This is not for kids. They chose victims at the nursing home where they worked with the intention that the murder victim's initials would spell M-U-R-D-E-R. No.
What? What? It was a game. What? Murder. For over 20 years, nurses have been rated the most trusted profession.
But nurses are terrible people too. Join us for a discussion about nurse crimes hosted by nurses. Welcome to this bonus episode where nurses' aides are terrible people too.
This is Nurse Dorothea. This is Nurse Ratched. This is Nurse Lillian.
And together we have 63, was it 63? Yeah, 63. Together we have 63 years of nursing experience. Today I'm going to tell the story of the lethal lovers, Gwendolyn Graham and Kathy Wood.
This is a story of people who are caregivers, who also care about each other, and then fuck it up with this weird ass murder. Kathy Wood was born in Soap Lake, Washington on March 7th, 1962. She got married as a teenager.
The marriage ended in divorce after seven years. She was working as a nurse's aide supervisor at the Alpine Manor skilled nursing facility in Walker, Michigan, which is a suburb of Grand Rapids. Gwendolyn Graham was born August 6th, 1963 in California, but grew up in Texas.
She got a job as a nursing aide in the Alpine Manor nursing home. And Kathy Wood was her immediate supervisor. In July 1985, Kathy and Gwen became fast friends.
They hung out. They went to bars and started having casual sex. Things got more intense and by late 1986, things started getting serious.
Way too serious. Isn't it already serious when you're dating your boss? Oh boy, it gets even worse. They had an intense, volatile relationship.
Gwen liked things rough and dangerous. She would choke Kathy or cover her mouth until she would black out. The motive was to create something that would bind them together forever.
You couldn't have just gotten matching tattoos? Right, like on your ring finger or something like that with each other's names or like maybe each other's names tattooed on your lip. You know how people do that? That's not okay. Or like on their neck.
So many other options really. You know, it's something to bind them together forever. Couldn't you just take a blood pact? What is that called? You both cut your hand or something and you... Blood brothers.
That would be better. Maybe you could have just been blood sisters. Blood sisters.
With your boss. That's a really awkward yearly review. So sit down in my office while we choke each other out and do your yearly review.
Nurses Are Terrible People Too does not endorse voluntary blood pacts. In the event of an involuntary blood pact, please refer to your emergency manual. A detective working on the case was told of an incident where they had gotten into a fight and Gwen dragged Kathy by her hair to the bedroom.
Somehow, this escalated into plotting actual murder. Well, of course. Why wouldn't it? They chose victims at the nursing home where they worked with the intention that the murder victim's initials would spell M-U-R-D-E-R.
No. What? What? It was a game. Murder.
The murder initial part of the game didn't work because the intended murder victims fought back too much and Gwen couldn't kill them. Well, how is she trying? She tried by smothering. Pillow therapy.
Pillow therapy. And she couldn't make that happen. These people are in a nursing home? Yeah, yeah.
And you can't make that happen? Well, then she decided to change the trajectory and she chose victims who had severe Alzheimer's and couldn't fight back. Oh. That is awful.
They were both very well liked by their patients and they were very well liked by their co-workers. Everybody liked them. Oh, really? Wow.
But nobody thought, hey, you're doing the boss. From January to April 1987, they committed five murders. Gwen doing the killing while Kathy being the lookout.
Gwen would kill the patients by smothering them with a washcloth. Oh. What? The sexual escalation would excite them so much that sometimes they would immediately have sex after the murder in a spare room.
Oh. In a spare room? Come on. Is it only spare because of your last victim? Exactly.
Haven't got any bales in there yet. I don't like this. Kathy and Gwen kept some souvenirs and oddly told other co-workers about the murders.
What? No one took them seriously. No one believed them. Wow.
Wow. Even if you did believe them, who are you going to tell? The boss? Right. Ghostbusters? Maybe that's why.
Maybe everybody got scared and they're like, ah, just don't say anything. Don't mess with them. Do you think it was a situation where, just like in other nursing fields, where there is a high death rate? Right.
You often make jokes about death and it's not because you're a terrible person. It's because if you don't laugh, you're going to cry. Yeah.
And so I'm sure to offset some of the trauma of just having their patients die randomly all the time. All the time. They joke about it, right? Totally could be.
I joke all the time about really inappropriate stuff. Absolutely. Yeah, absolutely.
Yeah. It is a coping mechanism. Yeah.
Right. What else are you going to think if your co-worker is actually telling you this? You wouldn't think my co-worker is killing someone and stupid enough to confess. You're going to think it's a joke.
Yeah. Especially if it's somebody that you like. They were very popular at work.
Yeah. Like the patients liked them. Everybody liked them.
Wow. I want to know what word they ended up spelling. Yeah, I don't think it was like P-P-R-I-I-S-Y.
It didn't spell anything, goddammit. Darn it. Curses.
Curses. And now a word from our alleged sponsors. Do you fall asleep on your commute home from a 12-hour night shift? Are you exhausted from caring for a fussy newborn? Are you struggling to keep your eyes open after pulling an all-nighter? Try SlapPack.
SlapPack is a USB rechargeable device designed to deliver a therapeutic slap to the face at the first sign of fatigue. SlapPack is fully customizable in timing and force of slap. Slap your way to a better day.
SlapPack saves the world. SlapPack from the makers of smelling salts. They called the game I love you forever and a day.
The word day being in reference to a murder. So after the five murders, it was I love you forever and five days. Whoa.
Yeah. Ew. So they could just keep referencing it and they were excited by it obviously.
Found it to be something that bound them. Now how'd they get caught? Well. Let me go on.
No one can say for sure, but some believe Kathy concocted the game to keep Gwen close when it was discovered that Gwen was interested in another woman. Shockingly, the relationship did not last. How? They were perfect for each other.
They were perfectly murderous. Wonderful. Who else are you going to find to smother people with you? No.
Bond was broken. Was not forever in five days. It was only three fucking months.
Really? That's pretty short. It's all in three months? This is all in three months. From.
What? What did I say? January to April 1987. This, all this happened. Wow.
Yeah. Kathy transferred to a different shift and Gwen became involved with another woman and then went to work at a different facility. Gwen ended up working at a hospital with infants.
Kathy kept in communication with Gwen, but Gwen started telling her that she wanted to, quote, smash a baby. Oh. This is when Kathy decided she needed to tell someone.
This. This was. Is when you decide.
This is it. Oh, you don't. You can kill old people.
That's fine. But if you're going to start killing babies, that's going to be the line I draw in the sand. Or was it the word smash? Like if you just smother the baby, it's fine.
But you said smash. I'm telling. I don't like that.
So Kathy decided to tell her ex-husband, Ken. Ken took 14 months to finally talk to the police about the confession. Whoa.
I'm just Ken. I am Ken-uff. He was not Ken-uff because he took 14 months.
I know he was. Oh, Ken's job was not detective. All right.
So in answer to your question, about 40-ish patients had died at Alpine Manor during the murder spree. And this wasn't an unusual amount of deaths. Oh, that seems like a lot.
Well, wait, wait. But 40, but only five of them were. Murdered.
Murdered. Okay. Well, I mean, that's kind of a lot.
I mean, you already had 35. So what's five more? It's not actually that. It's not like alarm bells.
That's what the article said, that it wasn't alarm bells. At first, police didn't believe it either. But upon closer examination and the report of Ken and some co-workers about the confessions, Kathy and Gwen did get arrested for five murders.
Finally. So the trial, the investigation primarily started with interviews with Kathy Wood. She pinned Gwen as the mastermind and hands-on killer.
Two of the nursing home victims were exhumed while the others had been cremated. It could not be determined by any physical evidence, but the medical examiner still ruled the deaths as homicide based on the interviews that Kathy had given to police. Kathy plea bargained for a reduced sentence.
Gwen maintained her innocence and testified that the alleged murders were part of a mind game played by Kathy. But Gwen's new girlfriend revealed that Gwen had confessed to the five killings. Good night.
Can somebody wear a wire? Come on. Once again, stop blabbing. Right.
First you tell all your co-workers, then you tell your new girlfriend. And then you tell Ken. And then you tell Ken.
Or what if the new girlfriend had gotten killed? Yeah. That's pretty ballsy to hear that confession. And still go out with somebody? It's not going to happen to me.
Ballsy, ballsy. Gwen was convicted of five counts of first degree murder and one count of conspiracy for killing severely incapacitated people. Kathy was sentenced to 20 to 40 years for one count of second degree murder and one count of conspiracy to murder by acting as the lookout.
Is that because she pled guilty? I think so. So she got a better deal. Did any of the families, did they find out? What did they do? Yes, they ended up suing Alpine Manor and Alpine Manor closed.
Of course. Yeah. Catherine Wood was released in January 2020 and moved to South Carolina after serving 30 years.
And then you deserve a pandemic. Gwen Graham is still serving a life sentence without possibility for parole in Tyler, Texas. But an author named Lowell Caulfield extensively researched the case and wrote a book called Forever in Five Days.
He paints Kathy as the actual mastermind of the murders. Kathy was trying to exact revenge on Gwen leaving her for another woman. It could be just salacious gossip to sell books, but Jimmy Kripitz, what twists and turns.
Can you imagine being so butthurt about getting dumped by someone that you were with for three months that you're willing to go away for 30 years over fake stories of murder? Whoa. Yeah, you're not gonna make that up. And if you did make it up, you're not gonna make it up about yourself included.
Right. I had nothing to do with it. It was all her.
Or you use your, she was the boss, right? She was the boss. You could have just used your power as the boss to exact revenge in some way. Yeah.
Don't give her a good reference. So many better options. So many better options than confessing your own murders.
Come on. Come on. In summary, if your relationship needs the spice of murder, consider just breaking it off.
It may seem hard, but three months really isn't that long. And probably three months from now, you will consider a whole new relationship. 100%.
And get really good at Scrabble for those letters. P-P-Y-S-I. What can I make out of these initials? Wow.
That's a crazy story. And now, to restore your faith in nurses. Polly Collins was a nurse on her way to work when she was accosted by a passenger on a train.
Stephen Breed intervened and told the attacker off. Afterward, his heart was racing and he collapsed with a heart attack. Polly immediately started CPR and saved her rescuer.
Thanks for hanging out with us for the shift. In lieu of a Press Ganey survey, please leave us a five-star review. We are at Terrible Nurses Pod on Instagram and TikTok as long as it lasts.
Email us at TerribleNursesPod at gmail.com. This podcast is for entertainment purposes only.
What? What? It was a game. What? Murder. For over 20 years, nurses have been rated the most trusted profession.
But nurses are terrible people too. Join us for a discussion about nurse crimes hosted by nurses. Welcome to this bonus episode where nurses' aides are terrible people too.
This is Nurse Dorothea. This is Nurse Ratched. This is Nurse Lillian.
And together we have 63, was it 63? Yeah, 63. Together we have 63 years of nursing experience. Today I'm going to tell the story of the lethal lovers, Gwendolyn Graham and Kathy Wood.
This is a story of people who are caregivers, who also care about each other, and then fuck it up with this weird ass murder. Kathy Wood was born in Soap Lake, Washington on March 7th, 1962. She got married as a teenager.
The marriage ended in divorce after seven years. She was working as a nurse's aide supervisor at the Alpine Manor skilled nursing facility in Walker, Michigan, which is a suburb of Grand Rapids. Gwendolyn Graham was born August 6th, 1963 in California, but grew up in Texas.
She got a job as a nursing aide in the Alpine Manor nursing home. And Kathy Wood was her immediate supervisor. In July 1985, Kathy and Gwen became fast friends.
They hung out. They went to bars and started having casual sex. Things got more intense and by late 1986, things started getting serious.
Way too serious. Isn't it already serious when you're dating your boss? Oh boy, it gets even worse. They had an intense, volatile relationship.
Gwen liked things rough and dangerous. She would choke Kathy or cover her mouth until she would black out. The motive was to create something that would bind them together forever.
You couldn't have just gotten matching tattoos? Right, like on your ring finger or something like that with each other's names or like maybe each other's names tattooed on your lip. You know how people do that? That's not okay. Or like on their neck.
So many other options really. You know, it's something to bind them together forever. Couldn't you just take a blood pact? What is that called? You both cut your hand or something and you... Blood brothers.
That would be better. Maybe you could have just been blood sisters. Blood sisters.
With your boss. That's a really awkward yearly review. So sit down in my office while we choke each other out and do your yearly review.
Nurses Are Terrible People Too does not endorse voluntary blood pacts. In the event of an involuntary blood pact, please refer to your emergency manual. A detective working on the case was told of an incident where they had gotten into a fight and Gwen dragged Kathy by her hair to the bedroom.
Somehow, this escalated into plotting actual murder. Well, of course. Why wouldn't it? They chose victims at the nursing home where they worked with the intention that the murder victim's initials would spell M-U-R-D-E-R.
No. What? What? It was a game. Murder.
The murder initial part of the game didn't work because the intended murder victims fought back too much and Gwen couldn't kill them. Well, how is she trying? She tried by smothering. Pillow therapy.
Pillow therapy. And she couldn't make that happen. These people are in a nursing home? Yeah, yeah.
And you can't make that happen? Well, then she decided to change the trajectory and she chose victims who had severe Alzheimer's and couldn't fight back. Oh. That is awful.
They were both very well liked by their patients and they were very well liked by their co-workers. Everybody liked them. Oh, really? Wow.
But nobody thought, hey, you're doing the boss. From January to April 1987, they committed five murders. Gwen doing the killing while Kathy being the lookout.
Gwen would kill the patients by smothering them with a washcloth. Oh. What? The sexual escalation would excite them so much that sometimes they would immediately have sex after the murder in a spare room.
Oh. In a spare room? Come on. Is it only spare because of your last victim? Exactly.
Haven't got any bales in there yet. I don't like this. Kathy and Gwen kept some souvenirs and oddly told other co-workers about the murders.
What? No one took them seriously. No one believed them. Wow.
Wow. Even if you did believe them, who are you going to tell? The boss? Right. Ghostbusters? Maybe that's why.
Maybe everybody got scared and they're like, ah, just don't say anything. Don't mess with them. Do you think it was a situation where, just like in other nursing fields, where there is a high death rate? Right.
You often make jokes about death and it's not because you're a terrible person. It's because if you don't laugh, you're going to cry. Yeah.
And so I'm sure to offset some of the trauma of just having their patients die randomly all the time. All the time. They joke about it, right? Totally could be.
I joke all the time about really inappropriate stuff. Absolutely. Yeah, absolutely.
Yeah. It is a coping mechanism. Yeah.
Right. What else are you going to think if your co-worker is actually telling you this? You wouldn't think my co-worker is killing someone and stupid enough to confess. You're going to think it's a joke.
Yeah. Especially if it's somebody that you like. They were very popular at work.
Yeah. Like the patients liked them. Everybody liked them.
Wow. I want to know what word they ended up spelling. Yeah, I don't think it was like P-P-R-I-I-S-Y.
It didn't spell anything, goddammit. Darn it. Curses.
Curses. And now a word from our alleged sponsors. Do you fall asleep on your commute home from a 12-hour night shift? Are you exhausted from caring for a fussy newborn? Are you struggling to keep your eyes open after pulling an all-nighter? Try SlapPack.
SlapPack is a USB rechargeable device designed to deliver a therapeutic slap to the face at the first sign of fatigue. SlapPack is fully customizable in timing and force of slap. Slap your way to a better day.
SlapPack saves the world. SlapPack from the makers of smelling salts. They called the game I love you forever and a day.
The word day being in reference to a murder. So after the five murders, it was I love you forever and five days. Whoa.
Yeah. Ew. So they could just keep referencing it and they were excited by it obviously.
Found it to be something that bound them. Now how'd they get caught? Well. Let me go on.
No one can say for sure, but some believe Kathy concocted the game to keep Gwen close when it was discovered that Gwen was interested in another woman. Shockingly, the relationship did not last. How? They were perfect for each other.
They were perfectly murderous. Wonderful. Who else are you going to find to smother people with you? No.
Bond was broken. Was not forever in five days. It was only three fucking months.
Really? That's pretty short. It's all in three months? This is all in three months. From.
What? What did I say? January to April 1987. This, all this happened. Wow.
Yeah. Kathy transferred to a different shift and Gwen became involved with another woman and then went to work at a different facility. Gwen ended up working at a hospital with infants.
Kathy kept in communication with Gwen, but Gwen started telling her that she wanted to, quote, smash a baby. Oh. This is when Kathy decided she needed to tell someone.
This. This was. Is when you decide.
This is it. Oh, you don't. You can kill old people.
That's fine. But if you're going to start killing babies, that's going to be the line I draw in the sand. Or was it the word smash? Like if you just smother the baby, it's fine.
But you said smash. I'm telling. I don't like that.
So Kathy decided to tell her ex-husband, Ken. Ken took 14 months to finally talk to the police about the confession. Whoa.
I'm just Ken. I am Ken-uff. He was not Ken-uff because he took 14 months.
I know he was. Oh, Ken's job was not detective. All right.
So in answer to your question, about 40-ish patients had died at Alpine Manor during the murder spree. And this wasn't an unusual amount of deaths. Oh, that seems like a lot.
Well, wait, wait. But 40, but only five of them were. Murdered.
Murdered. Okay. Well, I mean, that's kind of a lot.
I mean, you already had 35. So what's five more? It's not actually that. It's not like alarm bells.
That's what the article said, that it wasn't alarm bells. At first, police didn't believe it either. But upon closer examination and the report of Ken and some co-workers about the confessions, Kathy and Gwen did get arrested for five murders.
Finally. So the trial, the investigation primarily started with interviews with Kathy Wood. She pinned Gwen as the mastermind and hands-on killer.
Two of the nursing home victims were exhumed while the others had been cremated. It could not be determined by any physical evidence, but the medical examiner still ruled the deaths as homicide based on the interviews that Kathy had given to police. Kathy plea bargained for a reduced sentence.
Gwen maintained her innocence and testified that the alleged murders were part of a mind game played by Kathy. But Gwen's new girlfriend revealed that Gwen had confessed to the five killings. Good night.
Can somebody wear a wire? Come on. Once again, stop blabbing. Right.
First you tell all your co-workers, then you tell your new girlfriend. And then you tell Ken. And then you tell Ken.
Or what if the new girlfriend had gotten killed? Yeah. That's pretty ballsy to hear that confession. And still go out with somebody? It's not going to happen to me.
Ballsy, ballsy. Gwen was convicted of five counts of first degree murder and one count of conspiracy for killing severely incapacitated people. Kathy was sentenced to 20 to 40 years for one count of second degree murder and one count of conspiracy to murder by acting as the lookout.
Is that because she pled guilty? I think so. So she got a better deal. Did any of the families, did they find out? What did they do? Yes, they ended up suing Alpine Manor and Alpine Manor closed.
Of course. Yeah. Catherine Wood was released in January 2020 and moved to South Carolina after serving 30 years.
And then you deserve a pandemic. Gwen Graham is still serving a life sentence without possibility for parole in Tyler, Texas. But an author named Lowell Caulfield extensively researched the case and wrote a book called Forever in Five Days.
He paints Kathy as the actual mastermind of the murders. Kathy was trying to exact revenge on Gwen leaving her for another woman. It could be just salacious gossip to sell books, but Jimmy Kripitz, what twists and turns.
Can you imagine being so butthurt about getting dumped by someone that you were with for three months that you're willing to go away for 30 years over fake stories of murder? Whoa. Yeah, you're not gonna make that up. And if you did make it up, you're not gonna make it up about yourself included.
Right. I had nothing to do with it. It was all her.
Or you use your, she was the boss, right? She was the boss. You could have just used your power as the boss to exact revenge in some way. Yeah.
Don't give her a good reference. So many better options. So many better options than confessing your own murders.
Come on. Come on. In summary, if your relationship needs the spice of murder, consider just breaking it off.
It may seem hard, but three months really isn't that long. And probably three months from now, you will consider a whole new relationship. 100%.
And get really good at Scrabble for those letters. P-P-Y-S-I. What can I make out of these initials? Wow.
That's a crazy story. And now, to restore your faith in nurses. Polly Collins was a nurse on her way to work when she was accosted by a passenger on a train.
Stephen Breed intervened and told the attacker off. Afterward, his heart was racing and he collapsed with a heart attack. Polly immediately started CPR and saved her rescuer.
Thanks for hanging out with us for the shift. In lieu of a Press Ganey survey, please leave us a five-star review. We are at Terrible Nurses Pod on Instagram and TikTok as long as it lasts.
Email us at TerribleNursesPod at gmail.com. This podcast is for entertainment purposes only.
