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Eva Dugan
Eva Dugan (1878 – February 21, 1930) was a convicted murderer whose execution by hanging at the state prison in Florence, Arizona, resulted in her decapitation and influenced the state of Arizona to replace hanging with the lethal gas chamber as a method of execution.
Born in Salisbury, Missouri, in 1878, Dugan later married and had two children (a son and a daughter) but her husband abandoned the family, leaving them destitute. Dugan relocated to Juneau, Territory of Alaska, after trekking north during the Klondike Gold Rush of 1896–1899, and became a cabaret singer and worked as a prostitute to support herself and her children. Many years later, she moved to Pima County, Arizona, where she worked for an elderly chicken rancher, Andrew J. Mathis, as a housekeeper. Mathis had previously served nearly seven years in federal prison for his role in the lynchings of two Native American teenagers in Oklahoma in 1898. In 1899, he was convicted of kidnapping for having set fire to the brush heaped around the victims.
Dugan became a live-in housekeeper of Andrew J. Mathis, wealthy owner of a chicken ranch. Very quickly the employer/employee relationship became cantankerous. The two often bickered with each other because Mathis hated Dugan's cooking and was not satisfied with her work and Mathis was demanding, abrasive and difficult to get along with. Mathis fired Dugan and told her to leave his property by morning. The next morning, January 27, 1927, Mathis disappeared, as did some of his possessions, his Dodge coupe automobile, and his cash box. Neighbors reported that Dugan had tried to sell some of his possessions before she disappeared as well.
The police discovered Dugan had a father in California and a daughter in White Plains, New York. Though Dugan refused to give information about the identity of either of her children, police only found her daughter, leaving the identity of her son a secret. She had been married five times. One of them had left her for another woman, while the other four had mysteriously disappeared. She sold the Dodge coupe for $600 in Kansas City, Missouri. She was arrested in White Plains when a postal clerk, alerted by the police, intercepted a postcard to her from her father in California. She was extradited to Arizona to face automobile theft charges. She was found guilty and sentenced to nine months in prison.
Nine months later in October of the same year, a camper found Mathis' decomposed remains on his ranch. Dugan was tried for murder in a short trial based mostly on circumstantial evidence. During her testimony, Dugan said that Mathis believed that she had poisoned his breakfast food, but she claimed that he ate rotten meat in the form of a rabbit that had boils on it. Dugan also admitted that she had sex with Mathis on a weekly basis and performed prostitution at the ranch. According to her, if Mathis "saw any of the men on the street [in Tucson] that he thought was all right he would call them off and tell them to come on out to the house." She would perform sex acts for three dollars and give Mathis fifty cents from each transaction.
Dugan claimed that "Jack", a teenage boy who had come to the ranch for work, had accidentally killed Mathis with a retaliatory punch after Mathis beat him for refusing to milk a cow. According to her, Jack came to the house to tell her what he had done, and she and Jack both attempted to revive Mathis with mouth-to-mouth resuscitation after removing his false teeth. When that failed to revive him, they loaded the body into the coupe, and Jack drove it out alone to dump it and came back at five o'clock in the morning.
The prosecution proved to the jury's satisfaction that Dugan had murdered Mathis with an axe. After her conviction, in her final statement, she told the jurors, "Well, I'll die with my boots on, an' in full health. An' that's more'n most of you old coots'll be able to boast on." She remained defiant to the end.
To pay for her own coffin, Dugan gave interviews to the press for $1.00 each and sold embroidered handkerchiefs that she knitted while she was imprisoned. She also made for her hanging a silk, beaded "jazz dress", but later relented and wore a cheap dress as she was worried that her silk wrapper "might get mussed". She remained so upbeat that Time magazine called her "Cheerful Eva" in a March 3, 1930 story about her execution.
Eva Dugan
Eva Dugan (1878 – February 21, 1930) was a convicted murderer whose execution by hanging at the state prison in Florence, Arizona, resulted in her decapitation and influenced the state of Arizona to replace hanging with the lethal gas chamber as a method of execution.
Born in Salisbury, Missouri, in 1878, Dugan later married and had two children (a son and a daughter) but her husband abandoned the family, leaving them destitute. Dugan relocated to Juneau, Territory of Alaska, after trekking north during the Klondike Gold Rush of 1896–1899, and became a cabaret singer and worked as a prostitute to support herself and her children. Many years later, she moved to Pima County, Arizona, where she worked for an elderly chicken rancher, Andrew J. Mathis, as a housekeeper. Mathis had previously served nearly seven years in federal prison for his role in the lynchings of two Native American teenagers in Oklahoma in 1898. In 1899, he was convicted of kidnapping for having set fire to the brush heaped around the victims.
Dugan became a live-in housekeeper of Andrew J. Mathis, wealthy owner of a chicken ranch. Very quickly the employer/employee relationship became cantankerous. The two often bickered with each other because Mathis hated Dugan's cooking and was not satisfied with her work and Mathis was demanding, abrasive and difficult to get along with. Mathis fired Dugan and told her to leave his property by morning. The next morning, January 27, 1927, Mathis disappeared, as did some of his possessions, his Dodge coupe automobile, and his cash box. Neighbors reported that Dugan had tried to sell some of his possessions before she disappeared as well.
The police discovered Dugan had a father in California and a daughter in White Plains, New York. Though Dugan refused to give information about the identity of either of her children, police only found her daughter, leaving the identity of her son a secret. She had been married five times. One of them had left her for another woman, while the other four had mysteriously disappeared. She sold the Dodge coupe for $600 in Kansas City, Missouri. She was arrested in White Plains when a postal clerk, alerted by the police, intercepted a postcard to her from her father in California. She was extradited to Arizona to face automobile theft charges. She was found guilty and sentenced to nine months in prison.
Nine months later in October of the same year, a camper found Mathis' decomposed remains on his ranch. Dugan was tried for murder in a short trial based mostly on circumstantial evidence. During her testimony, Dugan said that Mathis believed that she had poisoned his breakfast food, but she claimed that he ate rotten meat in the form of a rabbit that had boils on it. Dugan also admitted that she had sex with Mathis on a weekly basis and performed prostitution at the ranch. According to her, if Mathis "saw any of the men on the street [in Tucson] that he thought was all right he would call them off and tell them to come on out to the house." She would perform sex acts for three dollars and give Mathis fifty cents from each transaction.
Dugan claimed that "Jack", a teenage boy who had come to the ranch for work, had accidentally killed Mathis with a retaliatory punch after Mathis beat him for refusing to milk a cow. According to her, Jack came to the house to tell her what he had done, and she and Jack both attempted to revive Mathis with mouth-to-mouth resuscitation after removing his false teeth. When that failed to revive him, they loaded the body into the coupe, and Jack drove it out alone to dump it and came back at five o'clock in the morning.
The prosecution proved to the jury's satisfaction that Dugan had murdered Mathis with an axe. After her conviction, in her final statement, she told the jurors, "Well, I'll die with my boots on, an' in full health. An' that's more'n most of you old coots'll be able to boast on." She remained defiant to the end.
To pay for her own coffin, Dugan gave interviews to the press for $1.00 each and sold embroidered handkerchiefs that she knitted while she was imprisoned. She also made for her hanging a silk, beaded "jazz dress", but later relented and wore a cheap dress as she was worried that her silk wrapper "might get mussed". She remained so upbeat that Time magazine called her "Cheerful Eva" in a March 3, 1930 story about her execution.