Free Prescription: Murder! Volume 1: Authentic Cases From the Files of Alan Hynd by Noel Hynd, Alan Hynd, George Kaczender Page B

anticipated as much, and made prior plans to transport the prisoner to Elkton, expecting to avoid a riot. To his surprise, word had spread to all corners of Huron County and an even bigger crowd had gathered at the Elkton depot than the one that patiently waited to catch a glimpse of the no-good doctor at the depot in Bad Axe. Sheriff McAuley, to his credit, safely escorted the prisoner to his new cell in Jackson.
    By July, however, word came back to Huron County that Dr. MacGregor had gained employment within the prison confines, serving as an assistant to the prison physician. He continued to profess his innocence and vowed to work toward redeeming his freedom.
    In December of 1912, Dr. MacGregor’s attorney requested a new trial. New evidence supposedly came to light in the form of a written statement by a Mr. J.W. Douglas of Bingham. In the statement, Douglas alleged Scyrel had consumed dangerous amounts of patent tonics. Douglas saw a bottle fall from Scyrel’s coat pocket, the bottle filled with an arsenic concoction.
    Carrie Sparling, no doubt still carrying a torch for Doc MacGregor, took her surviving son, Ray, and moved far away. The State Supreme Court turned down MacGregor’s appeal on the grounds that there were not, as the physician was claiming, any legal flaws in the evidence presented against him at the trial.
    The Doc became a trusty in prison, then, of all things, the prison doctor. He would have a bad time occasionally when, in prescribing something for a sick prisoner, the con would squint at him and ask,
    “You sure there ain’t any arsenic in this stuff, Doc?” But aside from that, MacGregor seemed to be quite happy with his prison work. And the inmates developed a genuine affection for him.
    But yet, the strange case of Dr. MacGregor just wouldn’t die.
    MacGregor had been in prison almost four years, sending out hundreds of letters protesting his innocence. One day he dropped a long handwritten letter to Governor Woodbridge Ferris.
    Ferris had a special interest in medicine and the health of his constituents. During his term of office, a farm colony for epileptics was established in Michigan, as well as the Central Michigan Tuberculosis Sanatorium. He was popular and received the nickname, The Good Gray Governor. Because of MacGregor’s fine work as prison doctor, The Good Gray Governor became interested in Dr. MacGregor’s case and questioned several of the jurors.
    Two jurors informed the Governor that they would never have convicted MacGregor of the murder of Scyrel had not Boomhower indicated to them that MacGregor had poisoned Albert, too, something for which no one had ever been convicted. The Governor wondered how the Supreme Court had approved such a verdict. He decided to review the whole case. When he did, and when his assistants conducted a series of interviews around Ubly and Bad Axe, he found himself seeing the case in a new light.
    So one day in 1916 Ferris phoned the prison at Jackson and asked the warden to send Dr. MacGregor to his office. Without an escort. When MacGregor arrived in the state house, he received a full pardon. Governor Ferris would only said publicly that he had, “uncovered new evidence,” exonerating the doctor. But he would never said what it was.
    Then came the most curious turn of all.
    Released, a free man, MacGregor found he didn’t have a single friend in the outside world other than his wife Ida, who was still faithfully waiting for him when he received his pardon.
    But he had no patients, and people cast suspicious glances at him on the street. Carrie was long gone. He moved up to his old home region in Ontario but quickly discovered that the tale of adultery and murder that he had starred in down in the U.S. had followed him there.
    So what did MacGregor do but move back to Michigan with Ida and ask the Governor to appoint him prison physician. The Governor complied. The inmates loved him and greeted him with cheers and applause when he