![]() Despite the tragic circumstances, the couple had attracted more stares than sympathy that day: many of those in attendance believed that, far from grieving for his stepdaughter, Maxwell had been the one who had murdered her. ![]() She was so overwhelmed after looking into the casket that she had to sit down, so her husband led her back to their pew. Up in front of them, Shirley Ann Ellington’s slight body rested in an open casket.Īfter some hymns and a eulogy extolling the teenager’s warmth and energy, the mourners came forward to say their goodbyes, including the preacher and his wife. Ceiling fans shuffled air around the chapel, and ushers offered paper fans to each of the 300 mourners as they made their way to the pews. It was a stifling day, and with only one storey in the funeral home, there was nowhere for the heat to rise. ![]() It was 18 June, 1977, and Maxwell, a rural preacher living just outside Alexander City, Alabama, was at the House of Hutchinson Funeral Home – not to conduct a service, but to attend one for his 16-year-old stepdaughter, who had been murdered the week before. ![]() But the Rev Willie Maxwell walked into a funeral that he never left. The dead arrive that way, and the living are supposed to leave that way. ![]()
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