Hotmail
One heart, one widow connect suicides of 2 men
In January 1997, he and his wife met her for dinner at a romantic waterfront restaurant in Charleston. Graham couldn’t keep his eyes off the 30-year-old widow.
“I fell in love with Cheryl the first time we met,” he would later confess in a letter.
The feeling was apparently not mutual — at least, not at first.
That April, Cheryl married husband No. 3, George Watkins. Elaine and Sonny Graham attended the wedding, and Sonny — standing in for Cheryl’s late father — gave away the bride.
Cheryl bore Watkins a son in January 1999. Around that same time, Elaine Graham learned that her husband’s relationship with the younger woman was more than fatherly.
In a poignant letter, Graham apologized to his wife for being “the S.O.B. you said I was” and destroying “a relation that we had for 40 plus years.
“I let someone come between you + I, which should have never happened,” he wrote. “I look back on everything + see where I gave up love, + companion ship, for attention + affection. ... It would be wonderful if I could turn back our lives for the past four years.”
Both couples separated, and shortly after a judge declared the Grahams’ 38-year marriage over, in October 2001, Cheryl and Graham moved into a mobile home on land he’d bought in his hometown while he built a house to her specifications.
The domestic bliss did not last long.
A marriage crumbles
In May 2002, Cheryl left — and Graham promptly sued, accusing her of reneging on some loans and refusing to return a diamond ring. She alleged in a counterclaim that when she told Graham their relationship wasn’t going to work out, he “became more possessive” and threatened her.
In the midst of the court case, she married again. Husband No. 4, John B. Johnson, Jr., was a corrections officer at the Georgia prison where Cheryl had been working as a contract nurse.
But within a year, that marriage, too, began to crumble. On Thanksgiving 2003, sheriff’s deputies were called, and both husband and wife accused the other of domestic abuse.
During a Yuletide reconciliation, Johnson says, a chilling incident occurred. One evening, while they lay in bed, he says, Cheryl began talking about suicide. When she failed to return from a bathroom trip, Johnson went to investigate and says he found her clutching his .22 caliber revolver.
As they wrestled over the weapon, Johnson says, the children and Cheryl’s mother rushed in. He says Cheryl told them that he had gotten the gun and was threatening to shoot himself.
The couple separated. By the time the divorce was final in August 2004, Johnson says, Cheryl was already wearing Graham’s ring.
They married Dec. 8, 2004, at the Almost Heaven Resort in Gatlinburg, Tenn. He started a landscaping company and let Cheryl’s two oldest sons work for him.
A few days before their second wedding anniversary, the couple attended an event on Hilton Head to honor the families of organ donors. The Island Packet ran a story under the headline, “A love story unlike any told ...”
“It’s true what it says in the Bible,” Cheryl told the newspaper. “If you live God’s will and give with a happy heart, you will reap the rewards.”
Graham said he’d “put my life in God’s hands,” and Cheryl was the answer to his prayers.
Right up to his death, Graham was making plans for the future. He’d invited friends down to fish and was talking about the upcoming golf tournament.
What no one knew was that Graham had drawn up a will.
Larry Lockley says he went fishing with his uncle the last week of February, and afterward Graham showed him the will and asked if he’d be alternate executor.
“Ain’t nothing wrong, is there?” the nephew asked.
“Ain’t nothing wrong at all,” Graham replied. But, “You never know.”
He gave Lockley a copy and slipped another in a briefcase on a shelf at the back of the utility shed.
On March 20, the anniversary of his transplant, Graham left a playful message on his old pastor’s answering machine: “Do you remember where you were 13 years ago on this day?” When Keller called back, Graham said he and his heart were doing great.
That week, Carson went down to Lyons to fish for bream and bass with his old buddy. Graham didn’t complain about his marriage — that wasn’t like him. But something just wasn’t right.
“He just wasn’t the happy-go-lucky guy I’d known all my life,” says Carson.
A few days later, Graham’s loaned heart would stop beating for good.
A grieving widow?
In late April, shortly after Graham’s death, Cheryl visited Tomme Hilton, an old friend. Over drinks, she complained that Graham “didn’t leave me a dime.”
Apparently, Graham had blown through his retirement funds and run up large debts — about triple his assets — trying, as he once put it, “to keep (Cheryl) in the style she wants to live.” His affairs were in such disarray that both of the men designated as his executors, including Lockley, declined.
“I always thought my uncle was in pretty good financial standing,” Lockley says. “It was just a shock to me that his finances were in that bad condition.”
Cheryl Graham did not respond to repeated requests seeking comment. But those who know her say she did not act like a grieving widow.
On her MySpace account — now deactivated — her photo changed from a sweetly smiling portrait to pictures of her on a lake or drinking beer with friends. Her screen name changed, too, from simply “Cheryl” to “PrEttY LAdy,” then “BeaUtiFuL MeSs.”
Family members monitoring the account noticed that shortly after Graham’s death, she posted a man’s photo identifying him as her “new boyfriend.” A flirtatious message on the man’s Web page, from her account, was dated March 26 — six days before Graham’s death.
The man confirmed to The Associated Press that agents from the Georgia Bureau of Investigation had interviewed him. He told them he no longer sees Cheryl.
Although the Toombs County coroner ruled Graham’s death a suicide in late May, the GBI still hasn’t closed the case.
During a 2005 dispute over custody of their grandchildren, first husband Isaac “Bo” Carter said Cheryl called his North Carolina home and threatened to “blow my brains out w/her 38 pistol ...” A protective order was granted.
Johnson, husband No. 4, says anyone who gets involved with his ex-wife is in for an emotional roller coaster ride.
“One day she hates you and one day she loves you and the next day she hates you,” Johnson told the AP. “I guess I am lucky to be alive.”
After 13 borrowed years, it appears Graham no longer felt that way.
- Discuss Story On Newsvine
-
Rate Story:
View popularLowHigh - Instant Message
MORE FROM MORE HEALTH NEWS |
 More Health News Section Front |
| Add More Health News headlines to your news reader: |
Resource guide