Marie Dean Arrington

Marie Dean Arrington (August 8, 1933 – May 10, 2014) was an American criminal. In 1969, she became the second woman to be placed on the list of FBI Ten Most Wanted Fugitives.

Arrington died on May 10, 2014, in Lowell Correctional Institution in Marion County, Florida, the same institution from which she escaped. She was 80 years old.

Murder of Vivian Ritter Arrington had two children, a son and daughter. In 1967 her son, Lloyd Dean, robbed a gas station with a friend in Leesburg, Florida. No one was hurt and $60 was stolen. Her son was represented by public attorney Bob Pierce, who advised him to plead guilty. Dean was sentenced to life in prison in 1968 at the age of 18, while his friend only received probation. Pierce had also represented Arrington's daughter on unrelated fraud charges, which resulted in the daughter receiving jail time as well.

This enraged Arrington, who felt that Pierce did not fairly represent Dean. Her car was discovered two days after her disappearance, bloodstained. The body of Ritter, who had three children, was found three days later in the woods near State road 44, several miles away from Leesburg. She had been shot and run over with her own car repeatedly.

Prior to her capture Arrington burgled the home of Judge Troy Hall, who had given her son his life sentence. On December 6, 1968, Arrington was sentenced to death for first degree murder.

Escape and later life On March 1, 1969, Arrington escaped from Florida Correctional Institution in her pajamas by cutting a window screen and jumping out. In May 1969, she was placed on the FBI’s 10 Most Wanted List, making her the second woman to ever be placed on the list. Arrington wasn't captured until three years later in March 1972. She fled to New Orleans and worked as a waitress. Arrington later described the feeling of being wanted as sounding like "the old wild wild West and the Jesse James Gang" and noted that reading newspapers about her being wanted dead or alive and the reward was entertaining.

For her escape Arrington was given an additional 10 years. Her death sentence was commuted to life in prison during August 1972, when the US Supreme Court declared capital punishment as unconstitutional. Marie Dean Arrington died from heart problems at age 80 on May 10, 2014.