Poison Plot

A "kaleidoscope of deception "

WANTED: EXPERTS IN POISONS AND CHEMICAL AGENTS WITH ACCESS TO SAME. That ad, in the paramilitary journals Gung-Ho and Soldier of Fortune, was not submitted by one of the adventurers and mercenaries who commonly read them; it was placed by William Chanslor, former president of the Houston Trial Lawyers Association. His mission: to end the life of his invalid wife painlessly and undetectably. But by last week his scheme had unraveled in a fashion so bizarre that his wife was pleading his innocence in court while prosecutors played tapes of him planning her death. Nonetheless, the jury unhesitatingly convicted Chanslor of soliciting the commission of a felony, then sentenced him to only three years in prison and a $5,000 fine, instead of a possible 20 years and $10,000.

By Texas standards of macho, money and murder, it was an almost refined case. Chanslor (who is worth a mere million) contrived a poison plan that was a virtual Agatha Christie plot with its intricacies and intrigue. In the prosecution's words, his mind was "a kaleidoscope of deception."

Three years ago, a stroke turned Susan Chanslor, then 39, from an athletic, vivacious woman into a wheelchair-bound cripple with some brain damage and recurring bouts of headaches and depression. Two years later Chanslor rented a post office box using a fake name and address, then placed his ads in Gung-Ho and Soldier of Fortune. He received several replies, but last fall the energetic attorney came across a promising five-volume set of books titled How to Kill, by John Minnery, a Canadian weapons expert. Chanslor telephoned Minnery, whom he refers to as Dr. Death, to ask about undetectable poisons, and they began a series of monthly conversations. One topic: D.D.V.P., which, Chanslor told Minnery, someone in Texas would sell him for $750. Minnery replied that D.D.V.P., which is used in Shell No-Pest insecticide strips, among other things, could easily be purchased for less than $10.

Chanslor apparently abandoned the No-Pest idea but asked to meet with Minnery in Toronto last April to talk about another poison, ricin, which is derived from the castor bean and is difficult to trace even when a doctor knows to look for it. By this time, says Minnery, he had concluded that the discussions were perhaps not entirely academic, and he alerted Ontario police, who in turn contacted Houston authorities. A tape recording was made of the Toronto meeting at which Chanslor paid $500 to have a capsule of ricin brought to him in Houston. During the Houston meeting, on a videotape later shown to the jury, Chanslor handed over $2,500 for the capsule (which was actually vitamin C). Moments later Chanslor was arrested.

His defense was that he was really a devoted husband who sought out a poison only after months of pleading by his despondent wife. Under Texas law, aiding a suicide is a misdemeanor carrying a maximum punishment of a $200 fine. Why did the poison have to be so undetectable? His lawyers contended that he was hoping to spare his nine-year-old son the stigma of a family suicide by making the death seem an inexplicable consequence of the stroke. Susan Chanslor took the stand to support her husband's story. "I discussed with Bill the possibility of ending my own life," she told the jury. "He was a typical husband. He wouldn't listen to me."

But, asked Prosecutor Brad Beers on crossexamination, had not Mrs. Chanslor first told investigators that she did not ask her husband to get her poison and that she had no intention of committing suicide? She conceded that she had. A prosecution witness also testified that at the Toronto meeting Chanslor said, "This bitch is really getting to me." He denied it, and the tape was fuzzy. The tape, however, clearly caught him saying that suicide was an "impossibility. We talked about it, and then the person backed out."

In light of all the evidence, why was his wife still supporting him? "She was under his dominion," argues Prosecutor Beers. "She's like a mother who says, 'Oh, Johnny couldn't have done that!' when she learned about a crime he committed." It took the jurors just 2 1/2 hours to agree with the prosecutor's version. But at trial's end, with Chanslor free on bond pending his appeal, little seemed to have changed. "I intend to take care of her as I always have," Chanslor said as he wheeled his wife out of the courtroom and she held his arm. And to her he added, "It's O.K., honey, I'm not going away for a while."

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