The 48 Hours episode “The Widow on Solway Road” profiles Raynella Dossett Leath, the 68-year-old Tennessee woman was married to two men who both died under strange circumstances. Her first husband, Ed Dossett who was battling colon cancer at the time, was found dead in the couple’s corral in 1992. He reportedly died after being trampled by cattle. Six months later, Raynella married retired barber David Leath. In 2006, Raynella called 911 and reported that Leath had shot himself in the head. When police discovered that three shots had been fired, the suicide was considered a homicide, and authorities re-investigated the death of Raynella’s first husband. The autopsy showed he died from an overdose of morphine not from a cattle stampede. In 2008, Raynella was charged with the first-degree murder of David Leath. In 2010, she was found guilty of murder (Leath) and was sentenced to life in prison. In 2016, Raynella was released from prison pending a retrial. In 2017, the retrial judge declared that insufficient evidence had been presented and before the jury could decide the case, the judged declared that Raynella was not the murderer.
[Diane Fanning wrote the book: Her Deadly Web: The True Story of a Former Nurse and the Strange and Suspicious Deaths of Her Two Husbands]
Raynella did have an alibi for the day of Leath’s death which was presented by her defense attorneys. According to the defense, that morning Raynella’s youngest daughter left for high school at 8:20 a.m. Then she and Leath “watched televangelist Joyce Meyer on television together. She then made him breakfast and put clothes in the dryer before she left home” to visit Leath’s mother at Parkwest Medical Center. Hospital personnel confirmed that Raynella was at the hospital at that time. She also stopped by her daughter’s high school to deliver medicine because her daughter called to report that she wasn’t feeling well. That was at 10:45 a.m. When Raynella returned home, before entering the house, Raynella stopped to talk to a neighbor. She called 911 at 11:23 a.m. 48 Hours airs on Saturdays at 9pm and 10pm.
