Name Virginia Ridley | ||
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Died October 4, 1997, Ringgold, Georgia, United States | ||
Virginia Ridley (April 18, 1948 – October 4, 1997) was a woman from Ringgold, Georgia, whose death made headlines when her husband, Alvin, was arrested and charged with imprisoning her for almost three decades, then killing her.
Alvin and Virginia lived on the outskirts of Ringgold in a dilapidated, cockroach-infested house. He maintained that the reason why no one in Ringgold knew of her existence was because her family's opposition to their marriage led to her decision to live as a hermit. Virginia's family claimed that Alvin prevented all attempts by them to contact her.
At trial, Ridley maintained he and Virginia were happy and that he never harmed her. He produced what he claimed was her journal, consisting of 10,000 pages. His attorney theorized that Virginia—who suffered from agoraphobia, hypergraphia and epilepsy—died of an epileptic seizure, as had Florence Griffith-Joyner, whose autopsy he submitted as evidence. The prosecution maintained that Ridley suffocated her. After the jury deliberated for 2 hours and 14 minutes, he was acquitted. Alvin Ridley was represented throughout the case by Georgia criminal defense lawyer McCracken Poston, who discovered the evidentiary treasure trove of a three decade journal by Virginia Ridley and presented parts of it at trial.
The case was featured on the A&E program American Justice and Forensic Files. The radio storytelling program Snap Judgment had Poston explaining how he defended Alvin and discovered Virginia's documents in the Nov 27, 2015 episode "Dirty Work".