pair would then roam the country, committing armed robbery to support their drug habit. They subsequently upped their game to murder, killing 4 young women in Arizona & California (plus maybe some guy in Kentucky). Typically, they would kidnap their victims, rape them, strangle them, then use their credit & ATM cards.
Cynthia was raised a devout Catholic in a wealthy St. Louis family. Things went south, though, when she became pregnant at 17. Forced to marry the father, she would not stay in the marriage long, abandoning both her husband and 2 children.
Fleeing to Arizona, she took up with a low-level drug dealer. After the pair were busted for a traffic violation in California, police found some meth and a handgun in Cynthia’s purse.
After getting off, Cynthia would later hook up with her boyfriend’s cellmate, Marlow. A career criminal, he was in and out of prisons his whole life. In them, he would join the Aryan Brotherhood and earn himself quite a reputation.
After leaving some evidence at one of their crimes, the pair were identified by the owner of a motel they were staying at in the California mountains. They were actually apprehended while out hiking.
In the subsequent trials, the two would turn on each other. In particular, Cynthia would plead battered woman syndrome, claiming that Marlow “burned her face with a cigarette, cut off her hair, stabbed her in the leg with a knife and offered her sexually to a friend.”
Both would receive the death penalty. And they’re both still around today. Cynthia is, in fact, the longest living women on death row (37 years & counting).
The pair appeared on Killer Couples.
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