Some of them had seen "the Duchess" when she entered San Quentin, a fox-faced, shabby murderess, bound for death in a gas chamber. Through the cell blocks the grapevine carried her story: that she (Juanita Spinelli), her common-law husband, Mike Simeone, and Thug Gordon Hawkins had drugged and drowned a gangster. Later another bulletin: a 30-day reprieve for the three by Governor Culbert Olson. Later still: "She's going to sniff it [lethal gas] just the same."
A few days later, Warden Clinton Duffy was told that a committee of convicts requested an interview. The committee filed into his office, stated their...