Woman on Trial for Alleged Murder Plot Asks About Buying Poison in Recording

SANTA ANA —  A former Tustin woman on trial for allegedly masterminding plans to murder her husband talked to a man about buying a lethal poison and asked him how to use it to kill someone, according to a recorded telephone conversation submitted as evidence Tuesday.

Margo J. Thibault-Lemke, 41, in a conversation with one of four men she is accused of hiring to commit the murder, discussed buying curare for $250 and was told to apply it to the steering wheel of her husband’s car because it is potentially fatal to the touch.

Prosecutors alleged that Thibault-Lemke and her then-boyfriend, William E. Lemke, also 41, schemed to kill attorney Richard Thibault for $300,000 in life insurance money. The pair hired four men to kill Thibault in late 1987 and early 1988, but each man failed to do so during four different attempts, prosecutors claim.

Thibault-Lemke later divorced her husband and married Lemke. They were both indicted by a federal grand jury on charges that include conspiracy and use of interstate facilities in the commission of murder for hire.

Thibault-Lemke’s attorney, H. Dean Steward, has said that his client was actually trying to thwart the plans of one of the alleged hired killers, who wanted to commit the murder in exchange for money for a sex-change operation. Steward said his client was threatened by David Lamb, then known as Jan Lamb, and was trying to stall him when she was arrested.

Lamb, who lived in Denver at the time, went to authorities with the alleged plot after he said he found out that Thibault-Lemke had canceled a plane ticket that she had purchased for him to come out and commit the murder, Lamb testified.

Lamb agreed to have authorities record a telephone call to Thibault-Lemke to discuss the plan.

In the conversation played for the federal court jury on Tuesday, Thibault-Lemke told Lamb that she was short on cash to buy the plane ticket for him, but was still interested in getting the poison.

”. . . If I send you the money for the curare, then you mail it out today, then I can go ahead and put it on the car,” Thibault-Lemke said.

Lamb replied: “But if you do it wrong, you’re not accomplishing anything but killing yourself. And that’s my point. Plus the fact that you hired me to do the job.”

Later in the conversation, Thibault-Lemke said: “I hope this works.”

Curare is muscle relaxant derived from a South American plant that some Indians used on poison arrows.

Steward tried to discredit the testimony of Lamb, whom he depicted as an admitted liar with an extensive criminal background who wasn’t even truthful with prosecutors. He also pointed out that Lamb never received the money for the poison.

Cross-examination of Lamb is expected to continue today.

Two of the other alleged killers-for-hire also testified on Tuesday. Jerry Redman and Thibault-Lemke’s brother William McCoy, both of Colorado, told the jury about their two failed attempts to kill Thibault. On the first attempt, they said they didn’t even make it out of Colorado before Redman was arrested on traffic warrants.

On the next attempt, they drove by Thibault’s residence and office, but could not find him. After several hours of searching, they said they lost their nerve and went back home.

C. Thomas McDonald, Lemke’s attorney, questioned McCoy about previous statements he had made to two federal grand juries about his role in the alleged murder plot.

“You lied to them didn’t you?” McDonald asked.

“Yes, sir,” McCoy replied.

McDonald later said outside the courtroom that the prosecution’s case “is based on a web of lies from convicted felons.”